🌟 Lesson 1.2: Your Skills, Strengths & Work Values

In Lesson 1.1 you learned what employers are looking for. Now we turn the lens on you. Before you can tell an employer why to hire you — or even decide which jobs are worth chasing — you need a clear, honest picture of what you're good at and what matters to you. This lesson helps you build that picture: your skills, your strengths, and your work values. It's the raw material for your goals, your résumé, and every interview answer you'll ever give.

📚 What You'll Learn

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

Tell apart the three kinds of skills — transferable, job-specific, and self-management
Find your strengths by drawing real evidence from work, home, and community life
Name your work values — what genuinely matters to you in a job
Start a skills inventory you'll reuse in your résumé and interviews
See how your skills and values point toward jobs that fit you

⏱️ Estimated Time: 50–60 minutes (go at your own pace — there's no clock on you)

🎯 Project: Build a one-page "Skills & Values Inventory" — at least eight skills across the three kinds (each with a real example), plus your top five work values ranked.

In This Lesson

Why Know Yourself First?

Imagine walking into a store to buy something, but you can't say what you're looking for or what you'd do with it. That's what job-hunting feels like without self-knowledge — you scroll past postings unsure which ones fit, and in an interview you freeze when asked "Tell me about yourself" or "Why should we hire you?"

The fix isn't confidence tricks. It's evidence. When you've taken honest stock of what you can do and what you care about, those questions stop being scary — you simply describe what's true. Self-knowledge turns "I hope they like me" into "here's what I bring, and here's the kind of work where I do my best."

You already started this in Lesson 1.1, when you rated yourself on the core expectations and named a couple of strengths. This lesson goes wider and deeper — and everything you gather here feeds directly into Lesson 1.3 (goals), your résumé in Module 2, and your interview answers in Module 3.

🧠 Mindset

Many adults find it genuinely hard to name their own strengths — we're often taught that talking about what we're good at is bragging. It isn't. Naming your skills accurately is a form of honesty, and employers need that honesty to match you to the right work. If it feels uncomfortable at first, that's normal — do it anyway, the way you'd give someone else an honest reference. You are not inflating; you are simply telling the truth about a capable person. 🌱

The Three Kinds of Skills

The word "skills" covers more than you might think. It helps to sort them into three kinds, because each one plays a different role in getting hired:

Kind of skill	What it is	Examples
🔁 Transferable skills	Abilities that move with you from one job (or life role) to any other	Communicating, organizing, solving problems, serving customers, handling money, leading, teaching, staying calm under pressure
🔧 Job-specific skills	Know-how tied to a particular kind of work; often learned by training	Driving a forklift, cooking on a line, taking blood pressure, using a cash register or a specific software, welding, coding
🧭 Self-management skills	Personal qualities and work habits — how you handle yourself	Reliability, patience, honesty, adaptability, attention to detail, willingness to learn, positive attitude

Here's why this matters: people often think they have "no skills" because they're only counting the job-specific ones. But transferable and self-management skills are just as real, they're often what employers want most, and you've been building them your whole life — at work, yes, but also raising a family, running a household, volunteering, or getting through hard times.

✅ The skills that survive a career change

Job-specific skills can go out of date or not carry to a new field. Transferable and self-management skills follow you everywhere — from a kitchen to a warehouse to an office. When you're changing careers or re-entering work, these are your bridge. Count them, and count them proudly.

Finding Your Strengths

A strength is simply a skill you're good at and can back up with a real example. The example is the key part — anyone can say "I'm a hard worker," but a strength you can prove is what convinces an employer. So don't hunt for fancy words; hunt for stories and evidence.

Try these prompts. For each, think of a concrete moment — at any job, or none:

What do people ask you for help with? (A clue to a real strength others already see.)
What have you fixed, organized, or kept running? (Problem-solving, organization, reliability.)
When did you handle something hard or stressful well? (Calm under pressure, resilience.)
What are you proud of — at work, home, or in your community? (Proud moments are packed with skills.)
What did past jobs, or life roles, teach you to do without thinking? (Skills so practiced you forget they count.)

Now name the skill inside the memory. "I cared for my mother through her illness" contains patience, reliability, organizing appointments and medications, communicating with doctors, staying calm in a crisis — every one of them a workplace strength. This is the skill of "renaming life experience" you practiced in Lesson 1.1, used on purpose.

💡 The "So what did that take?" trick

Stuck turning an experience into a skill? Describe what you did, then ask yourself: "So what did that take?" — "I ran a household of six on one income." So what did that take? Budgeting, planning, prioritizing, negotiating, patience. There are your skills, pulled straight out of real life.

Your Work Values

Skills tell you what you can do. Work values tell you what you want — what makes a job feel right or wrong for you. Ignoring them is how people end up in jobs they can do but can't stand. Knowing them helps you choose work you'll actually keep and grow in.

There's no correct answer here — only your answer. Which of these matter most to you right now?

Work value	It matters to you if you want…
💵 Good pay	Income to support yourself or your family is the top priority right now
🛡️ Stability & security	A steady, dependable job you can count on for the long term
🕒 Schedule & flexibility	Hours that fit your life — childcare, school, a second job, health
❤️ Helping others	Work that makes a difference for people or your community
📈 Growth & learning	Chances to move up, learn skills, and take on more
🧍 Independence	To work on your own and make your own decisions
👥 Working with people	A team, coworkers, customers — not working alone all day
📍 Location & commute	Close to home, on a bus line, or able to work from home
🤝 Respect & good treatment	A boss and workplace that treat you fairly and with dignity

Your values can change with your situation, and that's fine. Right now you might rank pay and schedule at the top; in a few years it might be growth. The point is to know your top few today, so you aim at jobs that fit — not just any job.

⚠️ "Beggars can't be choosers" — a half-truth

When you need work urgently, take the job you can get — that's wise. But knowing your values isn't a luxury; it's what turns a first job into a step. Even in a job that isn't your dream, aiming your next move toward your values is how a job becomes a career instead of a treadmill.

Building Your Skills Inventory

A skills inventory is just a written list of your skills (all three kinds) with a real example beside each, plus your ranked work values. It's a personal document — messy is fine — and it's one of the most useful pages you'll make in this whole course. You'll pull from it constantly.

Here's how the pieces fit together and where they lead:

graph LR
    A["Life & work experience"] --> B["Name your skills"]
    A --> C["Name your strengths (with evidence)"]
    D["What matters to you"] --> E["Rank your work values"]
    B --> F["Skills & Values Inventory"]
    C --> F
    E --> F
    F --> G["Goals, résumé & interview answers"]

Notice the last box: this inventory isn't busywork. Every strength with evidence becomes a résumé bullet and an interview story. Every ranked value becomes a filter for which jobs to apply to. You're not just reflecting — you're gathering the exact material the rest of the course will use.

💡 Keep it and grow it

Save your inventory in your course folder next to your Lesson 1.1 self-check. Add to it whenever you notice a new skill or remember a good example. By the time you write your résumé in Module 2, the hard thinking will already be done.

🔊 Hear It & Read Along — Key Sentences

Press 🔊 Listen on a sentence and follow the words with your eyes. Hearing and seeing a sentence at the same time builds reading fluency and confidence. Play each one as many times as you like.

A skill is something I can do well.
Everyone brings strengths to a job.
My work values guide my choices.
I can name what I am good at.
Knowing my strengths helps me apply.

Practice & Project

🏋️ Exercise 1: Sort the skill

Goal: Tell the three kinds of skills apart.

Label each as transferable, job-specific, or self-management:

Operating a forklift
Staying patient with a frustrated customer
Organizing a schedule so everything gets done

✅ Answer

1. Job-specific (tied to particular equipment/training). · 2. Self-management (a personal quality / work habit). · 3. Transferable (organizing carries to any job). Note how 2 and 3 are the ones that follow you everywhere.

🏋️ Exercise 2: From experience to strength

Goal: Practice the "So what did that take?" trick.

Turn each experience into two or three named skills:

"I coached my kid's soccer team for two seasons."
"I was the person coworkers came to when the register wouldn't balance."

✅ Answer

1. Leadership, organizing, communicating, patience, reliability (showing up every week). · 2. Problem-solving, attention to detail, handling money, being trusted/dependable. Sample answers — your wording may differ, and that's fine.

🎯 Your Project: Skills & Values Inventory

Build your one-page inventory. Paper or a device — whatever you'll actually keep. This is the raw material for your résumé and interviews, so take your time and be honest.

(10 min) Make three lists: Transferable, Job-specific, and Self-management skills. Aim for at least eight skills total across the three (more is great).
(8 min) Beside each skill, write one real example — where or when you showed it. Use the "So what did that take?" trick when you're stuck.
(5 min) From the work-values table, pick your top five and rank them 1–5 for your life right now.
(3 min) Look at your lists together. Write one sentence: "Based on my skills and values, the kind of work that fits me is…" — a rough idea is perfect.
(2 min) Date it and save it in your course folder, next to your Lesson 1.1 self-check.

✅ Project Completion Checklist

☐ I listed at least eight skills across all three kinds
☐ Each skill has a real example beside it
☐ I ranked my top five work values
☐ I wrote one sentence about the kind of work that fits me
☐ I dated the page and saved it in my folder

👥 Working with a tutor or group?

Pair up and interview each other about a past job or life role, then tell your partner which skills you heard in their story — people almost always spot strengths their partner overlooked. For values, try a quick "forced choice": read two values aloud (say, pay vs. schedule) and each person picks one, again and again, to surface what truly ranks highest. Hearing your strengths named by someone else is powerful — and it's exactly the practice you'll need for interviews.

🎯 Quick Quiz

Question 1: Someone says, "I don't have any skills — I've just been raising my kids and running the house." What's the most accurate response?

Question 2: What turns a claim like "I'm a hard worker" into a real, convincing strength?

Tips & Common Mix-Ups

✅ Do's

Count all three kinds of skills. Transferable and self-management skills are real skills — don't leave them off because they didn't come from a job.
Attach evidence to everything. A skill with an example is worth ten skills without one.
Be honest in both directions. Name real strengths and be realistic about what you're still building — both help you aim well.
Revisit and add. Your inventory is a living page. Update it as you remember more or learn new things.

❌ Common Mix-Ups

⚠️ Watch Out

"Skills only count if they came from a paid job." False. Employers hire the ability, not where you got it.
Confusing values with skills. "I value helping people" is a value; "I'm good at calming upset customers" is a skill. You need both, kept separate.
Listing skills with no examples. A bare list is forgettable. The example is what makes it stick — and what you'll say in an interview.
Thinking naming strengths is bragging. Accurate self-description is honesty, and it's what helps an employer place you well.

✅ Affirmation

You have spent your whole life building skills — at work and far beyond it. Today you're simply giving them their names and gathering the proof. That capable person on the page is you, described honestly. Let yourself see it.

📓 Learning Journal

Keep a learning journal — a notebook, or a note on your phone or computer. After every lesson, take five minutes to write down:

What you learned — a skill, a value, a new way to see your experience
What clicked for you
What's still unclear, so you know what to revisit
Where you'll use it in real life this week
How you feel about your progress

✍️ This lesson's prompt: Which strength surprised you most when you named it — something you do so naturally you'd never counted it before? And looking at your top work value, how well does your current or most recent situation match it? Write a few sentences. Noticing the gap between what you value and what you have is often the first spark of a real goal — which is exactly where Lesson 1.3 picks up.

📝 Lesson Summary

🎓 Key Takeaways

Skills come in three kinds: transferable (move with you), job-specific (tied to a field), and self-management (how you handle yourself).
Many people undercount themselves because they only tally job-specific skills — transferable and self-management skills are just as real, and often what employers want most.
A strength is a skill you can back with a real example — hunt for evidence and stories, not fancy words.
Work values tell you what you want from a job; knowing your top few helps you aim at work that fits, not just any work.
Your skills inventory is the raw material for your goals, résumé, and interview answers — build it once, use it constantly.

🎉 What You've Accomplished

You just built the single most reusable document in this course. You can sort your skills into three kinds, pull strengths out of real life with evidence behind them, and name what you actually want from work. That's the difference between hoping an employer likes you and being able to tell them, plainly and honestly, what you bring and where you'll thrive. Real, adult work — well done. 🎉

❓ Common Questions at This Stage

I really struggle to think of any strengths. Is that a bad sign?

Not at all — it's one of the most common experiences, especially if no one ever pointed yours out. Use the prompts and the "So what did that take?" trick, and (best of all) ask someone who knows you what they'd say you're good at. Others often see our strengths more clearly than we do.

What if my job-specific skills are all from work that's disappearing or that I don't want to do anymore?

That's exactly when your transferable and self-management skills become your bridge. They carry into new fields even when the job-specific ones don't. Focus your inventory there, and Lesson 1.3 will help you set a direction.

My top value is just "pay" — I need money now. Is that wrong?

Absolutely not. Supporting yourself and your family is a completely valid top priority, and honest to name. Knowing it simply helps you weigh offers and, later, aim your next move. Values aren't about ignoring reality — they're about steering within it.

How is this different from a résumé?

Your inventory is the raw, private, everything-included version — messy and complete. A résumé (Module 2) is the short, polished, job-specific selection you pull from the inventory. Doing the inventory first makes the résumé far easier to write.

🎯 Standards Alignment (for programs & tutors)

This lesson supports WIOA Title II workforce-preparation activities — self-management and using information to make decisions — and develops self-assessment central to career planning. It draws on CCRS writing practices (producing a written inventory with supporting evidence/examples) and speaking/listening (discussing and eliciting strengths in pairs). It supports NRS ABE/ASE functioning-level work and lays groundwork for Measurable Skill Gains through goal-directed self-knowledge. Framework-general; confirm current specifics with NDE/CRAELO.

🔭 Looking Ahead

In Lesson 1.3, we turn your self-knowledge into direction. You'll learn to set clear, reachable job and career goals — using the SMART approach — so you're aiming at something specific instead of applying at random. Your inventory and values from today are exactly what those goals will be built on.

✅ Before the Next Lesson

Finish and save your Skills & Values Inventory.
Ask one person who knows you well: "What would you say I'm good at?" Add anything new to your inventory.
Write your Learning Journal entry.

🌟 Encouragement for the Journey

It takes real honesty — and a little courage — to look squarely at what you're good at and what you want. You did that today, and you have the page to prove it. Carry this with you: you are not starting from nothing. You are starting from a lifetime of skills, finally named. See you in Lesson 1.3! 👋