Skills, Qualifications, and Experience: What Really Matters Most to Employers

A good CV needs to show a well-rounded and balanced person who’ll be appropriate for the role in question. That’s all well and good in theory but knowing how to list your skills on a CV, and how much to stress your qualifications and experience, can be surprisingly tricky in practice.

That’s why we’ve put together this quick rundown on what employers are looking for, as well as the best way to present that information to them.

Clarity Comes First

Whether it’s in a CV, a cover letter, or a job interview, you should always strive to be as clear as possible with your information. The ideal candidate for any job is one who can quickly and concisely demonstrate that they meet all the requirements before then going on to discuss the ways in which they exceed them.

One common example of this would be using subheadings in your CV, making it easier for hiring managers to navigate. After all, they don’t want to have to dive through your personal statement just to find out how many A-Levels you have. Clearly demarcated sections allow them to choose the parts they care about so that they can assess you in a broad sense before digging into the fine details.

The same logic applies to job interviews. When answering questions try to answer directly, without wandering too far off topic. It’s okay to take your time but try to ensure that the answers you do give are easy to understand and memorable.

Qualifications VS Experience

In securing a job role, the most important thing you can provide is evidence of your skill set and this is where qualifications and experience come in. Generally speaking, while both are valuable, relevant experience is usually more prized than qualifications alone.

In fact, for many roles, even if you don’t have qualifications, hiring managers will be happy to take you on the back of demonstrable experience. The same is not always true the other way around which is why it can be so difficult for young people to springboard their careers.

That said, the best resume for someone with no experience will always be a highly qualified one and qualifications certainly don’t count for nothing. While junior roles in all industries are becoming more sparse, they are still around and most hiring managers would still rather have someone with relevant qualifications than someone with completely irrelevant experience.

Put simply, experience is always more valuable than qualifications so long as it’s the right kind of experience. But how can you judge whether you have the right kind of experience? And what can you do to convince employers of that fact?

Soft Skills & Hard Skills

In practice, it all comes down to skills. Now, any CV should have a good balance of soft skills, even if you’re incredibly qualified. Being able to show that a previous role improved your people skills or taught you how to be a better leader is very valuable so long as you tie those soft skills to tangible elements of roles you’ve worked.

That said, relevant hard skills are by far the most valuable thing you can put on a CV.

Hard skills are specific and often relate directly to performing the role. Where “good people skills” might be a soft skill, “data entry and analysis” would be a hard skill.

Tying It All Together

We said at the start that a good CV should balance qualifications vs experience vs skills, but in truth, the really good ones know how to do all three at once.

For example, you might list “works well in a team” as a skill. That’s okay, but it would be better if it were tied to some experience. “Learned to work with a team as part of x project while gaining my degree” is better.

That said, the best example you can give is one that ties in a degree relevant job, showing not only that you have the skills and knowledge but also that you’ve used them before.

The Best Resume for People with No Experience

With all that in mind, it’s worth noting that everyone has to get their start somewhere, and while there are many ways to build experience, it is possible to get a job without one. When all’s said and done, the best resume for a person with no experience is still one that’s clearly rooted in the skills you developed via your qualifications.