When recruiters look at your resume they look for experience, education and then soft skills, like communication skills. These skills are sometimes hard to show, even if you have them.

There are ten soft skills that employers are looking for (as of August 2016), see the report here. 

Over a series of ten posts, I’ll provide writing prompts to get you started on adding soft skills, like communication skills, on your resume. 

Communication is a skill that gets asked for in nearly every job. Every employer wants to know how you communicate. Even if this isn’t your strongest skill, they want to know how you do it.

Are you proactive?

Do you prefer to send emails or have meetings?

How do you explain processes or problems?

HOW TO USE THE PROMPTS

Choose one of the prompts below and write a specific story about it. Choose the one that reminds you of a specific example. Write out a story that is full of as much detail as you can put down. Don’t worry about length right now, we are concerned with getting your career stories onto paper. At the end of the series, I will teach you how to turn your stories into resume accomplishment bullets.

We are using these prompts to develop your database resume. 

THE PROMPTS

Tell me about a time you used your communication skills to help a client.

Tell me about a time you shared an idea for process improvement.

Tell me about a time you gave an update on a project.

Do you give immediate updates or wait until the end of the day?

Tell me about a time you spoke to someone who was upset and helped them.

Tell me about a time you explained a process clearly to someone.  How do you know they understood?

Watch for the next post, where we get into organization skills!