Teamwork skills = “The ability to work well within a team”. Essentially the OG of skills on job descriptions. By default, it’s required everywhere – companies are split in to ‘teams’ (departments) who work together towards a shared end goal. Teamwork is a fundamental skill of collaboration, compromise and influence – and here is how to show you are capable of demonstrating it.
Teamwork is a skill all about operating smoothly and efficiently as a team, encouraging others, dulling your ego to compromise, communicating and negotiate with other conflicting perspectives.
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Teamwork skills on applications
The key to talking about teamwork skills on applications is emphasising how your personal contribution enabled the team to reach its full potential. Using an example with positive results is the best way to show off any skill, however with teamwork you will have to show how the group achieved the result together. Any competitions or prizes won collectively as a group from outperforming rivals, or completing a task ahead of time or under budget would be great examples.
Another good example could go along the lines of “by encouraging a group atmosphere and supporting my colleagues I helped in my teams efforts to beat the competing groups.” Explaining why you affected that outcome and how your team was successful is key to answering these types of questions.
How do you show your teamwork skills on your CV?
Recruiters are not looking for a list of the skills on your CV. So avoid saying things along the line of “I lead my team to success due to personally being the highest performing employee”. Applications are not about claiming you have the skills but showing you have them. Also just screaming ego at the recruiters isn’t the best first impression either. Remember to use a real world example, having multiple examples will boost your application too!
To highlight your skills with an example, the simplest way is to use the STAR Method:
- Situation: context for the interviewer, describe the situation.
- Task: what did you aim to achieve?
- Action: explain what you did in order to complete what you set out to achieve.
- Result: make sure it’s a specific and clear event.
So for example, you can present your mastery in teamwork skills the following way:
“I was the lead for a project for delivering 2,000 flyers to students in Delft in two days. I made a schedule with the times of the lectures in the separate faculties and sat down with the rest of the team to discuss who is going to take each faculty. We agreed on clear communication when someone is done with their batch of flyers so they can help the others. I collaborated with all of them and coordinated the flyer distribution and the team successfully reached the goal half a day earlier.”
Now, those are some great teamwork skills!
Developing your teamwork skills
Most people have gained teamwork skills without even realising it, from sports teams and clubs (maybe not so much tennis or golf), to committees of societies, part time jobs, and the dreaded group coursework. Examples are everywhere, you don’t need to have been a semi-professional athlete to know that team sports require teamwork! These are all easy things to pick up as well if you feel that you need to develop your teamwork skills and evidence!
Whether you’re ready to add teamwork skills to your CV or applications, or you’re still developing the skills, check out Magnet.me to connect with companies that are looking for someone like you!