Transferable skills
These are skills that can be developed through
your experience at medical school and that can be carried through
to the workplace. Having these types of skills will help to boost
your CV and ultimately, your ability to get the job you want.
Remember in an application, CV or interview, it is always good to
have a few examples that you can talk about, so you don’t keep
repeating the same experience.
Above all employers value self-awareness and
self-confidence. Self-awareness involves knowing your own strength
and weaknesses. This is why a good understanding of your own skills
is so important, as well as your ability to describe them.
Below are some ideas of how you can demonstrate these skills and
some examples of where you can gain the experience:
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Oral face-to-face contact or contact by telephone
- Written communication – examples of emails, letters you have
written (your accuracy and attention to detail)
- Negotiation skills
- Liaison skills
- Influencing skills
- Listening skills and giving appropriate feedback
- Social confidence
- Talking about yourself in a way that shows self-awareness.
- Expressing ideas- examples of where you have had to do
this
- Language skills
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- Presentations you have done at university
- Previous job, part-time role
- Volunteering
- Teaching or mentoring young people.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Participation in the delivery of team presentations
- The variety of team-working situations you have
experienced
- Flexibility in team-working
- Working together to achieve shared goals
- Developing open relationships with colleagues
- Actively sharing information and pooling skills
- Treating colleagues with respect
- Supporting colleagues under pressure
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- Previous job, or part-time role
- Team sports/ outdoor pursuits
- In team projects as part of your course-work
- Student-selected Components (SSCs)
- In meetings and discussions
- Volunteering.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Having responsibility for other staff in a previous job or in a
part-time job
- Where you have motivated people
- Where you have delegated responsibility
- Target setting
- Training experience
- Decision-making skills
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- Previous job, or part-time role
- Captaining a sports team
- Chair of your project group in medical school
- Taking a position of responsibility on a committee
- Volunteering
- By joining societies
Read more about medical leadership.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Planning and following a revision timetable
- Arranging travel itinerary, e.g. inter-railing.
- Setting targets and monitoring progress
- Working without direct supervision
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- Previous job, or part-time role
- Project work/Student-selected Components
- Organising social / sporting / charity events
- Your elective
- Taking part in an audit
- A gap year.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Active listening
- Eliciting feedback
- Handling complaints
- Defusing difficult situations
- Tact and diplomacy
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- Teaching or mentoring young people.
- Joining a university society e.g. Marrow
- Volunteering e.g. Samaritans
- Working e.g. in a care home
- Your elective
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Combining full-time study with a significant part-time job, or
family commitments.
- Managing and prioritising your personal workload.
- Working in a pressurised environment.
- Multi-tasking.
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- Previous job or part-time work
- In juggling your studies
- Project work/SSCs
- Voluntary work.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Networking for jobs/ work experience
- Coping well with a sudden crisis
- Coming up with new ideas
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- Suggesting changes to the course as a student rep
- Getting relevant project work/ SSCs
- Creating your own website
- Starting a new group or resurrecting an old one
- Volunteering.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- How you have an attitude of welcoming change
- How you have risen to new challenges
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- Year abroad/ independent travel abroad
- Part-time work whilst studying
- Successfully changing courses
- Shift-work; working at short notice
- Using language skills abroad
- Combining study with family commitments.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Creative solutions to coursework problems
- Showing strong analytical skills
- Developing a system/ new way of working to improve
efficiency
- Overcoming obstacles to achieve an ambition
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- Working in an environment with difficult staff or
customers
- Examples of where you have had to make tough decisions, where
you have weighed up the odds.
- In a research project /SSCs
- Setting up an elective project e.g. abroad
- Taking part in an audit.
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- How you have talked to people at careers fairs/royal college
events
- How you have talked to trainee doctors/consultants on your
clinical attachments.
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- By attending careers fairs (see your medical school website for
details)
- Going to royal college events (look on their websites and see our events page
- On clinical attachments
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What you can demonstrate:
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Examples of where you can get the
experience:
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- Knowledge of how to approach researching a topic
- Good use of the internet for research
- Being able to sort out all the information you have
collected.
- Reviewing the peer-reviewed literature on a topic
- Report writing
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- Carrying out an audit
- Getting relevant project work/SSCs
- Intercalated degree
- Reporting on your elective project
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