There are specific skills and attributes employers want to see in a candidate before hiring this person to become a team member within their organization. In this article, we explain 7 of the skills you want to highlight when searching for a vacancy in Trinidad. You may probably have one or more of these skills, if you don’t, you can understand better what they are and start cultivating them now.
The top 7 skills that will get you hired!
COMMUNICATION
No matter what job or industry you work in, the ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing, is of paramount importance. Admittedly, some roles require a greater level of communication than others. For example, someone working in customer service routinely speaks with customers, other staff, and management.
Remember, communication is more of a package than an individual skill. For instance, you need to:
• Showcase excellent presentation skills.
• Possess the capacity to phrase important questions correctly.
• Understand your audience and tailor your message accordingly.
• Learn the value of not saying too much.
TEAMWORK
You must perfect the balancing act of showing you’re a team player while also displaying the ability to lead and make important skills. Teamwork is all about operating efficiently and smoothly when working in a group. Important aspects include:
• The capacity to encourage and inspire other members of the group to enhance their performance.
• The ability to ignore your ego by compromising when necessary.
• Knowing how to negotiate, advise and communicate.
The majority of recruiters in Trinidad and Tobago place great emphasis on applicants with teamworking skills. There is a variety of ways to showcase your talents. For example, you might excel at evaluating and monitoring progress or else you could be an expert in motivation.
PROBLEM SOLVING
Employers are especially interested in hires that show the ability to think for themselves to solve problems. It is a burden on resources when management is forced to spoon-feed information to staff. By showing a logical and analytical approach to solving problems, you mark yourself out as someone to watch.
This skill is connected to others including:
• Resilience and level-headedness. These traits enable you to assess a situation and come up with a solution.
• Creativity, logic and critical thinking are also prerequisites.
• Teamworking skills are also needed when solving problems as part of a group.
During an interview, outline your problem-solving ability by using the STAR technique to show how you identified a problem, found a solution and implemented it.
LEADERSHIP
Some people are followers while others are born to lead. If you fall into the latter category, you will be in hot demand! Although you won’t reach management level in the immediate future, you can pave the way by motivating teams you are part of and taking extra responsibility.
Important additional skills include Emotional Intelligence, Delegation and Talent Management. Proving you have leadership skills is potentially complex. We recommend that you provide an example of an occasion when your personal involvement not only had a direct impact on your group but also led to a positive outcome. Being in charge of a group does not qualify as ‘leadership’; you have to show that your presence had an impact.
ORGANIZATION
You must show prospective employers that you can work efficiently and productively because you know how to prioritize tasks. Too much time is wasted by organizations in Trinidad and Tobago because of employees who are unable to focus on the most important tasks first. As a result, smaller jobs are completed while major projects end up on hold.
Outlining your capacity for independent working is no easy task. In actuality, most employers test your organizational skills throughout the recruitment process. If you submit an application too quickly, it might show that you didn’t take the time to read about the vacancy and failed to tailor your resume accordingly. Likewise, sending it in on the deadline is a sign that you are unable to plan ahead.
COMMERCIAL AWARENESS
Also known as Business Acumen, this skill relates to your understanding of how business and industry works and what makes an organization successful. Candidates must show knowledge of a prospective employer’s goals by knowing more about its products & services and their place in the market.
The most impressive candidates:
• Know how the biggest players in the industry are performing right now. In certain sectors, you should be aware of the businesses that have won important contracts.
• Have the ability to speculate about the future in an intelligent manner. For example, if there is a major incident or disaster somewhere in the world, you should know how it impacts the industry.
• Understand the past in a manner that helps them predict future trends. An example would be knowledge of how wider economic conditions impact specific industries.
MOTIVATION & PERSEVERANCE
Employers want ‘self-starters’ but it isn’t enough to write this phrase in your resume and hope it is enough to impress. You need to tell the interview panel about occasions when you faced a challenge at work and managed to find a way around it by motivating yourself to find the solution.
Motivated employees tend to showcase excellent problem-solving skills and are often cool, calm and collected in a crisis. Above all, employers want candidates with a clear plan for the future; one that involves their company! The last thing they need is to spend a small fortune recruiting staff only to find the new hires leave after a few months.
The skills you want in your resume
When writing your resume, bear in mind that there are certain ‘buzzwords’ that can catch an employer’s eye. Examples include:
• Dynamic
• Initiative
• Self-motivated
• Proactive
Also, include action words such as:
• Achieved
• Delegated
• Led
• Resolved
• Coordinated
• Presented
If you don’t yet possess all of the above skills, consider part-time work, volunteering and work experience courses to fill in the gaps. If you already have all seven skills, your chances of landing an interview at the very least increase dramatically.
