Friday, January 1, 2021

Transferable Skills: Concept, Definition & Examples for Job Interviews ( T & P Series on Wednesdays: 09)


Now a day, in the job market, there is the hype about transferable skills. Recruiters often talk about these skills in the interviews. Transferable skills are also called hard skills. These skills are learned through experience. Many people mistake transferable skills for soft skills. But, there is a vast difference between these two types of skill.

Definition

Soft skills help you to carry out normal activities in an organization without having problems such as good English communication which is a soft skill. It helps you to communicate your thoughts effectively to seniors and juniors while working on a project.

Hard skills are something you learned from your experience which can be quantified. Suppose, you are good at the financial analysis of a project and you have done ten such financial analyses for different projects. Then, financial analysis is your hard skill. Similarly, you have managed ten research projects as the principal investigator in a University, then project handling is your thing.

Even a simple receptionist can market his or her hard skills. Suppose the receptionist in a hospital handles hundred plus calls daily and sets an appointment for thousands of patient, and then these are her or his hard skills which can be quantified. A recruiter looking for a receptionist who can handle a large volume of calls and customers will like to recruit the person.

  Examples

Some hard skill examples are

(1) Business analysis skill

(2) Financial analysis

(3) Project management

(4) Educator (Training/ coaching/ Explaining to people)

(5) Sales and business developments

(6) Customer service

(7) Super connectors who help in networking people in business etc. 

 The fresh graduates should always keep in mind to develop these hard skills. Now a day, recruitment is done by private firms on behalf of the organization or company. The employer asks the recruiters to find persons with specific skill sets. They have to abide by the deadline. Within the deadline, they have to shortlist people by going through thousands of resumes and conduct an interview. While applying for the opening, if somebody can market his/her hard skill as per the job description through the resumes, the half work is done already.  This will also help one to get shortlisted through an automatic tracking system for various online portals for the job.

Now, let me tell my story. I worked in two engineering colleges in Assam as an Assistant professor before coming to the current university. In my interview, I had been asked to introduce myself. I gave them my bio-data in a nutshell and also mentioned where I worked and what subjects I handled. They asked me can you handle ‘Engineering Graphics’ in the first year. I told them that I taught some engineering graphics in both of the colleges and was very fond of machine drawing. If it was required, I could learn it very quickly to teach students. Now, I think that I was able to market my hard skills unknowingly that day. They wanted someone who can handle engineering graphics for first-year engineering students. My candidature fitted their bill.

In my story, you can see that engineering subjects taught in various engineering colleges are my biggest hard skills or transferable skills. These can be quantified and measured easily.

    Everyone has some kind of hard skills or transferable skills. He or she has to see the things from that angle and market those for their benefits.  

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