Hiring managers know that employees with strong leadership skills and abilities bring the best out of people, improve work efficiency, and help them reach targets and realize goals.
In this article, we’ll outline ten important leadership skills examples, how to include these skills on a resume, and the ways you can continue to grow as a leader.
What Are Leadership Skills?
Leadership skills are soft skills–personality traits and personal qualities–that enable you to guide, influence, and inspire those around you. Leadership often involves directing others to achieve a common goal.
What skills will help you to do this? Communication skills are a must, as are those traits that will help you “read” and understand other people even in the absence of spoken words.
You’ll also need to think through problems and make decisions.
We’ll consider these in more detail in the next section.
Leadership Skills Examples
If you’re crafting a resume for a leadership position, there are a number of core skills you’ll need to demonstrate. Many of these skills are interconnected; you may need to work on them in tandem.
If you are not sure how to incorporate these skills into your resume, you can try the suggestions that our AI resume builder tailors for you personally.
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💡 Our expert’s advice
Leaders who seek out leadership experiences in professional associations will catch the attention of a potential hiring manager.
Communication
Effective leaders communicate clearly with their teams, whether they’re doing so in person, via email, over a video call, or in some other means. You need to be able to exchange information and ideas, describe emotions, and make sure your team members understand goals and expectations.
Verbal, nonverbal, and written forms of communication are all important. Developing open lines of communication fosters trust and enables teamwork.
Leaders who craft clear, concise emails and reports promote effective communication and, by actively listening to their team members, demonstrate engagement and understanding.
Decision-making
Leaders are called on to make decisions every day. These should be well-informed and data-driven, timely, and aligned with organizational goals.
To do this, you should be able to analyze information, predict potential outcomes, and select the most advantageous course of action. When a leader is decisive, it inspires confidence in team members and drives their productivity.
Take calculated risks when necessary. Leaders consider the short-term and long-term implications of their decisions.
Problem-solving
When leaders face challenges or difficulties, they need to be able to 1) identify the problem, 2) analyze relevant details, and 3) propose a resolution. Problem-solving skills are intimately linked to decision-making and conflict resolution.
When a leader leans into problem-solving skills, teams may work more efficiently and develop innovative solutions. It also shows team members how to solve problems when under pressure or when things do not go as planned.
Delegation
Being a leader does not mean doing everything yourself. Instead, the best leaders assign tasks and responsibilities to their team members in accordance with their unique skills and abilities. In order to delegate tasks properly, leaders must provide clear instructions and expectations to team members who will handle the tasks.
Delegating communicates trust to your team members. They may then demonstrate improved confidence and efficiency.
Motivation
As a leader, you should encourage and inspire those around you. This helps your organization achieve its goals and individuals reach their full potential. Leaders inspire teams by providing growth opportunities and role-modeling appropriate leadership.
Communication skills are undoubtedly central to motivating others, whether you’re offering words of commendation, a smile, or a creative goal board.
Conflict resolution
When people from different backgrounds work closely together, disagreements will arise from time to time. As a leader, you must take the initiative to resolve disagreements in professional and constructive ways.
Set the example by not becoming embroiled in petty conflicts yourself. Admit mistakes and apologize when necessary. Set up conflict resolution strategies known to all team members to maintain a positive work environment.
Know when to involve a third party to assist in coming up with a resolution. If you feel you cannot be impartial as a leader, let the team members know and reach out to a colleague who is not familiar with the solution to provide an unbiased opinion on the matter.
Adaptability
Leaders are constantly called upon to adjust to new situations and face challenges head-on. Flexibility will help you embrace change with willingness and an open mind, and resilience will enable you to bounce back and recover quickly from failures, setbacks, or other difficulties.
You’ll be called upon to remain cool under pressure and guide your team through times of uncertainty while bolstering their morale.
Empathy
Empathy, sometimes linked to emotional intelligence (E.Q.), describes the ability to understand others’ feelings and perspectives. This will help you to work with people from diverse backgrounds.
Empathic leaders tailor their communication styles to each individual’s needs.
Strategic thinking
Strategic thinking will help you to analyze current trends to set long-term goals aligned with your organization’s mission statement. This will help you to produce sustainable growth, maintain a competitive advantage, and make informed decisions and data-driven long-term plans.
Feedback delivery
Leaders do get to tell others what to do, but you should give careful attention to your feedback delivery. Offer constructive comments and guide your team in ways that improve performance and employee development. Facilitate continuous learning.
When you do need to correct your team members, don’t scold them. Try to sandwich critiques with positive feedback. Effective feedback involves encouraging two-way communication and following up on progress and improvements.
How To Highlight Leadership Skills on Your Resume
Employers generally receive hundreds of resumes for each job position. They may spend only a few seconds looking at your resume before making a decision. Employers are also increasingly using automation to assess candidates initially.
Bearing this in mind, it is important to tailor your resume to the job description.
How can you stand out from the crowd by demonstrating leadership experience on your resume?
The trick is to provide concise examples of what you did and what it achieved. This applies to candidates from entry-level through to more experienced older workers.
You can include leadership skills bullet points in your work experience descriptions. In each statement, include a dynamic action verb.
Examples of useful action verbs that demonstrate different types of leadership skills
Boosted, campaign, delegated, drove growth, fixed, guided, ignited, implemented, introduced, inspired, led, managed, mentored, modernized, motivated, negotiated, persuaded, piloted, pioneered, reduced, revolutionized, spearheaded, trained, transformed.
The next step is to say what your action achieved. Using numbers and statistics to quantify your results is concise and more convincing.
You can use the STAR method to help you formulate your work experience bullet points, including the results of your actions as a leader both at work and in an educational setting.
Experience
- Led a cross-functional team of nurses, case managers, and physicians to develop a new discharge protocol for high-risk patients after noticing frequent miscommunications during transitions of care, which reduced post-discharge complications by 25% within six months.
Education
- Led a team of 5 peers during a senior capstone project focused on improving patient communication in geriatric care; delegated research tasks and coordinated simulation labs.
- Facilitated weekly check-ins, resulting in the highest-scoring project in the cohort and a presentation at the college’s health symposium.
Look at these example leadership resume statements that combine action verbs with numerical evidence to demonstrate leadership skills. You should write about your own experience in leading in a similar way.
- Managed a team of 26 and increased sales by 15%
- Pioneered a new scheme which was used across 7 departments
- Spearheaded a campaign which raised $7,500 in donations
- Boosted efficiency by 12% by introducing a new filing system
- Introduced automatic e-mail system which saved over $17,000 yearly
Don’t forget to include leadership-related soft skills in your skills section.
Highlight the resume leadership skills the employer is looking for
There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all resume, so you need to tailor your professional resume to each job application. Thankfully, what employers are looking for is no secret. You can identify the job requirements by carefully reading through each job description and identifying the keywords.
Once you know which skills are relevant to the job, you can add examples of when you’ve demonstrated them. This can be time-consuming, which is why many candidates use resume templates. Rather than taking hours, you can tailor your resume in mere minutes.
Use the same keywords the employer does in the job description and use synonyms. Your resume will probably be scanned using computer software to make sure it contains the right keywords before it’s seen by human eyes.
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💡 Our expert’s advice
Be sure that your skills are accurately portrayed and not embellished. Hiring managers will know when a candidate has embellished their skill set.
How To Improve Your Leadership Skills
Now, you’ve got the tools you need to craft a compelling, leadership-focused resume. What, though, if you feel like your leadership skills need some work? Don’t worry! You can take the following steps to do just that.
How can you develop leadership skills for a new senior role?
Normally, career changes involve forward-thinking and careful planning. Vertical career moves often require candidates to have strong leadership skills, but it can seem difficult to develop these abilities if you’ve never been a manager or supervisor.
However, there are some steps you can take to build leadership skills.
Ask for more responsibility
Once you’ve established yourself in a position and built a positive relationship with your boss, you can be open about wanting more responsibility.
Ask if there is anything else you can do or if anything is coming up that you can take an active role in. Showing you’re keen will only make a positive impression.
This approach works well outside of work as well. You can express your desire to lead a committee or special project.
Think beyond your job description
Job roles change and evolve all the time, and you’re not necessarily limited to yours. Take the initiative and think of things you can do that go above and beyond your job description. Managers appreciate employees who do this, and it can drastically improve your chances of promotion.
This approach shows you can think strategically and contribute to the broader organizational goals.
Develop leadership skills in your free time
You can develop skills outside of your job. You can start your own project, such as a website, or you can help a charity or join an organization. This is a great way to target the key skills which you think you’re lacking. This type of experience looks particularly good on a student resume or an entry-level resume.
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💡 Our expert’s advice
Develop your leadership skills by enrolling in leadership development programs and seeking out an experienced mentor.
Key Takeaways
To show your leadership skills on your resume, you need to go further than just listing traits. You need to demonstrate leadership with real examples and measurable results.
Here’s our guide to making sure you write a resume fit for the leader that you are:
- Tailor your resume to the job description and highlight leadership skills that match the employer’s needs.
- Use action verbs and quantifiable achievements to show the impact of your leadership. Try the STAR method, for example.
- Don’t forget to include leadership-focused soft skills in your skills section.
- Continue developing your leadership abilities by seeking responsibility, thinking beyond your role, and practicing in professional or community settings.
Present yourself on your resume as a capable leader who manages and inspires, making you a strong candidate for new opportunities, career growth, and advancement.
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