How to Put Transferable Skills on Your Resume: 120 Skills, Examples, & Tips

What You’ll Learn

Your experience can be relevant to a new job even when the connection isn’t obvious at first. The link often lies in the skills you’ve built along the way—the transferable skills you can carry into your next role.

This guide covers 120 examples of transferable skills to help you recognize the capabilities you already have and translate your experience into resume-ready language. You’ll also find realistic resume examples for different scenarios and tips for highlighting your skills throughout your resume.

What Are Transferable Skills?

Transferable skills are abilities you can apply across different jobs, roles, and industries. They can include both soft skills, such as communication, problem-solving, and leadership, and hard skills, such as data analysis, project management, and technical proficiency.

Unlike job-specific skills that may apply only to a particular position or field, transferable skills carry across roles, industries, and contexts. They’re especially valuable when changing careers, entering the workforce as a student or recent graduate, or returning after an employment gap.

For example, customer service experience can build strong communication and conflict-resolution skills that are valuable in sales, healthcare, administration, and many other careers.

120 Examples of Transferable Skills for Resumes

Transferable skills can include both soft and hard skills, from communication and problem-solving to data analysis, project management, and technical proficiency. Which skills are most transferable depends on the role, industry, and requirements of the job you’re targeting.

Below are 120 examples of transferable skills for your resume, divided into categories. Within each category are more specific abilities you may have developed through work, school, volunteering, or other experiences. You don’t need to use all of them—focus on four to six skills that best match the job you’re targeting.

How to Identify Your Transferable Skills in 4 Steps

To identify your transferable skills, review your work experience, education, projects, volunteer work, and other responsibilities for skills you’ve used repeatedly or successfully. Then compare those abilities with your target job’s requirements and prioritize the ones most relevant to the role.

Here’s how you can do that in a few simple steps:

• Step 1:

  Review Your Past Experience

  Audit your previous jobs, projects, relevant courses, volunteer roles, internships, and other responsibilities. Prioritize the abilities you used repeatedly or successfully, not just the duties associated with your job title.

  Consider responsibilities like:

  • Training or mentoring coworkers
  • Managing schedules, deadlines, or competing priorities
  • Communicating with customers, clients, or team members
  • Solving problems or resolving complaints
  • Tracking budgets, inventory, or other data
  • Coordinating projects, meetings, or events
  • Creating reports, presentations, or written materials
  • Using software, digital platforms, or workplace technology
• Step 2:

  Translate Responsibilities Into Transferable Skills

  Next, translate those responsibilities into skills that employers recognize across industries.

  For example:

  • Training new employees → Leadership, coaching, communication
  • Creating staff schedules → Planning, prioritization, resource allocation
  • Handling customer complaints → Conflict resolution, problem-solving, customer service
  • Preparing reports → Written communication, data analysis, attention to detail
• Step 3:

  Compare Your Skills With the Job Description

  Review the job description for the skills, tools, and qualifications the employer is looking for. Compare those requirements with the skills you’ve identified from your own experience to determine where your background aligns and which transferable skills are most relevant to highlight.

• Step 4:

  Choose Your Most Relevant Transferable Skills

  Prioritize the four to six skills that create the strongest connection between your background and the target job. Those are the skills you’ll want to reinforce throughout your resume summary, skills section, and work experience.

Where & How Do You Put Transferable Skills on a Resume?

You can put transferable skills throughout your resume, including your summary or objective, skills section, work experience, and additional sections, such as education, projects, or volunteer experience.

Follow these five tips when learning how to highlight transferable skills on resumes:

• 

  Choose a Resume Format

  Choose a resume format that makes your most relevant transferable skills easy to identify while giving employers the context they need to understand your experience.

  Three approaches, depending on your situation, are:

  • A chronological resume format organizes your work experience from most to least recent. It’s the standard format and generally works best when you have a consistent employment history and can demonstrate relevant transferable skills through your previous roles.
  • A combination (hybrid) resume format balances a prominent skills section with a chronological work history. It’s generally the better option when your transferable skills are highly relevant to the target job, but your previous job titles or industry aren’t an obvious match. It lets you emphasize relevant skills while still giving employers a clear view of your experience and career progression.
  • A functional resume format emphasizes skills more than work history. It may fit specific circumstances, such as a significant career transition or a unique portfolio career that doesn’t fully represent how your experience fits together. Use it cautiously, however, since some ATS may have difficulty consistently parsing this format, and recruiters often prefer to see a clear timeline of experience and career progression.

  For most job seekers, a chronological resume works best for a traditional career path, while a combination resume is generally the stronger choice when transferable skills need more emphasis.

  Functional resumes can be well-suited to specific situations, but a combination format often strikes a better balance between highlighting skills and demonstrating clear career progression.

• 

  Highlight Transferable Skills in Your Summary or Objective

  Feature two or three transferable skills in your resume summary or objective that directly relate to the target job. Rather than simply listing those skills, connect them to your experience, accomplishments, or scope of responsibility to immediately show an employer how your background applies to the role.

  For example, a retail manager transitioning into customer success could emphasize customer relationship management, conflict resolution, and communication.

  Resume summary example:

  Professional Summary

  Customer-focused retail manager with five years of experience building customer relationships, resolving complex issues, and using performance data to improve service. Skilled in client communication, problem-solving, relationship management, and process improvement.

• 

  Add Transferable Skills to Your Skills Section

  Use your skills section to give employers a quick overview of the abilities you bring to the role. Prioritize skills that appear in the job description and accurately reflect your experience, including your most relevant transferable skills. Use the employer’s terminology when appropriate.

  Skills section example:

  Skills

  • Client communication
  • Relationship management
  • Problem-solving
  • Data analysis
  • CRM software
  • Process improvement
• 

  Demonstrate Transferable Skills Throughout Your Work Experience Bullets

  Your work experience section should provide evidence of the transferable skills you’ve listed elsewhere on your resume. Focus each bullet on what you accomplished or improved, then use numbers, percentages, time frames, or other details to show the scope or impact of your work.

  Work experience example:

  Work Experience

  Retail Store Manager
  Northside Retail Co., Philadelphia, PA | March 2022–Present

  • Manage daily customer service operations for a high-volume retail location, supporting hundreds of customer interactions each week.
  • Coordinate weekly schedules and staffing needs for 25+ employees, maintaining coverage during peak periods and seasonal demand.
  • Resolve escalated customer concerns by developing solutions that have increased customer satisfaction scores by 18%.
  • Analyze weekly sales and inventory data to identify trends and adjust priorities, reducing out-of-stock merchandise by 12%.
• 

  Showcase Transferable Skills in Additional Resume Sections (Optional)

  Experience outside of traditional employment can also demonstrate transferable skills. Add optional resume sections, like coursework, projects, internships, volunteer work, certifications, or other experiences, to strengthen your qualifications for the target job.

  For example, putting successful projects on your resume can demonstrate transferable skills you’ve developed through academic, professional, freelance, volunteer, or personal work.

  Projects example:

  Projects

  Customer Feedback Analysis
  Northside Retail Co. | August 2026

  • Analyzed 300+ customer survey responses to identify recurring service issues and satisfaction trends.
  • Organized feedback into key themes and evaluated patterns in customer needs and concerns.
  • Developed five recommendations for improving customer communication and service processes.

  Customer Interaction Tracking System
  Freelance Project | March 2026

  • Built a spreadsheet-based system to organize customer interactions, follow-up needs, and recurring service issues.
  • Created categories and reporting fields to track customer concerns and resolution outcomes.
  • Used collected data to identify common issues and opportunities for improving follow-up processes.

Transferable Skills Resume Examples

The following transferable skills resume examples show how a career changer, recent graduate, and professional returning after an employment gap can position relevant experience for a new role.

Dos & Don’ts When Highlighting Transferable Skills on Resumes

When learning how to write a resume with transferable skills, use the job description to prioritize relevant skills, then show how you’ve applied them through your experience.

Follow these tips (and avoid these mistakes) when creating your transferable skills resume:

Showcase Your Versatility With Transferable Skills

Transferable skills can help you make a stronger case for your qualifications, even when your background doesn’t follow a direct path to the role you’re targeting. Focus on the skills most relevant to the job, show how you’ve applied them through measurable accomplishments, and reinforce them throughout your resume.

A targeted resume with transferable skills can show employers why your experience—directly relevant or not—has prepared you to succeed in the role and make a meaningful contribution to their organization.