1.

Highlighting Your Skill and Experience

Identifying your skills

It is important that you identify and appreciate what you consider to be your skills, abilities
and personal qualities. Only when you do this can you then confidently demonstrate these on
your CV and be able to market yourself effectively to potential employers.
An added advantage of assessing yourself is that you will be able to identify your
weaknesses, and thereby plan to improve and upgrade them. building your skill sets
Being able to communicate your work experience and knowledge to an employer and also
match their requirements is vital for successful job hunting. By using a little time and effort
to assess yourself it will be easier later on for you to match and demonstrate your abilities to
the needs of recruiters.
What is a skill
A skill is something that you are good at doing, it could come naturally to you or be
something you have learnt through experience or training. Having the right skills can go
along way to helping you get the job you want.
How to assess your skills
Start off by creating a list on a piece of paper of what you believe you are good at. Do this by
reviewing your current and previous jobs and listing particular career skills you have gained,
put them under different topics headings.
List what you have achieved to date and those points you feel you did well in and can
demonstrate, give examples of and also prove.
Your qualifications and training
List in detail all of the training and qualifications that you have gained. Academic
qualifications are a demonstration of your abilities and there a asset that can help you when
applying for jobs.
Job related skills
These are pretty self explanatory, if you have a skill that is related to the job you are after
then highlight it. A very simple example of this would be if you were a experienced architect
and was going to apply for a architects vacancy.
Specialist skills
If you are a specialist on one particular or have a particular expertise then focus on that.

Generalist skills
These are qualities that most people could have, but which you could mention to show yours
are better than others. A good example of this would be communication skills, for instance if
you were a architect you could say you:Having the ability to relay technical data to non technical work colleagues.
Other generalist skills sets could be:Problem solving.
Critical thinking.
Able to work as part of a team.
Ability to promote change.
Organisational skills.
Able to develop ideas.
For instance if you are a sales person then you would create a heading under sales skills.
Then under this you would review all of the sales jobs youve had in your career and the
different products or services you have sold. So if you were employed in Company A selling
car insurance, then you would list car insurance sales as one of your strengths.
Identifying the skills a employer wants
Look at the job advert and read it carefully, look for keywords that describe the skills and
capabilities that a employer is expecting from a applicant. Then build and develop your CV
or covering letter around the relevant skills that are required and highlight them in your CV.
If in your resume you can demonstrate to a employer that you have the qualities and
capabilities they are looking for then you have a good chance of being successful in your
application.
Transferable skills
These are skills in one particular work environment that you can take with you from one
employer to another. For instance if your are a motor mechanic and work in a garage then
you can get a job in another garage and of course you will take your skills with you. So you
have in effect transferred them from one workplace to another one. Below are a list of some
transferable skills:
Reporting information.
Speaking effectively.
Providing feedback.
Defining needs.
Motivating.
Decision making.
Enforcing policies.

4 Ways to Highlight Your Experience on

Your Resume
Your resume is your first impression on any hiring manager. You want to make sure you
effectively convey your experience and focus in just one document that is usually confined to
two pages. So how can you highlight all of your experience on a resume? Here are 4 ways to
showcase what you know and get a call back.
1. Match your resume to the employers needs. Before you ever submit a resume to a
job ensure that it is customized to the specific employer. You want to use their job
posting as a template and use keywords that match what they are looking for. Do this
in a naturally sounding way. Also, create a cover letter that introduces yourself, your
skills, and why you want to work with this company to send with your resume.
2. Use action words. A resume needs to sound dynamic. When youre writing about
what you do dont fall back on passive words. Instead of Worked in retail say
provided exemplary customer services skills throughout the holiday season with a
record sales for our department. Use words like managed, developed, lead,
organized, and created. These show not only what you did but what your role was in
the greater organization.
3. Provide data and details. In conjunction with action words you need to provide data
to back your information up. When you say you had record sales indicate the number.
You may not remember exact figures but you can come close without exaggerating
much. Include information on money, hours, innovations, and anything else that you
can quantify.
4. Focus on long term goals. Employers want to hire someone who is looking for a
career rather than any job. They want to know what you plan to do with your future.
You need to paint a picture that includes their company in your future plans. Explain
why you want to work specifically for your company.

2. RESEARCHING THE MARKET

DEFINITION of 'Job Market'

A market in which employers search for employees and employees search for jobs. The job
market is not a physical place as much as a concept demonstrating the competition and
interplay between different labor forces. The job market can grow or shrink depending on the
labor demand and supply within the overall economy, specific industries, for specific
education levels or specific job functions.

Career SWOT Analysis for Job-Seekers

I
N
T
E
R
N
A
L

E
X
T
E
R
N
A
L

Your
Strengths

Your
Weaknesses

Opportunities
in Your Career Field

Threats
in Your Career Field

To construct your own SWOT analysis to set a course for your career planning, examine your current
situation. What are your strengths and weaknesses? How can you capitalize on your strengths and
overcome your weaknesses? What are the external opportunities and threats in your chosen career
field?

Strengths

Weaknesses

Internal positive aspects that are under

control and upon which you may capitalize
in planning

Internal negative aspects that are under your control

and that you may plan to improve

-added features
-knowledge, lack of
specific job knowledge

I
field (e.g. hardware, software,
programming languages)

transferable skills (e.g.,

communication, teamwork, leadership
skills

communication, teamwork)
-hunting skills

ethic, self-discipline, ability to work

under pressure, creativity, optimism, or
a high level of energy

ethic, lack of discipline, lack of motivation,

indecisiveness, shyness, too emotional

Opportunities
Positive external conditions that you do not
control but of which you can plan to take
advantage

Threats
Negative external conditions that you do not control
but the effect of which you may be able to lessen

will create
more jobs (e.g., growth, globalization,
technological advances)

(downsizing, obsolescence)

by enhancing your education

knowledge

ce,

-hunting skills than you

skills

reputations.
greater self-knowledge, more specific
job goals
education/training you need to take advantage of
opportunities)

T
field

ment in your field, advancement is

cut-throat and competitive

development in your field

it's hard to stay marketable
opportunities

Companies are not hiring people with your

major/degree

To further refine your list of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats, you may also want to
ask yourself some critical questions adapted in part from an article by Dave Jensen, managing director
of Search Masters International.

Explore your own self-perception of your strengths, but also put yourself inside a prospective
employer's head as you consider your strong points. Avoid false modesty, but also be brutally honest
and realistic with yourself. Start out by simply making a list of words that describe you; chances are
many of these characteristics comprise your strengths.

One of your greatest strengths can be loving the work you do. Learning to "follow your bliss" should
be a critical component of managing your career. Some people know from an early age what kind of
work will make them happy. For others, nailing down the self-knowledge that leads to career
fulfillment comes from a process of exploring interests, skills, personality, learning style, and values.
Take a look at some career assessment and exploration tools, such as those described in Career
Assessment Tools and Tests. Take one or more of the tests and react to the results. Do the results
match your general plans and expectations?

In assessing your weaknesses, think about what prospective employers might consider to be the areas
you could improve upon. Facing your frailties now can give you a huge head start in career planning.

As humans, we find it relatively difficult to identify the areas where we are weak. But this assessment
helps to identify areas where we may need to improve. If you identify a skill that you know is in your
chosen field, but you are weak in that skill area, you need to take steps to improve that skill. Past
performance appraisals and even your grades and teacher comments from school provide valuable
feedback.

For a good collection of sites on the Internet that enable you to research the trends that will tell you
more about external opportunities and threats in your chosen field, go to Career Exploration
Resources. It's also helpful to visit online databases (often available through library Web sites), such
as ABI/INFORM, Business News Bank, and Lexis/Nexis and conduct a search of "hiring trends in
______" or "employment trends in ______," filling in the blank with your career field.

Don't forget print resources, such as newspapers, periodicals, and trade publications. Check out job
postings on the Internet to get a feel for the relative number of openings in your field. If you are a
college student, check out your school's Career Services office for information on file on
opportunities and threats in your field.

From this analysis, you will have a road map that shows you how to capitalize on your strengths and
minimize or eliminate your weaknesses. You should then use this map to take advantage of
opportunities and avoid or lessen threats.

After you've analyzed your strengths, weaknesses, threats, and opportunities, you should use that
information to plan how to market yourself.