Top 3 Key Skills Employers Want To See On Your CV To Stand Out & Get The Job

Writing a CV is not just about putting together a list of your academic and professional qualifications. A CV is a marketing tool and you should treat it as such. It is the first contact point between the employer and you before your meet them in person. If your CV is not at par, the meeting in person will never come.

The Kenyan job market is competitive and only a few make it. I am sure you have friends who graduated with you but have already established their careers by now. Where then are you going wrong? That piece of paper that we take for granted may be keeping you away from your dream career.

If your CV is shallow and does not have what the employer is looking for in terms of skills, you are bound to remain jobless for a while, according to Ms. Muthoni Ndegwa, a Recruitment Manger at Corporate Staffing Services.

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Key Skills That Employers Want To See On Your CV

You may be a fresh graduate with nothing much to show in terms of experience, but you can still launch a career by compiling a CV that stands out. The secret lies in including the key skills that I will share with you which is what employers look for when they are going through your CV.

These may not seem important but employers look for these skills when deciding who to employ, so having them on your CV is not a total waste of time.

1. Transferrable skills

You may not recognize them, but we all have transferrable skills.

“Your current or former employer may not tell you that you’ve got transferrable skills because they don’t want you to realize that you are very employable,” says Ms. Ndegwa.

Transferrable skills you may already possess include, writing skills, computer skills, management skills if you have ever managed people at one time whether it’s other colleagues or other interns as well as time management skills.

When writing your CV and you have only three months industrial attachment experience, key in these skills and you are more likely to charm the hiring manager. It will go a long way than just having a plain CV.

2. Job related skills

You would be surprised at how often candidate forget to include skills they have gathered up in their professional years.

More than the transferrable skills, job related skills are an avenue to show case what you have done and what you are capable of accomplishing because let’s face it; there is no need of having a career if you can’t pick any skills from it.

For instance, if you are in the accounting profession, your job related skills should include things like knowledge of accounting software, book keeping among others.

When writing a CV, be sure to list your job related skills even before you even go to the transferrable skills.

When screening through your CV the employer will be looking for the job related skills first, says Ms. Ndegwa so ensure it’s the first thing that captures their attention.

3. Adaptive skills

When it comes to listing skills in your CV, HR experts consider adaptive skills among the most important. When coming up with these kinds of skills, you need to think about your personality.

Some of the key ones that Ms. Ndegwa advices you list on your CV include team work, adaptability, creativity, loyalty among others.

The importance of these skills is to show the person going through you CV that you are a job seeker who can adapt to the work environment and work with others well.

When writing your CV, be proud of what you have and use it to propel you forward. You may not have years of experience or impressive academic papers, but the skills you have matter most in today’s job market. It’s all about what you can offer not the number degrees you have. So let the sky be your only limit.

Do you need help writing a professional CV that included key skills that Kenyan employers are looking for? Talk to us by clicking on here for CV writing services.

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