Heads up for career changers

Five timeless transferable skills

Technology is replacing many dated aspects of day-to-day work with new opportunities and roles for expanding industries.

That’s good news for some and bad for others. It means careers are changing and with them, career changers.

Increasingly we are seeing the workforce shift towards project-and contract work.

Below are five ‘timeless’ skills that most employers look for.

  1. Leadership skills: Take your existing leadership skills and apply them to a one-off project at work or in your spare time. In a rather over-glorified example, Richard Branson applied his leadership skills to run businesses across multiple industries including publishing, music, fashion, and airlines.
  2. Interpersonal skills: Being able to effectively interact with other people will be integral regardless of how dramatically the workforce changes. This means building effective business relationships.
  3. Problem solving: This is an essential skill. Work on it and refine it. In a cover letter, briefly state what a problem was at work, how you solved it, and what the good result was.
  4. Time management: In a resume, show your ability to deliver projects, not only to budget but on deadline.
  5. Creativity: You can be creative in any industry you’re in, it’s just a matter of finding novel solutions to problems. Not easy. In a resume, give a concrete example.

You have more transferable skills than you think.

Put your best foot forward

Malcolm builds expert resumes, cover letters and LinkedIn profiles, which unleash an unbeatable business case to promote you as a ‘must have’ asset to an employer.