The PCS Job-Seeker’s Guide: Assessing Your Skills and Abilities

The PCS Job-Seeker’s Guide

A series presented by PCS

Assessing Your Skills and Abilities

Part 1 of 2

A firm grasp of your skills helps you build strong resumes and solid interviewing techniques.

You must be able to identify your qualifications and package them such that employers want you.

You can approach your job search in several different ways.

This article will show you a few different ways to identify and inventory your skills and qualities. Initially, you’ll want to examine three areas: your work history, your education, and your interests or hobbies.

If you have no work history, develop your skill list by detailing your education and hobbies.

Work History

Begin with the jobs pertinent to the position you are applying for, starting with your most recent job. Include volunteer, part-time, summer and self-employment.

You want to express skills and strengths in ways that are important to employers, and cite examples of when and how they were used effectively.

A job search is really “finding an employer who is looking for someone like you.” This means always having the employer’s perspective in mind.

When “looking for a job,” you pursue only those positions that already exist. A job has to be created before you can find it. However, if you expand the search to include “employers who are looking for someone like you,” suddenly you’re pursuing both actual and potential jobs.

“Do you have a job for me?” is different than “Could your organization use someone with my assets?” The latter question might result in an employer creating a job that does not yet exist. However, for this to happen, you must be able to tell that employer what you know and can do.

The second question above is also more personal, and creates more options and possibilities than the first. The first question assumes that the employer has already done most of the work by creating the job.

The second question assumes that the job seeker can help the employer meet important needs. Employers sometimes create positions for strong applicants. You must be able to describe your strengths in ways that will interest employers.

Constantly consider the employer’s perspective:

• What do you know?

• What can you do?

• What qualities do you have that will contribute to this organization?

• Do you know how to match your skills with our needs?

The answers to these questions provide the framework for any successful job search.

This article first appeared in the Hamodia.

If you know of a job opening please contact Professional Career Services at 732.905.9700 or Lakewood@nj.pcsjobs.org

Yoel Tolwinski, Director of Placements

Shoshana Smulowitz, Director of Placements

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