Job Competencies, Transferable Job Skills and Other Tips

The other day I met with a recent college graduate. His Mom, one of my friends asked me to look at his resume and give him the feedback that only a stranger can give. He wants to go into advertising and while his resume noted that, the rest of it needed a tune-up. We did a couple of things. I asked him questions and took notes while he spoke. I wound up with 3 pages of notes and found that none of that good, solid experience was on his resume. This is what we did:
1. Job Competencies: I gave him a worksheet listing six common job competencies and the definitions of each. They are Communication, Organization, Analytical/Problem Solving, Leadership, Interpersonal and Technical skill sets. I asked him to go though the definitions and:
· Rate himself on how accomplished he is in the competency
· Check the competencies he enjoys doing
· Provide real life examples of how he used the competencies (especially the ones he likes and those where he excels.)

2. Transferable Job Skills: This is where it always gets interesting and fun. When he looked at the Job Competencies his face dropped and he said that he may have used one of them during a job as a summer intern at a corporation during his Sophomore Year in college. He couldn’t even imagine how these competencies would fit into his other summer jobs or even his college course work.
His other summer jobs included working at an ice cream parlor and being a camp counselor. Transferable Job Skills are those life and work skills that transfer to another job. For example, when he was a camp counselor, he ran a football league for 100 children who were between the ages of 8 and 12. When I asked him what running a league involved, he went through the list of organization skills, planning, follow through, time management, writing communication brochures, speaking with parents, recruiting coaches and referees, decision making, ordering uniforms and the like. The same holds true with the ice cream parlor job. He trained workers, was responsible for the money, handled customer complaints and so much more than making sundae’s.
Once these skills were out in the open and listed on the Job Competency worksheet we could move on.
3. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook http://www.bls.gov/oco/ or the Bureau of Labor Statistics Career Information for Kids: http://www.bls.gov/k12/index.htm . I asked him to go to these websites and look up the advertising industry. These sites list industry trends, salary and the needed training and education for hundreds of jobs. The career site for children is easier to navigate. He went to both and searched for key works to describe the jobs he is interested in. Those words will be strategically placed in his resume. I also asked him which of these advertising profession words matched the Job Competencies/Transferable Job Skills that he liked and was good at. There were matches!

The three steps that I used with this recent graduate can help anyone better prepare for writing their resume. Once the Job Competencies and Transferable Job Skills are identified, half the work is done. By the way, it is helpful to ask someone close to you to review your skill set and note if there are any other Job Competencies and Transferable Job Skills that you may have forgotten.