What are transferable skills and why they matter in the workplace?

If you’re fresh out of college or university and just starting out in your career, you’ll have limited experience. That’s where the importance of transferable skills comes into play. Where you lack experience, you’ll have transferable skills to offer, developed through your education, hobbies and projects.

If you’re considering changing careers but are worried about whether you’ll have anything to offer a new sector - rest assured, employers will see your potential through your transferable skills.

Depending on your new career goal, you may need to learn new hard skills or study towards a qualification. Options include:

• Distance learning degrees including ARU’s online undergraduate and postgraduate degrees
• Government funded online level 2 and 3 courses
• Subscription based online learning platforms like LinkedIn Learning, Coursera etc
• Evening courses at your local FE college

Developing sought-after transferable skills like leadership, project management, emotional intelligence, digital literacy, adaptability, analytical thinking, creative thinking and decision making can put you in good stead when it comes to career progression. Whilst you may lack the experience for the next job up, you’ll be able to demonstrate the potential to fit the next step.

There are many transferable skills in the workplace - here are ten popular skills:

Good communication skills cover both written and verbal communication but also good listening skills. Employers look for employees who can adapt their communication across different types of audiences and mediums. An example is adapting the same piece of information – e.g. research findings – for an Executive Summary report and a team presentation.

How to develop good communication: through practice, exposure and asking for critical feedback. You’ll also find lots of short online courses on improving communication – look at platforms like LinkedIn Learning, Coursera and FutureLearn. Your employer may also run communication workshops.

Being a team player is about recognising your part in making projects and daily operations work effectively. Other skills come into play with teamwork, like reliability, collaboration, communication and interpersonal skills. Employers value team players because it makes for more harmonious workplaces and effective working practices.

How to develop teamwork skills: volunteer for projects with defined goals and roles. Get feedback from the project lead as you progress through the project.

This involves analysing a problem, exploring solutions, weighing up their risks, pros, cons and viability, deciding on a solution and later reviewing it for future learning. Viewed like this, we can see problem-solving skills encompass other skills like analytical skills, creative thinking, decision making and critical thinking. Employees with problem-solving skills bring innovation to organisations that can be applied across industries such as technology, engineering, construction and business.

How to develop problem-solving skills: get involved in projects that focus on solving a problem for your organisation. Follow the steps of analysis, research, creative thinking for viable solutions, critical thinking to weigh up options, and review.

Leadership skills are not just for managers. You can display leadership skills every time you solve problems, share knowledge, motivate colleagues, mentor others, take the initiative, make decisions, co-ordinate projects and events. For employers, it can mean developing future leaders, and better succession planning.

How to strengthen your leadership skills: be aware of and practice other skills that make up good leadership such as listening, empathy, communication, problem solving and decision making. If you’re a manager or aspiring manager look for formal leadership programmes in your workplace or consider a management degree.

ARU’s portfolio of management degrees include undergraduate and postgraduate programmes taught via distance learning that provides the flexibility to fit study around work.

Digital skills cover a large remit. It can include the basics like using Microsoft Office, understanding shared files, and basic IT security to competence in specialised software. How developed your digital skills are very much depends on your job role. Technology touches every industry now so knowing the basics and demonstrating you can learn to adopt new technologies is an essential transferable skill.

How to improve your digital skills: some organisations offer IT training. If your organisation doesn’t there are online short courses or classroom-based training. For example, the Department of Education list options on their Skills for Careers website.

Critical thinking is the ability to look at information (for example research, argument, news article) weighing the evidence, questioning any assumptions and evaluating it. A workplace example could be using critical thinking skills when presented with a business proposal.

How to develop critical thinking skills: you can practise critically analysing information in everyday life from reading the news to scrolling through your Instagram feed. At work, you can practise this skill when looking at proposals, reports, research. Critical thinking and analysis are developed during degree study – particularly when it comes to postgraduate research.

People with emotional intelligence can recognise, understand and regulate their emotions. They’re aware of other people’s emotions and respond with empathy. In the workplace, it improves professional relationships, communication and collaboration.

How to develop emotional intelligence: EQ is hard to quantify. It’s more about self-awareness – awareness of your own emotions, your responses to them and to other’s emotions and then practising self-regulation.

Read Why Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace Matters

Creativity isn’t exclusive to artists, designers and budding film students. There’s a place for creative thinking skills in every workplace. That’s because creative thinking skills develop a way of looking at something with a fresh perspective – the ability to generate original ideas – and that’s useful in every job role. An example in the workplace could be when a marketer thinks up original ideas to present a product. Employers value creative thinking skills because it brings innovation and creativity into the workplace.

How to develop creative thinking skills: working on projects that requires original ideas. Online learning platforms like LinkedIn Learning also offer creative thinking courses.

You could view project management as a hard skill. Many Project Managers complete project management courses – like our online MSc Project Management – to understand project life cycles and project software. There are essential soft skills at the heart of project management such as organisation skills, time management, communication, leadership, and stakeholder management.

How to develop your project management skills: ask to co-ordinate or lead on projects at work to gain exposure. Again, online platforms like LinkedIn Learning offer time management and organisation development courses. If you want to switch or progress a career in project management consider studying a project management degree.

Providing good customer service isn’t a skill required just for customer service agents and those that are customer-facing – it benefits all job roles, especially when we consider internal customers as well as external customers. Examples in the workplace include marketers building customer journeys that responds to their customers’ needs.

How to improve your customer service: put in place a review mechanism and get feedback from your internal and external customers. Search ‘customer services courses’ on the web, you’ll get options like DfE’s list of customer service courses on their Skills for Careers website.

The list above are just ten examples from a long list of transferable skills. What’s important are the ones you possess. Here’s how to identify your transferable skills.

• Think about your previous and current job roles - list the transferable skills you used in those roles and how they have helped you succeed.
• Consider your hobbies, interests and life experiences, e.g. second languages, fundraising for charities, co-ordinating volunteers for social projects.
• Review your education – what skills did you need to complete that project, research, presentation?
• Ask your peers – you can ask for feedback during appraisals or more informally with colleagues.
• Reverse engineer job descriptions – struggling to think of your transferable skills? Look at job adverts for the types of jobs you’ve done. List the skills they’re asking for and identify from those the ones you’ve demonstrated.

Top tip! Reverse engineering a job you want in the future and identifying the skills employers ask for, is a great way to recognise if there are skills you lack for this role. Armed with this information, you’ll be able to focus on developing those skills for career development.

Now you have your list of transferable skills, it’s time to demonstrate these to future employers – here’s how.

You can list your hard and soft skills under each job role you’ve had – here’s an example:

Marketing Executive

Technical skills: CRM, Adobe Creative Suite, Google Analytics, email marketing, SEO, social media management, content management.

Soft skills: communications, organisation, creative thinking, stakeholder engagement, time management.

The cover letter is an opportunity to not just list your transferable skills but to demonstrate how you applied those skills. It’s particularly potent when you match that to the skills required on the job specification. Some examples:

• Using project management, creative thinking and communication skills to lead on the production of the college prospectus.
• Using research, critical thinking, stakeholder engagement and communication skills to investigate the viability of launching product X and reporting on it.
• Using organisational, interpersonal and leadership skills, I organised a charity fundraising event.

Use the STAR method – Situation, Task, Action, Result – and show how your transferable skills helped you handle the situation and yield results. For example:

Situation – An academic department approached us because they had low recruitment onto a classroom-based course. They wanted to know if it was viable to switch to a distance learning model.

Task – To look at demand and competition and make recommendations.

Action – Using my knowledge of Google Keyword planner, research skills and critical analysis to investigate search demand and competition.

Result – A written report with clear recommendation to help inform a business decision.

Here are some ideas on how to develop your transferable skills:

Further study – e.g., college courses, university degrees including distance learning options like ARU portfolio of online degrees.

Online learning – from MOOCs to accredited courses to online degrees.

Professional development – find out what professional development opportunities there are at your company.

Volunteering – search volunteering opportunities around your local area or if there’s a particular skill you wanted to develop (e.g., copywriting) contact a charity and volunteer copywriting services.

Stretch projects – ask your line manager to be involved in projects that stretch you to develop your career skills.

Mentoring – ask someone who exemplifies the skills you want to develop to mentor you. That could be at or outside of work depending on the skill. For example, if you want to strengthen your leadership skills ask a manager or department lead to mentor you.

Workplace experience – if you’re a graduate with little work experience, this is a great way to develop skills and add it to your CV. The same with career changers.

If you’re looking to study a degree to help a career change, get a promotion or gain more respect and confidence at work, you’ll find the process of studying will strengthen your transferable skills. Studying will improve your:

• Research skills – through projects, assignments and essays.
• Critical thinking – when applied to research and arguments.
• Communication – essay writing, reports, presentations.
• Digital literacy – using online learning systems, online academic management systems etc.
• Collaboration – that can be working with your ‘classmates’ or colleagues when you bring the theory into your workplace.
• Project management – good organisation, time management and prioritisation skills to manage your workload.
• Self-management – motivating yourself to commit to studying through the duration of your course.

Read our distance learner alumni case studies to find out what skills they developed through studying here.

Transferable skills are valuable at every stage of your career. Whether you're starting your first job, changing careers or aiming for a promotion, skills such as communication, problem-solving, teamwork and leadership can help you adapt to new opportunities and stand out to employers. The good news is that these skills can be developed throughout your career through work experience, volunteering and further study. By continually building your transferable skills, you'll be better prepared for today's workplace and ready to take the next step towards achieving your career goals, whatever they may be.