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When people hear leadership, they often think of some grand title or responsibility. But leadership is fluid and can take on many different shapes and forms. It’s more about the behaviors you inhabit and less about the titles you hold. Being a leader should be measured by your impact and what you’ve positively cultivated not necessarily by the prestige of your title. Employers want to see candidates that are leaders in their own right – candidates who exhibit behavioral patterns that make them competent in the workplace.
NACE competencies
The National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) developed a core set of competencies, abilities and behaviors related to successful work performance, for students to assess their career readiness. Employers across industries and disciplines use these central competencies when considering new talent. Students can use these competencies to measure their respective strengths and areas of growth as they work across internships, organizations and post-graduate opportunities.
These competencies being:
- Career and self-development
- Employers are looking for candidates with a heightened sense of self-awareness surrounding their respective strengths and weaknesses. Be able to articulate what you are great at and your areas of growth.
- Your ability to network and build professional relationships. Employers are assessing your ability to connect with others and communicate with conviction about what you are passionate about.
- What skills have you cultivated through your work and organizational experience? In what environment do you work best? What kind of environment doesn’t allow you to produce quality work? A self-aware candidate will be able to identify these competencies and apply them to what employers are looking for.
- Communication
- How effectively can you relay information? No matter the content of the message, you need to be able to clearly express ideas and perspectives to an array of audiences.
- Critical thinking
- Employers want to see that candidates can think outside of the box unprompted. Being able to analyze situational context and craft logical solutions to a given problem demonstrates that you are an independent thinker.
- Leadership
- Recognizing personal strengths and utilizing team members’ strengths to achieve a shared vision. Leadership is all about maximizing collaborative efforts to reach a common goal. Remember it’s not just about your success; it’s about the collective success of those you are leading.
- Professionalism
- Being dependable, delivering exceptional work in a timely manner and maintaining credibility.
- Social adaptability
- Being able to work with people who come from different backgrounds and inhabit different perspectives and opinions.
- Teamwork
- Working effectively with team members to achieve a common goal. Being respectful of your colleagues’ time, understanding group dynamics and being receptive of constructive feedback.
- Technology
- Being up to date on the latest uses of technology and utilizing software ethically in the workplace. Maintaining a level of tech literacy focusing on how you can mitigate inefficiency in your workflow and emphasizing human-led inputs and creativity.
Unconventional leadership
What do you do if you don’t have any leadership experience?
A position on an executive board or a decision-making cabinet does not always equate to a leader. Yes, having executive positions is a great thing to have, but what does it matter if you don’t have anything to show for it. Employers want to see how you made an impact on your organizations and the ways in which it’s helped you develop professionally.
Being an unconventional leader looks like going above and beyond your expected responsibility, fostering empathy-centered connections with those in your organizations and showing continued engagement in the work you care about. Finding ways to lead in an informal capacity keeps you in a growth mindset and allows you to learn more about yourself in a professional sense. This can look like volunteering more of your time in an organization to get a project done, delegating tasks in a group project and making sure your team members feel supported, or even offering to mentor an underclassman who’s unsure about what’s next for them. Notice that these are qualities and behaviors of leaders even if you don’t have an official title.
Reframing your experience can be what separates you from other applicants. On applications and when speaking to employers really articulate the behaviors that make you a leader, this will show employers you embody the competencies they are looking for. Leadership is not one-size fits all; it’s the measure of your impact and ability to cultivate success.
By Raigan Clay