Do’s and Don’ts of Adding Soft Skills to Your Resume

Soft skills in resume are qualities of a person to smoothly manage teams, secure connections, team leading and take complex decisions. Unlike hard skills, which are task bases and can be easily calculated. Soft skills are more focused towards personality and how you approach your surroundings.

Commonly valued soft skills in a person are communication, teamwork, problem solver, adaptable, and emotionally strong. These resume skills help a person to build confidence in the workplace through connections and relationships. Including these types of soft skills can make your resume stand out by increasing your CV score instantly. Some people might take soft skills as software skills, but that's absolutely incorrect. Soft skills include understanding of human personality traits and knowledge of software, which are considered as hard skills for resume. So, invest a certain amount of time to align your own soft skills in resume perfectly.

Let us discuss some Do’s and Dont’s of adding soft skills in resume:

Do’s 

• Match your soft skills with the job description and job requirements. 
• Always use action-oriented and quantitative data to support your soft skills. 
• Place the most relevant soft skills in the summary section to boost the CV score.
• Always highlight soft skills with an example.
• Research the targeted industry and include only industry-related soft skills.
• Align your soft skills with the company's objectives. 
• Make a balance between both soft and hard skills for resume.
• Do not use unusual fonts. 
• Proofread all the content where you inserted soft skills as a keyword 

Don'ts

• Do not use generic keywords as a skill for every job application.
• Do not mention soft skills that are not related to the targeted job.
• Do not include any soft skills without proof to support. 
• Avoid using vague phrases; always be specific with results.
• Never lie about your resume skills; it may backfire on you
• Try not to copy-paste soft skills from the job description; use it only as a source of information.
• No need to insert too many soft skills;  only a few relevant resume skills are enough. 
• Don't include any outdated resume skills.
• Avoid listing soft skills that are not relevant to the employer's needs.

These were some do's and don'ts that should be kept in mind while adding soft skills in a resume. Also, if you want to find relevant soft skills based on different job profiles. You can go through the list of top resume skills and keywords to match any job descriptions.

Let's understand with resume keywords and examples how to perfectly incorporate soft skills in resume to stand out in the competition: 

Problem solving: 

Keywords: Resolved, Analysed, Improved 

Example: Resolved a recurring technical issue, reducing downtime by X% and saving the company $XYZ annually.

Teamwork and Collaboration:

Keywords: Collaborated, Partnered, Coordinated

Example: Collaborated with cross-functional teams to launch a new product, increasing market penetration by X% within six months

Creativity:

Keywords: Designed, Ideated Conceptualized, Innovated

Example: As a social media manager, I ideated a unique social media campaign that increased engagement rates by X% within a month.

Time Management:

Keywords: Prioritized, Scheduled, Streamlined, Organized

Example: Prioritized and scheduled tasks effectively, ensuring on-time delivery of a high-impact project worth $XYΥΖ.

Leadership Skills:

Keywords: Directed, Mentored, Guided, Led

Example: Led a team of 10 to successfully complete a key project ahead of schedule, improving efficiency by X%

These differences in how soft skills and hard skills are totally opposite of each other. This also means that including a balance of both soft and hard skills for resume is very crucial for a strong application. Together, these skills present you as a multi-talented individual and increase your chances of getting hired. If you should check your resume score and if your score is below 75%, it means you should optimize your resume with relevant skills.

When you want to craft a resume that stands out to recruiters. What's the need for presenting your soft skills in resume? By properly optimizing your resume skills section in the resume with a balance of soft skills and hard skills for resume, you can add value to the job application that attracts the recruiter.

Soft skills in your resume show that you are efficient in communication, collaboration, and easily adaptable to any conditions. Also, it is also necessary to tailor your soft skills to the job requirements. For example, if a job posting says you have to deal with customers and solve their queries. It means that this job requires good communication skills. 

In short, your soft skills are not a formality to show in the resume. It has equal importance as the hard skills. As remote work culture is spreading day by day. Recruiters are seeking people with good soft skills because remote work has more challenges while dealing with teammates. This is why it has become very crucial for every applicant to mention their soft skills clearly.

Incorporating relevant soft skills in resume is a game changing strategy for applicants because it increases your chances of getting shortlisted and also boosts your resume score. Nowadays it has become very important to understand How to Showcase Your Non-Technical Abilities in Your Resume. So that you can get noticed by the hiring managers. By following the above outlined do's and don'ts, you will be guided to create a resume that possesses relevant soft skills as well as a good ATS resume score.