Skills to Put on a Resume (and How to Choose Them)
The skills section is a quick index of what you can do, and for applicant tracking systems it is often where keyword searches find you. The goal isn't to list everything you have ever touched; it is to list the skills this job needs that you can back up.
Hard skills vs soft skills
| Hard skills | Soft skills | |
|---|---|---|
| What they are | Teachable, testable abilities: tools, techniques, languages, certifications | How you work: communication, leadership, problem-solving |
| Examples | Excel, SQL, bookkeeping, forklift licence, Adobe Premiere, phlebotomy | Negotiation, coaching, stakeholder management, conflict resolution |
| Where to show them | Skills section and experience | Mainly in experience achievements and your summary |
How to choose your skills in 4 steps
- Collect the advert's skills. Highlight every tool, technique and qualification in the job advert.
- Keep only what you can prove. For each, ask: could I talk about a time I used this?
- Use the advert's wording. If it says "Microsoft Excel", don't write "spreadsheets". If it says "CRM (Salesforce)", write "Salesforce CRM".
- Order by relevance. The skills the advert mentions first or most often go first.
In MakeCV, type a skill and press Enter or comma to add it. Each skill has a three-step level selector, which some templates show as bars or dots. The skill name is what recruiters and parsers read, so word it carefully.
Example skills by field
Starting points, not lists to copy. Keep only what is true for you and relevant to the advert.
| Field | Hard skills | Soft skills to prove in experience |
|---|---|---|
| Customer service | Zendesk, Salesforce Service Cloud, live chat, order management, returns processing | De-escalation, patience, clear writing |
| Retail | POS systems, cash handling, stock control, visual merchandising | Upselling, teamwork, reliability |
| Administration | Microsoft 365, diary management, minute-taking, data entry (with accuracy) | Organisation, discretion, prioritisation |
| Accounting | Reconciliations, month-end close, IFRS/GAAP, Xero, SAP, Excel (pivot tables) | Attention to detail, deadline management |
| Sales | Prospecting, discovery calls, HubSpot/Salesforce, pipeline forecasting, negotiation | Resilience, relationship building |
| Marketing | SEO, Google Ads, Meta Ads, GA4, email automation, copywriting, A/B testing | Creativity, cross-team collaboration |
| Software engineering | Languages (e.g. TypeScript, Python, Go), frameworks, SQL, cloud (AWS/GCP/Azure), CI/CD, testing | Code review, mentoring, ownership |
| Data analysis | SQL, Python (pandas), Excel, Power BI/Tableau/Looker, statistics, A/B test analysis | Storytelling with data, stakeholder communication |
| Nursing | Patient assessment, medication administration, IV therapy, wound care, EPR systems | Compassion, calm under pressure, handover communication |
| Teaching | Lesson planning, assessment design, differentiation, classroom technology, safeguarding | Behaviour management, parent communication |
| Project management | PRINCE2/PMP, Agile/Scrum, budgeting, risk registers, Jira, MS Project | Stakeholder management, facilitation |
| Trades and logistics | Forklift licence, CSCS card, HGV/CDL licence, inventory systems, health and safety | Reliability, safety awareness, teamwork |
Proving skills beyond the list
A skill that appears both in your skills section and in an achievement is far more convincing:
Skills: Excel, Power BI
Experience: Built a Power BI dashboard from three Excel trackers, saving the operations team about four hours of reporting a week.
More on writing achievements in how to write a resume.
Common mistakes
- Listing basics such as "email" or "internet". They are assumed.
- Listing everything, which buries the skills that matter.
- Skills you can't discuss, which an interviewer will test.
- Relying on bars or percentages to show level. Write it in words if it matters.
- Not updating the list per job, so the order no longer matches the advert.