Learn and grow!
You started by getting to know yourself, and you already have an overview of what the job market looks like. Great! Now it’s time to focus on developing your skills. In this step, you’ll learn what competencies are and how to work on them.
What are competencies?
Competencies refer to abilities, knowledge, and skills shown in practice. People often split them into general, hard, and soft skills, although this division can be a bit limiting. It’s important to look at a person’s competencies, considering the trio: abilities, knowledge, and skills — sometimes called employability skills.
Original division
General competencies
General competencies are skills that are useful in almost any job. They’re transferable across fields or roles in different companies, and they can be measured relatively easily (for example, with a test). Examples include computer skills or languages.
Hard competencies
Hard competencies are more specific and often tied to a particular position. We gain them through learning, and they can be reliably tested and compared (through exams, tests, etc.). Simply put, they’re knowledge based. Examples include SQL expertise or knowing how to use an electron microscope.
Soft competencies
Soft skills relate to someone’s personality and experience but can still be developed. They’re transferable across many fields, but unlike the previous categories, they’re harder to measure or compare. Examples include communication or teamwork.
Employability skills
Employability skills are generally transferable across jobs and industries. They can mostly be classified as soft skills; however, recently the term “employability skills” has been gaining wider use, precisely because a strong level of these competencies increases employability.
We can divide them into three main categories: applied knowledge, work skills, and effective relationship‑building.
How to grow?
Now that we’ve covered the basics, we can jump into the core of this step. As you probably guessed, developing competencies can take many forms. It doesn’t have to be traditional retraining courses; you can gain experience in lots of other ways too. Let’s go through a few options that aren’t just boring memorizing.
Grow during your studies
Internships and work placements
One way to gain more experience and develop your competencies is through internships and placements. You might run into them at university or on the job portals we mentioned in the previous step.
TIP:Studying or working abroad is an amazing experience. It doesn’t have to be just internships, you can go abroad to study too, for example through Erasmus+. You spend part of your studies abroad and can even get financial support.
Make use of workshops and courses
You can grow outside your studies too. There’s a huge number of events and courses that can improve your competencies. Explore the courses and webinars offered by our Career Centre, but there are many development options outside MUNI as well.
In addition, you can take advantage of the course offerings from the Labour Office of the Czech Republic. The selection is quite broad; you can filter the courses by area of interest, as well as by price and location. These courses are mostly paid, but some companies may require them.
Feeling like you can’t do it on your own? Try coaching!
A coach will help you clarify how and where you can improve. Coaches not exactly advisors, but they know how to ask right question that’ll guide you toward your goals.
Attend workshops with companies
Back in step 2, we mentioned that events with companies are a great way to get straight to the source. Not only do you meet potential employers in person, but you also find out what skills they expect and what they might require from you.
Company workshops focus more specifically on how a particular company works and what it needs. A sales focused company might let you peek into its sales strategies; somewhere else you might try working with specific software. Check out the current offer and choose a workshop that fits your requirements.
Think about what you can do on your own
If you want to avoid courses and webinars for now, you can still grow through activities you already enjoy in your free time. There are tons of books, podcasts, videos, and social media accounts dedicated to skill development in a fun way. Here are a few tips from each category. Maybe you know some of them, maybe you’ll discover something new!
