Transferable skills are the abilities you built in one job that are just as useful in another: leading people, managing projects, solving problems, writing clearly, handling customers or working with data. To use them in a career change, find them in your own history, describe them in the new field’s language, and back each one with a concrete example or a small piece of proof.
What counts as a transferable skill
Most people undersell themselves because they think of skills as job titles. Break your experience into what you actually did. Transferable skills usually fall into a few groups:
- People skills: leading a team, training new staff, handling difficult customers, negotiating, presenting.
- Organizing skills: running projects, managing budgets and schedules, building processes, keeping many moving parts on track.
- Thinking skills: analyzing problems, researching, working with numbers, making decisions with incomplete information.
- Communication skills: writing, explaining complex ideas simply, running meetings.
- Tools and knowledge: software, systems and industry knowledge that a new field also uses.
Industry knowledge is often the most overlooked. A teacher moving into training, or a nurse moving into health technology, brings an insider view that a career-long specialist does not have.
How to find them in your own work history
Set aside an hour and build a simple inventory:
- List ten things you are proud of from your work, including unpaid work and side projects.
- For each one, write what the problem was, what you did and what changed because of it.
- Circle the verbs: organized, persuaded, fixed, trained, built, reduced, launched.
- Look for verbs that repeat. Those are your strongest transferable skills.
- Ask two former colleagues what they relied on you for. Their answers often surprise people.
Old performance reviews and thank-you emails are useful here, because they show what others valued, not just what you remember.
Translate your experience into the new field’s language
Every field has its own vocabulary. A retail manager who ‘ran the floor’ was doing what an operations job calls ‘workforce planning and process improvement.’ To translate:
- Collect five to ten job postings in your target field and highlight the phrases that repeat.
- Make two columns: their phrase on the left, your matching experience on the right.
- Rewrite your experience using their words where it is honest to do so.
- Drop jargon from your old field that a new reader will not understand.
Informational interviews with people in the field are the fastest way to check whether your translation sounds right.
How to put transferable skills on a resume
- Open with a short summary that names the role you want and the two or three strengths you bring to it.
- Use a skills section that mirrors the language of the postings you are targeting.
- Rewrite bullets around results, leading with the transferable skill: ‘Trained and scheduled a team of twelve’ instead of ‘Store manager duties.’
- Cut details that only matter in your old field to make room for what the new one cares about.
- Use your cover letter to connect the dots directly; see cover letter tips.
How to prove them to a new employer
Claims are easy; proof gets interviews. Build one or two of these:
- A small project in the new field, such as an analysis, a plan, a portfolio piece or a process you redesigned.
- Volunteer or contract work that uses the skill in the new setting.
- A short course with a hands-on final project you can show.
- Two or three interview stories, each with a situation, what you did and the result. Practice them using job interview prep and how to answer tell me about yourself.
- References who can speak to the specific skill the new employer needs.
Where a mentor helps
Most people can do this work; the hard part is doing it while holding down a current job. A mentor helps you build the inventory, keep the weekly steps small and check in between sessions so the resume actually gets rewritten and the conversations actually get booked. See career and education mentoring, and if you are making this change later in your career, career change at 50.
Related
- Career change in your 30s or 40s
- Career change at 50
- Making a mid-career pivot
- Cover letter tips
- Rebuilding Your Routine After Divorce
- Getting Back on Track After an Illness or Injury
Common questions
What are examples of transferable skills?
Leading people, managing projects, solving problems, writing and presenting, handling customers, working with data and knowing a particular industry well are all common examples.
Should I use a functional resume for a career change?
Many hiring managers prefer a resume that still shows your work history. A hybrid format, with a strong summary and skills section on top and results-focused bullets below, usually works better.
How do I explain a career change in an interview?
Give a short, honest reason for the move, then spend most of your answer on the skills you bring and one concrete example of using them.
Can a mentor help me change careers?
A mentor helps with structure and follow-through, like building your skills inventory and keeping weekly job search steps on track. A mentor does not replace industry-specific career advice.
Get started
Want help turning your experience into a clear career change plan? Call (888) 305 5422, email contact@blackburnmentoring.com or start with a short assessment. A member of our team reviews every assessment personally and sets up a free intro call.