Graduate Skills Employers Want the Most

Interviews can be daunting,  especially when you’re a fresh graduate and aren’t used to the process. From the handshake (is it tight enough? Or too tight?) to how much eye contact you make (you don’t want to be too starey, right?), there sure is a lot to consider to make a good impression on the hiring manager. And that’s before even considering what skills employers look for in graduates!
 

Using online job boards, we’ve discovered the most common graduate job requirements for each industry, revealing the skills employers look for in graduates the most.
 

But first, what are the top graduate skills cited for interviews overall?
 

14 graduate skills you need for interview success

According to Glassdoor, there are 14 top skills every graduate should develop to fast-track their interview success and secure that sought-after grad role:

• Communication
• Business Acumen
• Collaboration/Teamwork
• Adaptability
• Problem Solving
• Positivity
• Organisation
• Leadership
• Negotiation
• Confidence
• Perseverance
• Self-motivator
• Ability to work under pressure
• IT skills

On the one hand, we’re not going to disagree entirely. All of these skills are good to have and would conceivably contribute towards securing a well-paid grad role. But, while this is a good starting point, it’s not the whole picture.

The top skills to secure a grad role in your sector

It goes without saying that no two sectors are the same. Standing up in court to represent your client as a barrister is different to crunching numbers as an accountant. A consultant may be a strategy whizz, but their tech skills aren’t going to compete with a software engineer’s. Each industry requires a different specialist knowledge and lends itself to a certain set of soft skills, so the graduate skills employers want varies from sector to sector.

By looking at the industries with the most growth in demand for graduates, and comparing graduate job descriptions in each across LinkedIn, Glassdoor and Indeed, we discovered the real most important skills employers look for in graduates:

The most competitive graduate jobs

Learning the above soft skills for your industry is all the more important in a competitive sector. Our research shows these sectors have the highest interest from recent graduate candidates looking for their first role out of uni:

According to monthly search trend data from SEMRush.

Meanwhile, the sectors recruiting the most graduates in 2022 are:

Source: https://www.highfliers.co.uk/download/2022/graduate_market/GM22-report.pdf

Ready to ace the interview and get your dream graduate role?

Work on harnessing the above top graduate skills — particularly those relevant to your industry — and we’re certain you’ll smash the interview. Good luck!

Looking for more interview and job-hunting tips? Check out the below:

• How to write a brilliant CV
• Graduate job trends
• How much will your degree earn you?

Or, if you’ve secured the perfect grad role and are looking for a rental property in your new city, check out Fresh rental properties — stylish and modern rental homes, perfect for young professionals and available in major cities across the UK and Ireland.

Methodology

Using the High Fliers 2022 Graduate Report, we selected sectors that had seen the most growth in demand for graduate jobs in 2022. By then looking at 3 graduate roles in each sector on LinkedIn, Glassdoor and Indeed, we pulled out soft skill requirements for each industry. The final list comprises the skills that are repeated across a number of job ads in each industry.