Critical Skills for Students & Grads

Part One: The Three Types of Skills

I recently ran a poll on LinkedIn asking about topics folks wanted to see me tackle in a Newsletter and YouTube video, and the runaway winner was “What are the most important skills for recent graduates?”

This is a crucial question for several populations, including:

• Recent graduates of a college or university who want to maximize their opportunities in the job market
• Current students who want to develop the skills that will help them land relevant internships and full-time career opportunities
• High School students who are thinking about how they might want to approach a higher education experience based on some of the skills that will serve them well in college and beyond
• Educators and administrators who want to align their offerings with the skills that students need to develop the most
• Parents who want to equip their children with the right skills to help them maximize their opportunities in school and beyond
• Any career professional who wants to consider their current skill set and how well it aligns in the current job market

I wrote this newsletter and posted the video to YouTube using recent and upcoming college graduates as the target audience, but there is value for many audiences.

More employers are moving to a “skill-based” recruitment model, which emphasizes candidates’ and employees’ skills more than traditional metrics like years of experience, titles, degrees, etc. This can “even the playing field” for an early career job seeker who accentuates the skills necessary to do a job successfully. To do this, however, the job-seeker must attain, develop, and articulate those skills, and I break those skills into three categories.

• Technical Skills. Previously referred to as “Hard Skills,” technical skills are just what they sound like – skills employing the use of technology. These skills can be specific to an industry (i.e. “Computer Aided Design” for Mechanical Engineers) or more transferable (i.e. Word Processing and Spreadsheet programs like Microsoft Word or Google Sheets.) If you want to go into a field or industry with specific technical skills, you need to address the development of those skills in the classroom, during internships, or on your own.
• Transferable Skills. As the name implies, these are skills that are portable across many different industries and areas. These can be developed in many ways, including work experience, classroom instruction, self-paced learning, extra-curricular involvement, etc. Leadership is a transferable skill, in that not all roles require you to be a leader, but the skill is applicable across many different industries and positions. Project Management is also a good example; you can use this skill as a Project Manager, but you can also use the skill in non-PM roles and industries with high efficacy.
• Essential Skills. Transferable Skills and Essential Skills have a lot of similarities and were historically lumped together as “Soft” Skills, a true misnomer. The difference is that these Essential (often referred to as “Power Skills”) Skills are applicable and critical across almost any professional role and industry, as a lack of any of these skills can have a negative affect on one’s employability and success. A great example of an Essential Skill is Emotional Intelligence.

When I mentor others, one activity I like to employ is a personal SWOT analysis, which asks the individual to think like a company and identify their own Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. I encourage you to do the same.

If you watch the video above, at the end you will find a QR code and an opportunity to provide me feedback on the video/newsletter. If you complete that simple feedback, (all you need is your Smartphone and 2 minutes!) I will e-mail you a printable PDF template for you to use to create a SWOT Analysis of your own.

In part two of this series on skills for students, we will focus on the opportunities that exist for students to develop these different types of skills, providing some actionable steps in the quest to “jump the skills gap.”

Chris Fitzpatrick (he/him/his) is a Professional / Keynote Speaker & Emcee, an Aspiring Game Show Host, a Future Author, and a Below-Average Charity Golfer.

Chris is also a Human Resources Professional with 18 years of experience in Talent Acquisition & Development, specializing in early career and internship development and diversity & inclusion. Chris is proud to be the Sr. Manager, Talent Development at Crestron Electronics, an industry leader in the AV Industry.

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