What Are the Top Transferable Skills From a Military Career?
“What skills can you bring to this position?” It’s a question many ex-forces personnel dread, and that’s if you’ve made it past the long list of essential and desired skills on the job advertisement.
But it needn’t be.
You might feel you’ve little to offer by way of office experience, commercial acumen or business know-how. However, the reality is the armed forces have flourished you with a long list of transferable skills that employers are crying out and desperate for.
All you need to do is recognise these skills in yourself, believe in them, and start telling potential employers about them.
Back to basics: what are transferable skills
While some of your experiences, knowledge and qualifications are highly specific to military life, the majority will be relevant and useable in a variety of situations. These are known as transferable skills.
In fact, military careers are designed to leave you with skills that will see you succeed in commercial life on civvy street - whether that’s a formal NVQ or degree, or more hands-on experiences and knowledge.
Where many ex-forces personnel stumble is translating their military experience into business terms, and being confident about how their life experiences can significantly benefit businesses - even more so than other candidates.
Sound familiar?
Top transferable skills from a military career
We could write all day about transferable skills from the military, but what we really want to do is get you thinking about and believing in your own transferable skills - coming up with a list that you can use in your post-military job search.
To get you started, here are the most common transferable skills we see in ex-forces personnel looking to change career:
Hard skills
Hard skills cover the formal and learned skills from your time in the forces and often translate into specific civilian careers. For example:
IT skills that lend themselves to a programming or coding position.
Engineering skills that see you working in sectors such as construction, manufacturing or mechanical engineering.
Project management experience that is sought after in a variety of commercial roles.
Training experience for use in an educational setting.
Analytical skills for data analyst roles in tech, engineering, or life sciences.
Soft skills
Soft skills are non-technical skills, such as social skills, personality traits or work ethic. Luckily for you, the armed forces develops a long list of wholly transferable and hugely desirable soft skills, including:
Strong work ethic
Reliability and dependability
Ability to handle stress and work under pressure
Interpersonal skills
Motivation
Teamwork
Problem-solving
Organisational and multi-tasking skills
Attention to detail.
Just because these skills have been learned and honed in unusual circumstances, doesn’t mean they aren’t valuable in a commercial setting. In fact, many employers find ex-forces employees to excel in these soft skills, far beyond regular employees.
Leadership skills
If you’ve been involved in leading anyone during the forces, then you will have developed leadership skills, such as:
Team building
Stakeholder management
Supervision and delegation
Mentoring and coaching
Performance evaluation
Time management.
These skills aren’t just ideal for managerial or supervisory positions; they also show your ability to work well with others, and your potential for future senior roles.
Communication skills
Communication skills are fundamental in all walks of life, and you have a tremendous advantage coming from a military background, having developed skills such as:
Listening;
Negotiation and mediation;
Verbal;
Interpersonal skills.
Depending on your communication preferences, these skills could steer your career towards a public-facing position, internal communications role, or business development vacancy.
How to establish your transferable skills and what to do with them
Hopefully, that list got you thinking about your own military experiences and how they translate into “business skill terms.” Take time to think about your roles and duties and start listing your skills and expertise.
Once you have your list, it’s time to:
1. Highlight the skills you enjoy using
Shouting about and promoting a skill that you hate using will only get you a job you hate turning up to.
Of all the skills you developed during the forces, highlight the skills you genuinely enjoy using and want to continue doing so.
2. Keep your skills in mind when looking for work
Don’t be turned off by a long list of desirable “business-related” skills when reading job advertisements and descriptions. Instead, keep your list of skills nearby and think how you can bring relatable experience, rather than direct experience.
3. Add your skills to your CV
Add your key transferable skills to your CV, remembering to translate them into business terms that a potential employer will understand and can relate to. If you’re unsure, get someone to help.
4. Talk about them at interview
Finally, be proud of the skills you gained from your military career and talk about them during interviews - explaining why they make you the best candidate for the position.
Want help to determine your transferable skills?