You now have a rough skills inventory!

This skills list is invaluable to your resume - it tells hiring managers how your experience has prepared you.
We now need to "take off the rough edges" a bit.

This lesson is called "Generic-ize"...

…which will show you how those core skills work for other jobs.

Take out extreme specifics.

Let’s say you are a server and one skill you wrote is “refilled the ketchup or salt shakers.”

First, take out the words ketchup and salt shaker. Replace with a generic word like “products”. Refilled products.

Let’s say you are a customer service person and you wrote “I explained to customers the benefits of products and services for their needs.”

That’s already perfect because it’s generic for huge numbers of jobs!

Short sentences are best – the longer it is, the more specific your skill gets.

From specific... to generic!

Why?

Because if an employer sees your skills as “Refilled salt shakers”, they’ll see you have a skill for refilling only salt shakers!

When you know damn well your skill for refilling salt shakers isn’t limited to just salt shakers. No hirer in the world checks that your skill is from just salt shakers. It’s just not that specific in the hiring world!

However…hiring managers and recruiters are busy going through 200 resumes per job- so busy they cannot take the time to read, think, and generalize.

Generic-ize for them – so they don’t cut you out of jobs wrongfully.

But don’t go too nuts cutting it down!

Keep at least one or two keywords next to “refilled”. Refilled product, refilled shelving, refilled machinery, all are great generic skills because each one can relate to multiple types of products, shelving, or machinery!

Your refilling of salt shakers just became generic enough to qualify you, in part, for all manufacturing and retail jobs, fulfillment jobs, even some office jobs.

There IS a fine line between too specific and too generic...

Have you removed too many specifics?

Ask yourself this. Can this generalized skill be misunderstood as an entirely different category of jobs you’re not related to? If so…add one word back in.

Are your skills 1-2 words, such as “Cutting items”? Too little info! Make them into a sentence! Verb-noun-prep phrase. Example: “I cut items on the production line.”

OR it works like this too…

“I cut production line items”.
“I refilled restaurant items.

Rule of Thumb:

Specify the type of industry you’re in, not the job you do, or name of the thing you handle.

Example: Operating Machinery. What type of machinery? Making-items machinery or operating forklift/mack truck type machinery?

“Operating Truck Machinery” or “Operating Manufacturing Machinery” will specify the Industry without getting it too specific to one specific job.

Example 2: saying “Operating joining machinery” indicates you can only operate that one specific type of machine in the one specific (wood) manufacturing industry. Use a general industry description of the machines instead, like “Operating CNC machinery”

Extra values and achievements

Some recruiters and hiring managers like to see what you did that added value to a workplace, or achievements you’ve done.

Whenever possible, use strong action verbs. Thesaurus.com is immensely valuable to giving words some flavor to stand out!

So when you say you talked, you Explained or Demonstrated.

When you Handled, you Examined.

When you Taught, you Coached or Trained or Educated.

Generic-ize your skills list before continuing! Now that you know how to generic-ize….your skills list will make thousands of jobs open to you.