The 6 Soft Skills You’ll Need to Boost Your Resume

In the business world, you’ll hear about employee skills being referred to as “hard skills” and “soft skills”. Hard skills are the technical knowledge you possess, like language capabilities and the ability to use various software.

Soft skills, on the other hand, are your personality traits and behaviors that influence how you work – both on your own and with others.

Most companies will narrow down candidates to those who all have the same level of hard skills. So the deciding factor in the hiring process can come down to these important personality traits.

Having excellent communication skills means you are able to speak clearly, understand non-verbal cues, and are an avid listener.

Honing your communication skills means being equipped to give clear presentations, read body language, create professional emails and proposals, and create visual storytelling through graphs and models.

In business, we all have deadlines to uphold to our clients and teammates. And because of these external deadlines, we need to take charge of our own workload to ensure work is presented on time.

The key components of time management skills are the ability to prioritize work based on importance and urgency, to schedule tasks into your calendar. In addition, to understand when a task will be executed and how much time is anticipated to complete it, and having the courage and responsibility to communicate with your team when you have too much work on your plate.

At the end of the day, problem-solving comes down to two key components: the ability to analyze data, and the ability to make informed decisions to resolve issues.

To develop your skills in problem-solving, you’ll need to understand how to gather information to best address and define the problem, to brainstorm flexibly and creatively about possible solutions, to listen avidly to the thoughts of your teammates, and to create a well-thought plan based on information to resolve the issue.

What are the qualities of a great leader? Can you be a leader even if you are new to working in a company?

Whether you’re in a leadership position or not, the key aspect of possessing leadership qualities is your ability to influence others.

Leadership can be about taking ownership of new projects to optimize workflow, having the courage to make tough decisions in times of conflict, or simply about having a positive attitude towards work challenges that inspires others to take charge.

Adaptability is a topic that can arise in two scenarios.

First, when you first enter a company and have to quickly learn how to do the job and work with people new to you. Second, when unexpected changes arise that require shifts in your behavior to move work forward.

People who are adaptable are those who are able to learn quickly, are resourceful, are resilient in times of change, and possess a curious attitude to problem-solving.

There’s no doubt that doing an internship abroad will give you the opportunity to experience adapting to a new environment.

Working well with others is important to any company you’ll apply to. But how can you gain skills to work well with others?

Teamwork-related soft skills include being empathetic to the diverse thoughts from your teammates; and the ability to accept constructive feedback as a way of strengthening working relationships.

When you work in multi-cultural teams abroad, you’ll quickly learn how humbling it can be to learn how people think and do things differently; and what impact that can have on your own attitude and behavior towards work.

At Beyond Academy, we offer career development training to build your soft skills in order to stand out from your competitors. At Beyond, we offer internships in 18 industries across 14 locations; if you’d like to find out more, contact us to begin planning your Beyond experience!