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Employers are interested in more than qualifications.
They want people who can communicate clearly, work effectively with others, solve problems, take responsibility and adapt when circumstances change.
These are known as transferable skills because they can be used across different jobs, industries and situations.
The difficulty for many young people is not understanding what these skills are, it's finding credible evidence that they have used them.
That is where your Leap becomes particularly valuable.
Working alongside established project partners, living with a new team and navigating unfamiliar environments gives you real examples of the skills employers repeatedly ask for.
You simply need to recognise them.
Transferable skills are abilities and personal qualities that are valuable in almost every workplace.
They are not tied to one particular subject, qualification or profession. The communication skills you develop on a conservation project, for example, could later be useful in hospitality, healthcare, marketing, education or business.
You may see phrases such as these in job descriptions:
Strong communicator • Team player • Proactive • Adaptable • Resilient • Organised • Solutions-focused • Culturally aware
Employers don’t just want you to claim these qualities. They want examples showing when and how you have demonstrated them.
Your Leap is full of those examples.
Good communication is not simply about being confident or talking a lot.
It involves listening carefully, asking questions, explaining yourself clearly and adapting the way you communicate for different people and situations.
During your programme, you communicated with teammates, guides, project leaders and people from different cultural backgrounds.
You may have needed to:
Think about a moment when careful listening or clear communication helped your team complete a task or understand a different perspective.
Nearly every employer wants people who can work effectively with others.
Strong teamwork means contributing reliably, sharing responsibility, respecting different personalities and putting the wider team goal ahead of your personal preference.
From the moment you arrive, you live, travel and work with people you may never have met before.
Whether restoring coral, supporting a community project, completing a trek or managing everyday team life, you learn how to:
Think about a time the team needed to pull together. What did you personally contribute and how did your actions help?
Leadership does not always mean being formally placed in charge.
Employers also recognise quieter forms of leadership: helping a group make progress, remaining calm during a challenge, encouraging someone who is struggling or taking responsibility for getting something completed.
Your Leap creates opportunities to lead through your actions.
You may have:
Think about a moment when your actions positively influenced the team. What did you notice, what did you do and what happened next?
Initiative means recognising what needs to be done and acting without waiting for someone else to tell you.
It shows employers that you are engaged, responsible and willing to make things happen.
Project work and team life provide plenty of opportunities to step forward.
Perhaps you:
Think about something you chose to do rather than something you were instructed to do. Why did you step forward and what difference did it make?
Workplaces need people who can assess a situation, think practically and find a sensible way forward.
Problem-solving is not always about discovering a dramatic or ingenious solution. It can mean asking the right question, breaking a task into smaller steps or changing your approach when something isn’t working.
Real projects take place in real environments, where circumstances do not always unfold exactly as expected.
You may have needed to:
Choose a situation that did not immediately go to plan. Explain how you assessed it, what action you took and what you learned.
Adaptability is the ability to adjust your behaviour or expectations when circumstances change.
This is particularly valuable in busy workplaces where priorities, customers and challenges can change quickly.
Travelling and working in an unfamiliar environment requires constant adjustment.
You may have adapted to:
Think about something that felt unfamiliar or did not happen as expected. How did you adjust and remain useful to the team?
Resilience means responding constructively when something feels difficult and continuing to move forward.
It does not mean pretending that everything is easy. It means recognising a challenge, managing your response and finding the determination to continue.
Your Leap may have pushed you physically, practically or emotionally.
The challenge could have been:
Think about a moment when giving up or withdrawing would have been easier. What helped you continue and what did the experience teach you?
Cultural awareness means recognising that your own experiences and assumptions are not universal.
Employers increasingly value people who can work respectfully with different perspectives, backgrounds and ways of thinking.
A Leap takes you beyond simply observing another country as a tourist.
Working alongside local project partners gives you the opportunity to listen, ask questions and understand how environmental and community challenges are approached by the people closest to them.
You learn to:
Think about something a project partner or community member taught you. Did it challenge an assumption or change the way you understood an issue?
Writing “excellent teamwork and communication skills” in a CV skills section proves very little.
Employers want evidence.
For every skill you claim, prepare one specific Leap moment that shows:
You don’t need to use a dramatic story. A clear, honest example of listening carefully, adapting your approach or supporting your team can be extremely powerful.
You don’t need to include all eight skills in every application.
Read the job description and identify the three or four qualities that appear most important. Then select the Leap examples that provide the strongest evidence.
If the role requires customer service, focus on communication, cultural awareness and adaptability.
If it involves working in a busy team, highlight collaboration, reliability and problem-solving.
If it offers greater responsibility, use examples of leadership, initiative and decision-making.
The best application is not the one containing the longest list of skills. It is the one that makes the clearest connection between your experience and the opportunity.
For practical examples, read our guide to how to put your Leap experience on your CV.
You probably didn’t join The Leap because you wanted to practise transferable skills.
You joined for the adventure, the projects, the people, the destination and the chance to do something completely different.
But while you were restoring reefs, supporting community initiatives, trekking through mountains, caring for wildlife or navigating team life, you were also learning how to communicate, collaborate, adapt and take responsibility.
That is the clever part.
Your Leap is packed with evidence for CVs,applications and interviews. Explore the complete series and learn how to turnwhat you did, learned and overcame into something that helps you stand out.
Discover where your Leap belongs on your CV and howto turn project work and team challenges into strong evidence.
Turn your projects, challenges and team experiencesinto confident interview answers using the simple STAR technique.
Discover: Prepare for Your Interview
Learn how to explain your contributionprofessionally, credit local expertise and avoid exaggerating the impact ofyour role.
Discover: Describe Your Contribution
Connect your project experience, personal growthand transferable skills to your chosen course and future university plans.
Discover: Strengthen Your Application
Understand when volunteering counts as valuable work experience and how to present your projects, responsibilities and skills accurately.
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