Yale Student Athlete Transferable Skills
What are transferable skills?
Transferable skills are a set of skills that one develops over time and can be useful to employers across various jobs and industries. There are certain skills that a student athlete naturally develops during years of training and competing.
This document will help Yale Student Athletes identify transferable student athlete skills and learn how to incorporate them into one’s job search or graduate school application process.
Five Steps to Incorporate Student Athlete Transferable Skills into the Job Search/Graduate School Application Process
- Identify the examples of student athlete transferable skills that closely match your own skill development
- Reflect on which skills are most relevant to the opportunity
- Articulate these skills with explanations that can be incorporated into your Resume and Cover Letter
- Match these skills to specific experiences that you can elaborate on and provide supporting details
- Practice articulating these experiences in your Interview Preparation including the STAR Method
Step 1 – Identify the examples of student athlete transferable skills that closely match your own skill development.
Examples of Student Athlete Transferable Skills
• Ability to make decisions quickly/under pressure • Ability to work in teams • Coachable • Communicates well in group settings • Competitive • Goal Oriented • Handles adversity • Leadership • Learn from failure • Mental toughness • Mentoring skills • Organization skills • Receives feedback well • Strong work ethic • Time management skills
Step 2 – Reflect on which skills are most relevant to the opportunity
Review Job Description or Graduate School Application and identify which of your transferable skills are best suited for the opportunity. Look for keywords and any examples that are provided. Do this every time you apply for a new opportunity.
Step 3 – Articulate these skills with explanations that can be incorporated into your Resume and Cover Letter
Review the list below along with the Student Athlete Resume and Cover Letter Samples to help you elaborate on these skills. Once you have written these examples out, include them in your Resume and Cover Letter.
Examples of How to Explain Student Athlete Transferable Skills
- Consistently met goals for personal and team achievement.
- Developed resiliency by allowing myself to release negative emotions that typically follow failure.
- Learned to provide and accept constructive criticism.
- Balanced a demanding academic schedule along with dedicating over 30+ hours week to athletic games, practices, training and travel.
- Collaborated with over (include #) teammates to accomplish team goals (specify what these goals are).
- Established productivity habits that allowed me to complete workload in less time.
- Faced adversity with sports injury by dedicating over x hours to physical therapy and training in the off season to return the following year in starting position.
- Understand and retain information quickly and communicate this to others to achieve shared goal.
- Elected by teammates to be captain and worked closely with coaching staff to communicate team goals and establish strong team culture.
- Mentored incoming class of teammates on adapting to campus life by providing guidance and support throughout their first year (provide specifics).
Step 4 – Match these skills to specific experiences that you can elaborate on and provide supporting details.
Use the Student Athlete Accomplishment Story Grid Worksheet to write these skills and experiences out.
Step 5 – Practice articulating these experiences in your Interview Preparation including STAR Method
Use the Accomplishment Story STAR Method Worksheet to write out these skills in a format that is used in answering many behavioral interview questions.
