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What are career readiness skills? Top skills

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What are career readiness skills? Top skills
Published on: 10 July 2026
Updated on: 5 August 2026

Table of contents

What is career readiness?

Career readiness is the process of preparing yourself to enter the workforce - as a high school or college student.
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The goal is to develop key skills for success in a workplace and to ease the transition (seamless transformation) from being a student to being an employee.
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Who makes sure you are career-ready?

Many educational institutions or organisations, like high schools and universities help students prepare for the workforce.
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Some of the career readiness strategies are:
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  • Going to orientation fairs or events
  • Doing an internship (abroad or domestic)
  • Volunteering
  • Job shadowing
  • Learning how to write your resume and motivation letter
  • Learning about companies or organisations you wish to work for
  • Planning a gap year

How do you make sure you are career ready?

Doing the digging to see the bigger picture. Explore options to see what is sought out for and compare with your skills. Being career-ready means recognising your own strengths and using them to present yourself.
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Doing an internship locally or do an internship abroad. Internships help you develop skills, interests, and see where you stand. Being an intern means being professional in your field for the first time, communicating as a professional, and putting technical skills to practice.

What is important for employers?

Changes in the workforce make it challenging to reach consensus on what skills students should have when leaving high school.
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Normally, it is a combination of soft skills, technical skills and willingness to work and learn.
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Green skills are becoming increasingly important as well.

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What are career readiness skills or competencies?

These are skills that go beyond knowing facts or theories. Career readiness skills enable students to apply knowledge in real-world situations, communicate effectively and work in a team.
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There is no consensus, but communication and teamwork are among the top cited career readiness skills.
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Learn more about employability skills.

  • 1. Communication

One of the top skills is effective communication. Being able to present and elaborate ideas in writing, speak with confidence in interviews and presentations, and actively listen before responding. It also means adjusting when communicating with a peer, supervisor, client, or patient.
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  • 2. Career exploration

Another top skill is to have a career plan and flexibility around it. Having a career plan, ideas about your career paths, options, and requirements to reach positions. Knowing the training requirements for different careers informs the selection of internships and courses.
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For example, if you know you want to work internationally, you try to develop global citizen skills.
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Exposing yourself to a range of options, on the other hand, prevents you from narrowing choices.
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  • 3. Teamwork

Another top skill is teamwork. Meaning teamwork in every setting and by using various communication channels - from physical to virtual meetings, with distributed teams. Having experience with working in a team indicates being able to give specific feedback and navigate potential disagreement.
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  • 4. Work ethic

One of the career readiness skills and transferable skills is self-management, time management and work ethic. In practical terms: respecting deadlines, finishing a task, doing what you said you would do.
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  • 5. Technology literacy

This includes basic proficiency with spreadsheets, documents, email, collaboration apps, industry specific softwares or technology.  It also means understanding cybersecurity and data privacy.
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With AI tools becoming common at work, students need to understand where these tools add value and where not.
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  • 6. Financial literacy

One of the highlighted skills is financial literacy - understanding investing, budgeting, and saving for long-term stability. Useful skills when evaluating internships options and funding, job offers, benefits, and salary negotiations.

NACE Career Readiness Competencies - Examples

NACE Career Readiness Competencies mapped to Green & Human Skills

*NACE stands for National Association of Colleges and Employers. It is a professional association that empowers and connects the community of professionals who support, develop, and employ the college-educated workforce.
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Career readiness skills: internship testimonials

Here are a few examples of career readiness skills developed during internships with RealStep.

Career exploration:

... On a professional level, I learned new construction methods, gained on-site experience, and expanded my network for future projects.

... Professionally speaking, this experience has opened up new horizons for my future.

Teamwork / communication:

... Being exposed to different circumstances allowed me to develop many professional skills that I would not have acquired in France.

I discovered a professional world where people are at the heart of everything. What made the most impression on me was the richness of the interactions with my colleagues, all of whom come from very diverse backgrounds.

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RealStep internships abroad

Internships abroad with RealStep are focused on developing global citizen skills, green skills, and employability skills. Focus are both personal and professional experiences.
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Career readiness skills FAQs

How to become a global citizen?

Becoming a global citizen has to do with your career plan. Learn how to become a global citizen.
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What is the difference between career readiness skills and transferable skills?

Transferable skills are skills you can use across different jobs, industries, professions, or countries. Career readiness skills refer to skills you need in order to be ready to enter workforce.

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