What Are the Essential Skills to Include in Your Resume?
The skills you include in your resume determine whether you land the interview and your dream job.
Often, hiring managers pay special attention to the skills section when selecting the best interview candidates.
If you’d like your resume to help you land an interview and your dream job, you must keep updating the skills section.
And it doesn’t mean that you should include every other skill.
In today’s competitive world, you should keep your resume up-to-date with relevant skills.
Like this post?
Sign up for our blog updates and never miss a post. We’ll send you A FREE job interview eBook as a thank-you.
Keeping your resume up-to-date with the necessary skills allows you to stand out among other job seekers and land an interview and dream job.
Ensure you incorporate the top skills hiring managers seek in your resume.
Add more essential skills to your resume that’ll benefit the company you’re applying for, and explain why these skills make you the perfect candidate.
In this blog post, we’ll help you discover how to include the essential skills in your resume to appear more qualified than other candidates.
So, keep reading for valuable insights.
Make the Skills Section Look More Appealing
Do you know how to create your resume skills section to look professional and appealing?
When writing your resume, organize your content well for easy readability.
Near the top of your resume, just above your professional experience, highlight a three-column and three-row section.
This is an ideal way to list the soft and hard skills related to the job post’s required qualifications.
You should list essential skills in your resume for your hiring manager to scan.
Include Top Skills Sought by Recruiters
Listing your most marketable skills in your resume allows the recruiter to see what you have to offer.
The more relevant your skills are, the higher the chances of landing the interview.
While there are essential skills needed for jobs in various industries, there are some top skills that most recruiters look for.
Employers know that these top skills make a candidate an effective employee, so they are considered the primary employability skills.
Here are some of the top skills employers look for in a candidate:
- Communication skills
The traditional communication skills you should include in your resume are speaking, writing, negotiating, and listening.
These skills are needed in almost any job. Employers need a team member who can interact with others and communicate effectively.
- Problem-solving skills
Your hiring manager will want to know if you can deal with any challenges in your line of work.
With problem-solving skills, you can attend to any challenging situation effectively and positively.
You won’t have to rely on your seniors to deal with various problems.
You can highlight several problem-solving skills, such as research, communication, and decision-making.
- Leadership skills
Leadership skills are soft skills useful at all career levels, which most hiring managers look for in a candidate.
From managing a team to contributing to a project in a leadership role, the skills assist you in motivating others and ensuring others complete tasks on time.
Common leadership skills to highlight in your resume include dependability, active listening, and patience.
- Computer skills
Nearly all organizations will require employees with computer skills in the digital era.
If you’re applying for a job requiring computer skills, include this skillset when writing your resume.
You can highlight that you’re good at word processing, social media, email communication, spreadsheets, and data visualization.
- Teamwork skills
If you seek a job in a large organization, you should expect to find a larger team.
Employers expect you to interact well with other workmates for a seamless and compelling working experience.
Ensure you highlight teamwork skills such as collaboration, responsibility, honesty, and communication.
- Time management
Time management lets you plan your time and be as productive as possible within the workstation.
This skill ensures you contribute to your organization and focus on professional growth.
Common time management skills include self-management, self-motivation, and organization.
- Strong work ethic
Employers prefer working with self-driven and honest individuals who they don’t have to monitor when working.
A strong work ethic means that you can work freely and meet deadlines without someone micromanaging you.
- Open-mindedness
Being open-minded means you can adapt to your new line of work and perform your tasks effectively.
Your prospective employer will know that you only need a short time to learn new ways to adapt.
Also, your employer will know you can be innovative and positively change the organization.
- Organizational skills
Organizational skills are essential for anyone who wants to be productive.
With organizational skills, you can manage your time well and set deadlines for achieving specific goals.
Some organizational skills you can highlight include critical thinking, planning, conflict management, and attention to detail.
- Emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence is perceiving, reasoning, understanding, and managing feelings positively.
Before hiring you, the hiring manager will know whether you possess vital emotional intelligence.
You can understand, use, manage, and handle emotions with emotional intelligence.
Since you’ll be interacting with several workmates, you need vital emotional intelligence to recognize your feelings and those of others.
As a result, you will deal with every other individual at your workplace well.
Most of these top skills will fall under soft skills.
While you can’t quantify some soft skills, blending these skills with hard skills will help recruiters know if you’re worthy of the job.
The thing is, every profession has its set of soft skills.
If you incorporate them into your resume, you’ll show how you pay special attention to details.
Besides the soft skills mentioned in the list of top skills above, there are other soft skills to consider. They include:
- customer service
- resilience
- public speaking
- persistence
- persuasion
- networking
- proactive
- decision making
- self-motivation
- conflict resolution, among others
Before you include any soft skills in your resume, could you evaluate yourself to determine if you have them?
Recommended Reading
- 4 levels of emotional intelligence
Add Technical Skills Acquired from Previous Positions
When listing technical/hard skills in your resume, include specific competencies and accreditations that you have acquired from previous positions.
Remember to list skills that match the job description.
Unlike soft skills, technical skills are quantifiable.
The hiring manager will want to know the extent of your abilities in most technical skills you list.
You can elaborate on your proficiency level in each technical skill in your work experience section.
Remember, your technical skills will come in handy when shortlisting candidates.
These are relevant skills in your resume that prospective recruiters need for their companies.
Technical skills vary depending on your niche.
Some of the top technical skills hiring managers will look for include:
- Data management
With more organizations moving online, hiring managers seek candidates with top-notch data management skills.
Some data management skills they’re looking for include:
- Amazon Web Service
- DataStax
- Google BigQuery
- Database design and planning
- Cloudera
- Commvault
- Ataccama
- Oracle Product Hub
- Accounting
If you’re looking for a job position in the accounting niche, you’ll need strong accounting skills.
The skills here depend on whether you’re looking for a job in a small to mid-sized business or as a corporate accountant.
Common accounting skills you can highlight are:
- Intuit QuickBooks
- Microsoft Dynamics
- SAP
- Sage 50 accounting
- cost and trend analysis
- GAAP and FASB knowledge
- Intrax ProcedureNet
- Marketing
Hiring managers will seek candidates with soft and technical marketing skills to attract customers and drive more sales.
Some common marketing skills to highlight are:
- Mobile marketing
- Google Analytics
- Digital advertising,
- Content development
- Social Marketing
- Website design
- Coding and programming
When looking for a job in information technology, your coding and programming skills can put you ahead of other applicants.
Some common in-demand coding and programming skills to highlight are:
- HTML
- JavaScript
- Python
- CSS
- C
- C++
- XML
- SQL
- Ruby
The others are PHP, visual basic, cloud computing, debugging, mobile development, network structure and security, backend development, and network architecture.
- Graphic design
As a graphic designer looking for a job, your prospective employer will expect you to have various graphic design skills.
Some of the graphic design skills to highlight in your resume include the following:
- HTML
- Print design and typography
- UI/UX
- Branding
- Photoshop
- Illustrator
- InDesign
- Adobe CS
- Project management
Your hiring manager will know you can handle a team and meet goals with project management skills.
Typical project management to highlight in your resume include:
- Data analytics
- Technical reporting
- Scrum and Agile proficiency
- Work scheduling software
- Kanban
- Business Analysis
Business analysis is a top technical skill most hiring managers seek in job seekers.
Most companies require experienced business analysts to help them in decision-making.
Various business analysis skills to highlight in your resume are:
- Amazon Web Service AWS software
- Transact-SQL
- Eclipse IDE
- Python
- Ruby
- Data analytic
- Data modeling
- BI tools and applications
- Microsoft Access
- Copywriting
Copywriting is a critical skill in any business with a website for press releases and advertisements.
You’ll need to have strong copywriting skills to help your business increase sales.
Some common copywriting skills to highlight are:
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Content creation
- Headline writing
- Landing page copy
- Topical and keyword research
- Social media
Many businesses use social media for online engagement, marketing, and awareness.
Some essential social media skills hiring managers are looking for include:
- Engagement metrics
- Promotion Tactics
- Ad campaigns
- Customer Research
- Expertise in various platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.
- Medicine and healthcare
As a medical professional, you could specialize in surgery, pediatrics, trauma, neonatal obstetrics, and several other types of healthcare.
Some essential medical and healthcare skills to highlight in your resume include
- Dialysis
- Advanced lifesaving training
- Traction management
- Diabetic care
- Wound monitoring
- Phlebotomy
- Troubleshooting
Troubleshooting is crucial in any organization relying on technology to run its daily operations.
With troubleshooting skills, you can find and fix common technological problems.
Some critical troubleshooting skills to highlight are:
- Quality assurance
- Testing
- Research
- System knowledge
- Analysis
- Communication
- Video creation
Many industries are relying on video creation for marketing and creating awareness.
Video creation skills will depend on specific roles, such as editor, director, set designer, or other video-related roles.
Various video creation skills to highlight in your resume are:
- Shooting
- Video editing
- Directing
- Sound Editing
- Writing
- Lighting
- Script Supervision
Mention Where You Used These Skills
You can stand out among other job seekers by mentioning the past positions where you used these skills.
For example, you can elaborate in the experience section of your resume to show the responsibilities and how you relate with your coworkers.
Also, your prospective employer will look into your professional accomplishments to see how you effectively used your skills.
If employers find that your skills match your experiences from previous positions, you stand a higher chance of landing the interview.
Highly Recommended
- Create an effective CV for free
- Create an effective cover letter
- How to create a compelling LinkedIn profile
Demonstrate How These Essential Skills Will be Beneficial for The Position You’re Applying
The hiring manager will want to know if you will be valuable to their company once you get the job.
Therefore, you must explain how these skills will benefit the company.
You can provide evidence from your past positions showing how you participated in projects.
Also, to show the number of sales you made in a given period, the group of workers you managed, or specific successes you attained while in those positions.
Ensure that every piece of evidence you provide matches a particular relevant skill.
In addition, you can demonstrate how your skills will fit the position.
Structure your explanation to show how your skills will help the company reach the next level.
Final Thoughts
Are you wondering which essential skills to include in your resume?
Your skillset should make your resume irresistible to hiring managers to stand out among other job seekers.
You can create a well-targeted resume with the skills employers in your industry seek.
Ensure you include essential skills in your resume that you’ve acquired throughout your career.
Also, update your resume with every essential skill you gain along your career path.
Whether soft or technical skills, you can keep enhancing the skills in your resume with other critical skills.
With the necessary skill set, a hiring manager will know you have what it takes to get the job done and contribute to the organization’s growth.
Further Reading
- 24 categories of soft skills to include in a CV
- How to write accomplishments in resumes
Request A Resume Review
CV and Resume Examples
Our Story
