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Identifying your skillsYour degree course may well have included a module to help you analyse the skills you have gained or identify opportunities to develop a personal and academic skills profile. If you have not had the benefit of such opportunities, or you feel uncertain about what skills you have, there are a number of tools that may be able to help you. For example, try the skills check offered at Windmills. Based loosely on the Windmills model, a list of your specific skills might include: - teamwork;
- leadership;
- customer service;
- oral communication;
- written communication;
- the ability to speak a second language;
- self-awareness;
- self-confidence;
- networking;
- planning;
- problem-solving;
- computing;
- flexibility;
- numeracy;
- commercial awareness;
- creativity;
- commitment.
A list is just a tool to help you remember things, so modify or extend your version as you see fit, bearing in mind that there are certain key skills that almost all employers will be looking for. back to top Reviewing your skillsIt may help you get a perspective on what you have to offer if you review your skills from a number of different angles. One way is to look at the skills required in different parts of your life, which may divide up roughly as follows: - study;
- volunteering;
- part-time job;
- past jobs;
- hobbies;
- home.
Another angle might be to construct a matrix to sort different activities into basic skill categories. The Windmills Programme gives a good example using the following framework: - working with data/information;
- working with people;
- working with practical things;
- working with ideas.
Be careful not to write off activities as irrelevant - they may involve skills that you are unaware of. It doesn’t matter where your skills come from, provided that you can demonstrate that you have them. Another useful approach is the technique of mind mapping, as originated by the psychologist Tony Buzan. The root concept of mind mapping is to represent your ideas in graphic form, using plenty of colour and different label systems. It has the advantage of encouraging creative thought by helping you to think in ways that may be more associative and less linear than you normally use in your everyday life. A good step-by-step introduction to the concept of mind mapping is available on the Mind Tools website. It can be very useful to complete a skills audit. Most universities have either a generic university wide ‘skills audit’ document or a faculty, department or course level document. Speak to your university careers service for further information. Whichever method you choose, ultimately, what you want to achieve is a list of your main skills and some detail about how you have achieved them. back to top Why do I need to identify my skills?Identifying your skills is crucial to successful career planning and is a central aspect of self-awareness. A good understanding of your skills profile aids self-awareness which, in turn, aids the development of a well informed, realistic career decision. An ability to describe and give examples of your skills is also crucial to completing application forms, developing your CV and answering questions at interview. back to top Skills in contextIt is important to remember that skills awareness is not all there is to self-awareness: you also need to consider how your skills fit in with your interests, personality, motivation and values at work. Personality is a more complex dimension. You may find that using or even just understanding tools like the Myers Briggs Type Indicator or the Cattell 16PF (16 Personality Factor) model can help give you more insight into key factors of your own personality. To find out more, ask your higher education (HE) careers service if they have access to personality questionnaires, or try the assessment tools and personality tests in psychometric tests. back to top CVs and application formsEmployers’ application forms ask you to describe your skills. Questions relate to the person specification for the job and may be situational in nature. For example, you may be asked to describe a time when you overcame a significant difficulty or planned and executed a particular project. Underpinning these examples will be skills such as organisation, leadership and commitment. Your curriculum vitae (CV) will include both technical (specific, job-related skills such as IT application knowledge) and transferable skills. Transferable skills are the types of skills listed above. You can list these skills in a separate skills-related section of your CV, or you can describe the skills within the relevant sections of your CV, such as ‘employment’. back to top Job interviewsAgain, awareness of your skills and your ability to describe these skills will be crucial to success. Many organisations now interview using the competency-based model in which you are asked to give examples of the sorts of skills required of the post. Even if this model is not used, it is crucial to understand your skills in order to answer typical questions such as, ‘Describe the biggest challenge you have faced’ or, ‘Why are you interested in this role within this organisation?’ For more information on making applications and interview technique, see applications, CVs and interviews and Selection Success In One.
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