Here’s Why You Should Include Soft Skills on Your Resume 

You can add all the skills you want on your LinkedIn profile, but space is limited on your actual PDF or paper resume. You might find yourself trying to figure out which skills and experiences to include, and which ones to leave out. Often, people choose to omit soft skills in favor of harder ones to showcase their technical proficiency — but there are a few reasons why you should definitely add a couple.  

“[Soft skills] are great to have on your resume,” Merri Lemmex, managing partner at training organization Lemmex Williams, said during our recent soft skills livestream series. Having these soft skills listed out on your resume gives you an opportunity to talk about your experience and examples of instances when you put soft skills into practice. “Just make sure that if someone says to you, ‘What is problem solving?’ you’ve got a really good answer for it,” Merri said.  

Did you miss our soft skills training series last month? If you have Pro or Plus, you can rewatch recordings of all of the exclusive courses and access the course materials anytime. Ahead, we’ll go through some of the most important soft skills to include in your resume, how to showcase them during an interview, and how you can start building them today.

The most important soft skills for your resume 

Communication 

Strong communication skills are a must for almost any role, and they become even more important as you advance in your career. For instance, say you completed the Data Scientist: Analytics Specialist career path and landed your first job. Even if you’re a master at cleaning and analyzing data, your communication skills will play a role in how well you’re able to share your findings with your teams. Different stakeholders have different priorities, and knowing how to adjust your messaging for your audience is crucial. 

Fortunately, building and demonstrating your communication skills can be easy. Check out our blog post on how you can improve your communication skills at work and during a job interview. 

Problem-solving 

Problem-solving skills are essential for many jobs — especially as you grow and take on more responsibility for resolving problems that fall under your domain. For example, software engineers regularly fix bugs and errors in applications and cybersecurity specialists mitigate and respond to cyber threats. In either case, you’ll need critical thinking and logical skills to come up with efficient solutions. Read this blog about problem-solving tips for developers to pick up a few pointers. People with Pro or Plus can learn more in-depth problem-solving strategies by rewatching part one of our soft skills series hosted by Merri.   

Project management 

Many people juggle multiple projects at work, and it takes a skilled hand to balance them all. Keeping a project on track can be tough, and issues arise often, so knowing how to navigate blockers and obstacles and properly allocate your resources is essential. Along with shifting deadlines, company goals and strategies evolve over time, and you’ll need to know how to reprioritize accordingly.  

In part two of Merri’s soft skills training series, she taught some crucial prioritization and planning techniques. Did you miss the livestream event? You can rewatch it here, and download a prioritizing template to use on your own.  

Empathy 

Empathy can help UX designers better understand their users and create better products. It can help the head of an engineering team better support their team members and find more personalized, intrinsic motivators. You need to understand people to work with people, and being receptive and understanding of different perspectives can help you collaborate more effectively and contribute to a positive team and work environment. 

How to include soft skills in your resume 

Adding “communication” and “problem-solving” to the skills section in your resume might help send the right signals, but as Merri said, it’s on you to back it up with proof. You can provide more detail in your work experience section to illustrate how your soft skills play a role in your actual work. For example, you can demonstrate your communication skills by highlighting responsibilities that include giving presentations or collaborating across departments. 

Here are a few examples of ways you might write out soft skills on your resume: 

• Facilitated communication between dev team and C-level execs for seamless collaboration. 
• Led development initiatives for specific projects or time periods, showcasing technical expertise. 
• Incorporated team members’ feedback and suggestions into project workflows, fostering a collaborative environment that enhances the overall quality of the final deliverables. 
• Received positive feedback for delivering a client-facing presentation that clarified the benefits of a new software feature in a way that resonated with a non-technical audience. 

And remember: Your behavioral interview is when hiring managers are going to really witness and assess your soft skills in action. As you discuss your resume points in greater detail, keep these points and examples in mind.  

Level up your soft skills 

We know it can be challenging to work on your soft skills if you’re not already employed. If you’re still building your skills or need experiences you can include use to demonstrate them in your resume, here are a few tips for training your soft skills.  

If you have Codecademy Pro or Plus, you can watch our soft skills series where Merri dives deeper into the soft skills you need to succeed. Only have Basic? Upgrade your account to Pro or Plus or start a free seven-day trial to check out our exclusive instructor-led courses. Our next livestream session is on December 6, and it’s all about generative AI and ChatGPT.