What Are Good Skills to Write in a Resume?

The right skills on your resume will increase your chances for an interview.

Good skills placed in the right format will make your resume stand out from the competition. Most people view a resume as a document that details their history. If you understand the resume as a marketing tool to further your career goals, your chances of getting results will grow. The employer cares more about the skills you posses and how you used them to help previous employers rather than a detailed account of the past ten years.

Formating Your Skills

Detailing your skills in a resume is different from how you write narratives, letters and most other communications. Resumes do not have to be written in precisely correct English. For example, numbers jump out to the eye when surrounded by letters. So in a resume, numbers are written out and put at the beginning of a sentence or phrase. If you are targeting a sales position, it is better to write "Brought in 48 new clients" rather than, "Expertise in account capture" or "Brought in a lot of new clients."

Target Skills to Job

The particular skills you list must be based on the job you are targeting. Skills important to a network engineer don't mean much in an HR position. Regardless of your background, many skills can be transferred from one job to another. If your background is in IT and you are now looking at human resources, consider your experience training end-users, project team leadership and talent recruitment.

Find Key Words

Use the job posting as a source for key words. In the job requirements you should see the kinds of skills the employer is looking for. For technical positions such as graphic designers or engineers, you should see a list of software and programs the employer expects you to master. Be sure to include these programs and how you used them to help past employers. Simply listing knowledge of CRM as a skill is not as effective as writing something like, "Used CRM to develop post-sales support, increasing repeat business."

Vary Your Words

Use a thesaurus to vary your text while emphasizing important skills. If you are a personal trainer, you can't repeat several times that you improved clients' health, but you could mention that you developed, upgraded, enhanced, built-up, furthered and enhanced client's fitness levels.

Use Action

Good skills should be termed as actions. Many people that write their own resume for the first time will start every sentence with, "I". Compare this sentence: "I write books effectively..." with, "Effective writer..." The second phrase is briefer, to the point and is more action-orientated than the previous sentence.

References

• Easy Job: How to Write a Winning Resume
• My CV Builder: CV and Resume Tips
• Rogers Resume Help Center: Use Powerful Resume Wording to Write Winning Resumes