Skills are broadly classified into two categories: Hard or technical skills and Soft skills. Hard skills type is a specific skill set that is directly related to a job or industry. These are generally acquired through certification, training, workshop, or other learning platforms. Such skills are often technical in nature such as software coding, data computation, drilling, driving, data analysis, programming, technical writing and so on. Most of you reading this are proficient in some hard skill or the other.
Now let’s talk about soft skills. These skills apply to all jobs in general and are often part of a person’s personality. You can improve your soft skills, but learning them from scratch is quite difficult, unlike hard skills. Therefore, candidates with strong soft skills such as people skills and social skills are highly valued in any organization.
One common and critical mistake job seekers make while making their resume is to ignore mentioning their soft skills and only harp about their technical knowledge and experience.
Please note that soft skills play a crucial role if you want to take up a senior role and want extraordinary career growth and it is of utmost importance to an employer to hire people with strong soft skills.
Let us show you how to develop and use your soft skills when looking for a job to accelerate your career trajectory.
1. Understand your strongest soft skills
One cannot ace everything, but one can definitely be a master of some things. Take a step back and think of the soft skills that you are really good at. Do you accept challenges and come up with effective solutions by engaging critical thinking? Do people in your social circle look up to you for support and solution and see you as a leader during tough times?
Here are the most prominent soft skills that seasoned professionals possess and make an employee very valuable in the organization.
- Communication
- Leadership
- Team player
- Critical thinking
- Ethical
- Hard worker
- Time management
- Conflict resolution
- Negotiation
- Convincing
2. Sharpen the skills required for your desired job
Some soft skills are very crucial to grow in your career. For example, if you want to move up the ladder in the managerial hierarchy, you should display strong people management and leadership skills. If you want to become a trainer you have to have great communication skills to garner the attention of your training group. If you choose to be a successful sales and marketing professional, convincing and negotiations will have to be your most potent skills.
Now, if you wish to work upon these soft skills based on your career path, the apna app is a great place to begin. Once you download this app, you will find various job and skill groups dedicated to upskilling and professional networking.
3. List out your soft skills to make an impressive CV
Did you know that almost all recruiters screen CVs by keywords? And these keywords are mostly your skills. So if you want your CV to get shortlisted, mention your soft skills smartly.
You might be good in several fields and might possess numerous skills too. But you should know what your job needs the most. Employers look for the soft skills that are most relevant to the job. So list down the soft skills you possess that are relevant to your career and put them in your CV with a short example.
Let’s say, you are applying for a sales job. “Communication skills & Persuasive skills” are two key skills that you should write in your resume along with a short instance to show how to put these skills to use to succeed in a task or project. This will help your CV get shortlisted faster!
