With the world changing every day, it is important to make sure you keep improving your skills to stay a strong candidate. Here are some tips for you to improve your skills:
- Get a Mentor
- Set goals for yourself
- Take constructive criticism
- Gain a qualification
- Observe others
- Keep a journal
Get A Mentor
A mentor could be your manager, a lecturer, or someone with a qualification or experience in the field you want to develop your skills in. Having a mentor is an easy way to receive advice on how to build your skills, as well as how you can improve on the skills you already have.
Set Goals For Yourself
Identify the skills you want to improve on, and then set goals for yourself so that you remain motivated. Set measurable goals and give yourself an end date for when you want to achieve them.
Take Constructive Criticism
Asking your mentor, supervisors, or colleagues for constructive criticism on your skills or making sure that you have improved on your skills is a great way to keep yourself in check. Sometimes it is a good idea to get an outside perspective so that you know for sure whether you are improving. Take the feedback you received and use it to help you improve your skills.
Gain A Qualification
Getting a qualification adds to your skills. When you further your education to advance your career, you could be gaining more skills. For example, if you work in Management and you decide to gain a qualification in financial management, you will be gaining a scarce skill and transferable skills.
Observe Others
Observing people who inspire you and seeing their approach could give you tips on how you should approach gaining a skill or improving on those skills.
Keep A Journal
Keeping a journal, to keep track of your progress, so you can reflect on what you have done, could be a great way to hold yourself accountable. You can use the journal to set the goals mentioned above and then tick them off as you improve.
Why Is It Important To Have Skills?
It is important to have skills because they help you with your performance and your professional network. It could also help you when you are looking for a job, employers are more likely to hire people with the relevant skills.
Here are reason why it is important to develop your skills:
- For personal growth
- Having skills helps you stand out from the crowd
- You will gain a sense of achievement
- It will increase your chances of being promoted
- You could receive an increase in your salary
- It will help you feel more confident in your abilities
What Are The Skills I Should Have?
The main types of skills are soft skills and hard skills, here is a list of the skills you should have when you are looking for a job:
Soft Skills
- Effective communication
- Creativity
- Decision-making
- Leadership
- Time management
- Adaptability
Hard Skills
- Copywriting
- Graphic design
- Mathematics
- Accounting
- Event planning
- Data analysis
Soft skills are transferable, you can use them in any industry. Hard skills are very specific to the career you are interested in pursuing.
What Are The Benefits Of Developing Your Skills?
Developing your skills is essential to advancing your career, these are some benefits of developing your skills:
- It keeps your mind engaged because you will constantly learn new things and gain new experiences
- Developing hard skills is beneficial for you because it will make finding a job much easier for you
- When there are big changes happening in the work space, having adaptability as a skill is beneficial for you. You will be able to adjust to the changes happening around you, and it will not affect your work.
- It keeps you up to date with the changes happening in the economy. When new graduates join your profession, their skill sets are more advance than yours. For example, their technology skills will be more advanced than yours.
Studying With Bellview Institute Of Distance Learning
At Bellview Institute of Distance Learning, we offer a variety of courses that can help you gain new skills and a new qualification, which will benefit you when you are job searching. We offer NATED and ICB courses that will effectively prepare you for your career.
How Can I Apply?
If you are interested in studying a course with us, these are the ways you can apply:
- Fill in our online application form
- Contact our course specialists
- Call us on: 021 838 8280
- WhatsApp or call us on: 065 656 9818
Frequently Asked Questions
These are some skills that are best to learn for the future:
- Artificial Intelligence
- Coding
- UX design
You can learn from observing or shadowing your manager or team leader, or if your work offers you the opportunity to gain another qualification, then you should take it. Gaining another qualification can help you with developing your skill set.
Some skills that are hard to learn are:
- Time management
- Consistency
- Empathy
- Listening
It is not easy to find a skill that you just do not need, some examples of useless skills are mastering something you will only do once and memorizing information you can just look up.
Writing and art are two skills that take a long time to learn. They require you to be consistent and committed to acquiring this skill.
Author: Jodie Brown
Editor: Connor Bergsma
Date Published: August 26, 2022