Resumes can be an absolute game-changer while seeking new employment. They can either make or break your case. Thus, designing the perfect resume becomes of utmost importance. Among the various parts of a resume, the ‘skills’ section can help you strengthen your legitimacy in multiple ways. While the experience section of your resume illustrates the impact you have made throughout your career, the skills section elaborates on how you materialize that impact. The three reasons that make the skill section of your resume indispensable include –
- All your skills, abilities, and competencies are compiled in one place for easy referencing and scanning
- It highlights the compatibility between your background and the job mandates of the position you are interested in
- A well-versed skill section ensures that your resume qualifies through the automated screening process of Resume-reading Bots (ATS)
It is noteworthy to mention that recruiters and Resume-scanning Robots both take account of the resume example skills as a pre-qualifying step in determining your candidacy. So, let us help you out with some doable tips and tricks that will make your skills stand out in your resume.
Top Four Tips and Tricks to Enhance the Skill Section of Your Resume
- Avoid Listing Skills That Are Obvious – You should include a combination of soft and hard skills on your resume to put the impression forward. However, enlisting basic technical skills that are considered a standard baseline in your relevant industry can do more harm than good to your candidacy. For example, basic user-level competency with Word, Excel, and email applications is assumed to be a given in almost all job postings.
- Include Relevant Technical Skills – The general thumb rule to make your skills stand out in your resume is to enlist the skills that directly or indirectly speak to the position you are applying for. For example, if you are applying for a social media marketing manager post, competency in Canva, Adobe Photoshop, and likewise are what you should incorporate. However, if you add your gaming or computer programming skills, it does not serve the purpose and somewhat relegates your pitch.
- Elaborate on Your Technical Skills – A common mistake observed in the skills sections of resumes is that candidates list broad categories of skills without going into sufficient detail. The problem with this approach is that it will not get your resume cleared through the ATS system, as they are on the lookout for specific competency assertions. Therefore, for example, instead of simply mentioning your dexterity with accounting software, you can list the names of all the accounting software that you have pioneered. Then you can add details like the number of projects you have handled in the past, people you have trained, and so forth.
- Highlight Your Soft Skills – Including soft skills in your resume can be monumental and can help you grab your dream job swiftly. No matter how technologically or digitally cumbersome your interested position is, interacting with people dealing with change and adhering to deadlines will always be a part of the same. Thus, make sure that you focus on your soft skills like leadership skills, people-oriented competencies, and teamwork abilities to stand out from the crowd and elevate the overall status of your resume.