Essential Personal Skills
Employers are looking for 15 essential personal skills when evaluating candidates, according to the non-profit research organization ACT.
1. Carefulness: Do you have a tendency to think and plan carefully before acting? This helps with reducing the chance for costly errors, as well as keeping a steady workflow going.
2. Cooperation: Willingness to engage in interpersonal work situations is important in the workplace.
3. Creativity: You’ve heard of “thinking outside the box?” Employers want innovative people who bring a fresh perspective.
4. Discipline: This includes the ability to keep on task and complete projects without becoming distracted or bored.
5. Drive: Businesses want employees who have high aspiration levels and work hard to achieve goals.
6. Good attitude: This has been shown to predict counterproductive work behaviors, job performance and theft.
7. Goodwill: This is a tendency to believe others are well-intentioned.
8. Influence: Groups need strong leaders to guide the way. Influence includes a tendency to positively impact social situations by speaking your mind and becoming a group leader.
9. Optimism: A positive attitude goes a long way toward productivity.
10. Order: “Where did I put that?” A tendency to be well organized helps employees to work without major distractions or roadblocks.
11. Safe work behaviors: Employers want people who avoid work-related accidents and unnecessary risk-taking in a work environment.
12. Savvy: This isn’t just about job knowledge, but knowledge of coworkers and the working environment. It includes a tendency to read other people’s motives from observed behavior and use this information to guide one’s thinking and action.
13. Sociability: How much you enjoy interacting with coworkers affects how well you work with them.
14. Stability: This means a tendency to maintain composure and rationality in stressful work situations.
15. Vigor: This is a tendency to keep a rapid tempo and keep busy.
Robert Boroff Executive Profile Managing Director Reaction Search International
• Uses over 17 years of industry experience to provide clients with proven recruiting strategies that garner results
• Leads a team of Executive Recruiters in fulfilling clients important hiring needs in a time and cost-effective manner
• Keeps abreast of business and market trends in order to effectively consult clients on their hiring requirements
• Skilled at using traditional and contemporary recruiting practices
• RSI recruits top executives from around the country in a wide range of professions, including: Accounting, Advertising, Aerospace & Defense, Biotechnology, Banking, Board and CEO Services, Computer Hardware, Construction, Consulting, Consumer Products, Computer Software and Hardware, Education, Energy & Utilities, Entertainment & Sports, Financial Services, Food Products, Government, Human Resources, Health Care, Hospitality & Tourism, Insurance, Industrial, Internet & New Media, Legal, Journalism & Publishing, Marketing, Manufacturing, Medical Device, Non-Profit, Pharmaceutical, Real Estate, Retail & Apparel, Sales, Technology, Telecommunications and Transportation.