Ultimate List of 35+ Transferable Skills for Teachers

Are you considering other career options, and wondering about what transferable skills for teachers can be applied to other positions? Look no further. Teachers are versatile and talented individuals with many useful skills.

If you have a degree in classroom teaching, then you likely have more transferable skills than you think which can be applied to a variety alternative careers.

Whether you dream of:

working from home
climbing the corporate ladder
establishing a side hustle or looking for a summer job ..

The skills you have as a teacher will convince anyone (including yourself) that there are so many other jobs you can do besides teaching.

The career you pursue doesn’t have to be anything similar to what you’re doing in the classroom, unless you want it to be. As an introvert, I wanted a career that allowed me to work on a more solitary basis, with less constant interaction.

Whether you’re looking for an education-related job that isn’t teaching, or whether you want a career that is like night and day compared to the classroom like I did, I can guarantee you have more skills than you may realize.

Let’s jump in – the ultimate list of transferable skills for teachers

Interpersonal Skills that Teachers Can Transfer to other Careers

These interpersonal skills involve the more interactive communication aspect of teaching. Teachers have many transferable skills in these areas; highlighting them would put you in a good position for any job involving working directly with people

1. Customer service

Every teacher knows that the job resembles a customer service position in many ways. Dealing with unhappy parents and students involves listening to their concerns and coming to conclusions together that will satisfy all parties.

Having good customer service skills is a key piece of what you would need in any career involving public service, client relations or customer service.

How to communicate this on a resume: “As a school teacher working with diverse groups, I demonstrated great customer service skills to ensure the satisfaction of both students and their parents. I used strong communication and problem-solving abilities to address concerns effectively, foster positive relationships and enhance the education experience for both students and families”

2. Collaboration

Teachers are often thought of as working on their own, but we know that’s not true. Teachers do a lot of collaborating with:

other teachers (in committees, professional development and co-planning)
administration
community resources, such as IEP development

The skills of collaboration are used to co-plan lessons, activities and events within the school, handle challenging situations that come up and even team-teach.

Therefore, any job that involves working well as a team with others is something you can speak to what you’ve done in your current role.

3. Active Listening

We don’t usually associate teaching with listening, but being an effective listener is a key aspect of being a good teacher.

Teachers need to use active listening in order to:

hear and address any concerns or issues that come up
assess students for what they already know, or what they learned

Needing to listen to the concerns of others and using the information you gather to move forward is something you likely often do as a teacher and can be applied to many careers, including:

Therapist or counsellor
Customer service or client relations
Human Resources
Sales
Journalism
Leadership + many more

Listening is sometimes an overlooked skill that is crucial to the above fields, as well as many others.

If you’re a good listener and used this skill as a teacher, be sure to highlight this and speak to how you will use active listening skills in your desired career.

4. Communication

While listening is a big part of communication, the other pieces of it include:

Clarity and conciseness: the ability to ensure that the message being delivered is clear and easy to understand
Using the appropriate tone and style for the situation
Respect for different opinions and points of view, and the ability to adapt communication style for the flow of the conversation and the relationship you have with the person

Education is a valuable and high-stakes resource for many people, and teachers need to be talented communicators who ensure that it runs smoothly.

How to communicate this on a resume: “As a teacher, I use impeccable communication skills to adjust my style and tone based on who I am delivering the message to. This ensures that a good working relationship and problem-solving with all parties, whether it’s my colleagues, admin, students or their families.”

5. Building relationships

A big part of teaching involves building relationships. We build and foster relationships with our students, their families, and our colleagues.

Building relationships involves building trust, using strong communication skills (as outlined above), adapting your style to suit the situation, and being able to read other people.

And trust me, the ability to build good relationships based on trust and communication is a golden ticket in terms of job possibilities in the corporate world.

Any job that involves business relationships, and establishing a good rapport can easily be related back to the skill you used in teaching.

6. Working with children

With a background in teaching, you’ve undeniably worked with many people under the age of 18; possibly even a variety of ages within that bracket.

There are many education-related jobs that aren’t teaching that involve working with children outside of a classroom setting. In addition, there are careers working with children that don’t involve being a teacher of any sort:

speech and language pathologist
child psychologist
nurse
dental hygienist
nanny
coach + many more

Being a teacher is the ultimate ‘working with kids’ job that tells an employer that you are comfortable and get along with kids. Whether your desired position involves working with large groups of them, or one on one – you’ve done both as a teacher.

7. Motivating others

Teachers are as much motivators, coaches and cheerleaders, as they are instructors.

And let me tell you, motivating other people is a very powerful skill that you can make good money from.

Motivating others involves:

Understanding their personal struggles and viewpoints, and being able to channel that into finding the adequate support, and establishing achievable goals

There are few other careers that involve needing to motivate others than a teacher; often jobs in sales, leadership, and other managerial positions.

Pro Tip: Remember- school is the ultimate place where people don’t want to be, and as a teacher, you get large amounts of students to buy into your lessons. That’s quite remarkable!

8. Cross-cultural competence and awareness

If you work in a public school, then you likely serve a diverse group of people. A big part of teaching in this day in age is:

fostering inclusion in the classroom
being respectful and knowledgeable about different cultural viewpoints and needs.

Diversity and inclusion are buzzwords in many workplaces now; not just education. Having skills in cultural awareness can be applied to almost any career that involves serving the public.

Pro Tip: If you speak another language, this is also a bonus to mention (whether or not you will use that language on the job.

9. Using feedback loops

Using feedback loops is about applying feedback for ongoing improvement. It is sometimes called ‘applying feedback.’

Teachers need to be open to feedback (from students, families and admin) and be able to analyze it effectively and apply it to their practice.

This is part of what makes us a flexible group of professionals.

10. Leadership

While the main task of teaching involves being a leader in the classroom, teachers often take on leadership roles within the school.

Examples include:

mentoring new teachers
running committees

Good leadership encompasses excellent listening, written and verbal communication skills, motivating others, and several interpersonal skills which we will get into below.

11. Public speaking

My least favourite skill that I had to use in teaching, but that I used every day – was public speaking.

Many people underestimate how often teachers need to use public speaking skills. Not only do we use them every day in front of large groups of children, but we often give announcements at assemblies, share demonstrations at staff meetings, and many other situations.

Public speaking is not something most people enjoy doing – in fact, about 75% of people have a fear of it. As a teacher, you may be more comfortable with it than the majority of people, which adds a definitely boost to your resume.

Teacher Intrapersonal Transferable Skills

The skills below do not involve the front-lining aspect of our jobs but are equally as valuable to teaching as the direct interaction we have with kids, our colleagues and student families.

12. Problem-solving

We teachers know better than anyone that several problems come up on our job.

We use good judgement, and decision-making under pressure to defuse situations and improve them for the better.

13. Attention to detail

Attention to detail is a quality that often gets overlooked when it comes to teaching, but it’s a crucial part of our job.

You can’t be a teacher without keeping good records, having well-thought-out lessons with a learning goal, and balancing many responsibilities. This involves impeccable attention to detail in the records you keep, and the assessments you make.

14. Resource Management

Resource management is being able to balance your resources (time, money and materials) to get the job done as efficiently as possible.

Some examples of how teachers use resource management:

Managing classroom time effectively in order to fulfill learning goals
Managing behind-the-scenes time effectively in order to ensure that all steps are needed
Ensuring that the classroom budget is distributed evenly throughout the year
Managing resources in order to ensure the support of a large group of diverse needs within the classroom

15. Data analysis

You can’t do teaching without doing some data analysis. As a teacher, you use the skill of data analysis to:

Calculate accurate marks for student report cards
Ensure that students are meeting grade-level expectations and that no one is slipping behind
Track the academic progress of students

16. Organization

As a teacher, you don’t need me to tell you how organized we need to be. Even people who aren’t naturally an ‘organized’ person are forced to adapt to the teaching profession where there are a lot of files and resources that need to be kept in order such as:

student work (graded, and ungraded)
assessments that you’ve made
documentation of classroom observations, parent communication
resources that you use, by subject
important dates to remember
the classroom (it needs to be set up in a way where things have their place)

And so much more. Be sure to highlight the amount of things you needed to keep track of and keep organized as a teacher, and how you can use this skill for a future job.

17. Emotional intelligence

I once heard that teaching is like “acting” because you aren’t being yourself for the day – you’re being your teacher self. What that really means is that you’re using a high degree of emotional intelligence.

If something upsets you, pushes your buttons, or you feel overwhelmed (which trust me, happens quite a bit) then as a teacher, you find the strength in yourself to always conduct yourself in a way that is professional, fair, compassionate and with the consideration many different viewpoints.

This requires a high degree of emotional intelligence as you set your own personal thoughts, feelings and emotions aside – and do what is best from a professional standpoint. And trust – many employers are looking to hire someone who can do that.

18. Critical Thinking

What we’re told is ‘best’ for the students, or what is mandated isn’t often what really is the most beneficial for their wellbeing – and teachers know that.

When it comes to issues like zero discipline, cell phones in the classroom – we have formed many of our own opinions through assessing the situation that has been created. This is critical thinking in a nutshell.

In addition, teachers use critical thinking to:

differentiate instruction and create accommodations. Each student is unique
interpret learning and governmental documents, such as the curriculum. They are often up to interpretation
analyze problems and struggles, and develop solutions

There is no ‘one size fits all’ with teaching, so you need to be able to think critically about scenarios in order to move forward. Teachers are some of the best critical thinkers I know!

19. Empathy

Empathy is an underrated skill that you may not think you need outside of working with children, but it is absolutely crucial in many jobs.

Having empathy for people means understanding them. If you can understand them, then you can sell things to them. Jobs in copywriting, marketing and advertising all require strong empathy skills.

How to Communicate this on a Resume: “As a teacher, my job is to understand the feelings, needs and perspectives of diverse groups of people; including my students, their families and my colleagues. I used my intuition of various points of view to curate good communication, and tweak lessons to reach and resonate with them effectively.”

20. Research skills

Teachers are some of the most resourceful researchers I know. They navigate several platforms to find information in order to provide the best learning experience for their students.

As a teacher, you need to research:

your subject matter, whether you know well or only at a basic level. I taught several subjects that I wasn’t an expert in (music, science and physical education.)
curriculum and board requirements; to ensure that I was fulfilling all the education needs of the class.

21. Patience

A big part of teaching is patience. Things do not always go as planned, and change doesn’t happen overnight. Teachers demonstrate patience in seeing the progress and benefits of their hard work over time.

In addition, teachers work with many different people – some very difficult. Patience is needed to handle challenging situations, and the resilience to work through them in order to achieve a desired result.

22. Evaluation

The skill of evaluation involves involves analyzing and assessing information, performance, and outcomes in order to make informed decisions or improvements for moving forward.

Teachers need this skill, but so do people who work in healthcare, marketing, project management, finance and many other fields.

How to Highlight this Skill on a Resume: “As a teacher, I used advanced evaluation skills to assess student performance, identify learning gaps, and adapt instructional strategies to meet diverse needs.” And then, show how you can apply these skills to jobs wwhere evaluating performance and making data-driven decisions are crucial.

23. Instructional design

Instructional design is my favourite part of teaching. It’s the creation of educational slides and presentations, lessons, syllabuses and worksheets.

Teachers are masters at instructional design – and luckily, instructional design is a career in of itself. It can done freelance, or it can be a hired in-house position.

You need to have the mind of a teacher to ensure that the materials effectively deliver the content -but you also have to have good empathy too.

Why do you need empathy in instructional design? Because you need to understand where the learning starts, and the natural process of how students absorb, process, and apply new information, adjusting your approach to meet their unique needs and responses.

24. Multitasking

A teacher’s job is all about multitasking. You are supervising a group while doing assessments. You’re listening to someone recounting an incident, while also keeping your eye on the time.

Multitasking isn’t necessarily great for us, but it comes in handy for jobs where you need to pay attention to multiple things at once.

25. Ethical judgement

Ethical judgment is a ‘must’ in public education, as well as the corporate world too.

It’s about making decisions that align with moral principles and professional standards. Emotions and personal beliefs are taken out of the equation, and instead, you apply your knowledge of the school board improvement plan, curriculum, laws, and other things that you as a professional need to know come into play.

This is a crucial skill when it comes to decision making, emotional intelligence, in mostly managerial type roles, and working with the public service.

26. Stress management

Teaching is a stressful job, there is no doubt about that – and it is becoming a more well-known fact. In fact, according to statistics, somewhere between 1/3 and half of all teachers experience anxiety on the job. (38% to 41.2%)

Now, you may be burning out from teaching. (I’m assuming this if you are looking to transfer your skills to other jobs.) But that doesn’t mean that you don’t exercise very exceptional stress management while on the job.

Pro Tip: Rather than speaking about how stressful your job as a teacher is, I recommend highlighting how you managed that stress. Use examples such as: “Demonstrated strong stress management by effectively balancing multiple responsibilities under pressure”

27. Monitoring

Monitoring can mean a few things in teaching, but its a skill that we need to use in order to:

track progress, and find important patterns
manage behaviour and ensure smooth transitions

Any job that requires you to track project progress, and timelines to ensure that objectives are met can be very relatelable to the skill of monitoring that you use as a teacher.

28. Decision-making under pressure

Being a teacher requires good decision-making, but because of the nature of the job, quite a few of those decisions are made on the spot

Here are the kinds of decisions that you frequently have to make under pressure as a teacher:

Handling any incidents that arise in the classroom. Many teachers have dealt with emergency situations
Responding to student inquiries about asking for permission to do something. (We need to make these decisions multiple times a day.)

While these may seem like small examples, our minds work pretty hard to analyze all sides of a coin to come up with the best response.

Any job that requires you to handle disruptions, respond to (potential) emergencies and handle time constraints are ones you could definitely do with your transferable teacher skills.

29. Technological Proficiency

Being tech-savvy may not have been important for a teacher in the 50s, but it’s impossible to be a teacher now without being decently good with tech.

You use programs such as:

Google slides, docs, sheets, and more
a special software for reporting
Tools to communicate with families
Are familiar with some AI tools and using them in the classroom

As teachers, we learn how to use new software quite frequently (usually harder, and less user-friendly versions of the ones we previously had). We also troubleshoot and solve simple tech issues that our students are having.

As a teacher, you have familiarity with learning to use new programs, which can be applied to a multitude of other careers

30. Adaptability and flexibility

You need to have a lesson plan as a teacher, but its not unusual for things to not go to as planned. Teachers are experts in revising their plan if something unexpected comes up, such as a disruption, emergency, or something completely out of left field.

Being a school teacher means having to effectively manage curve balls as they come, and making adjustments as needed.

31. Time-management

Time management is closely linked to resource management that we talked about earlier, but specifically related to time. So, if you’re applying for a job with a strong need for managing time (such as a project manager) then you should definitely speak to how you use this skill as a teacher.

Teachers use time management in and outside the classroom. In the classroom, we keep a close watch on timing, and predict how much time a certain task will take.

In addition, we have limited time outside of the classroom to get a lot of behind-the-scenes tasks completed, and we use time management to ensure that we maximize that time.

32. Conflict resolution

Teachers rarely get through their career (or let alone, a week in their career) without some form of conflict. This can be student-to-student conflict, between a student and a teacher, or a parent and a teacher.

As teachers, we use strong conflict resolution skills by:

Active listening to all parties involved in the conflict
Identifying the source or root cause of the problem, and using good communication skills to explain how it can be fixed
Defusing situations through emotional intelligence. (If you’re like me, you know that things can push our buttons at times – but it’s our job as professionals to maintain our composure and keep our communication resolution-focused.)

33. Keeping good records and data

A crucial part of teaching is keeping good records and documentation – especially in today’s day in age.

You keep records of student grades (formal and informal), their progress, communication with parents, documentation of learning, and incidents that occur in the classroom.

Doing our job wouldn’t be possible without a decent ability to keep through records. If you are proud of your record and data keeping as a teacher, then this is a skill you should highlight on a resume.

34. Proofreading and editing

Proofreading and editing is apart of a teacher’s job, especially if you teach the older grades that write a lot of essays.

Part of the proofreading and editing process that you use as a teacher (that will be applicable to jobs outside teaching too) are:

Using attention to detail to spot errors
Using AI checkers to ensure that the content is original and human-written
Identifying areas that need to be expanded on, for clarity for the reader
Making good notes and corrections for feedback to the writer, so that they know what they need to improve on
Proofreading our own work (report cards, class newsletters) for clarity, grammar correction and consiceness

An editor or proofreader can be a job in itself (often as a freelance position), but it can also

35. Seeing potential in others

Being able to see the potential in other people is a skill, and not always an easy one to find. If you’re the kind of teacher who doesn’t give up on that one kid that many others have, then this definitely a skill you should highlight on your resume (especially if you’re applying for any type of leadership position.)

When you see potential in others, then you would be good at:

Spotting potential in candidates
Motivating and inspiring team members
Offering constructive feedback with a growth mindset attitude that encourages others to perform at their best

36. Presentation planning

If you often follow the three-part lesson approach, then you know that the “minds on” part of our lessons are presentations that teachers deliver to their students.

Your presentations involve a good ‘hook’ to peak students’ interests, information, and possibly an accompanying video to complement the information you’re presenting.

Most of your presentations may be to children as opposed to adults, but they involve an ability to curate a presentation based on the needs of the group.

37. Delegating tasks

If you work in an elementary school classroom, you know that delegating tasks is apart of the job as a teacher. We need to be able to:

identify people’s strengths, weaknesses, and interests
consider input, and opinions
assign classroom ‘jobs’ to different members

Being able to see potential in people and highlight what strengths they bring to the table is part of a managerial role, and one that you can apply as such.

38. Growth Mindset

Growth mindset is a core value and skill in not only education, but in the private sector too. As an educator, you’re familiar with a growth mindset and how it correlates with learning and improvement.

Being able to apply growth mindset to any area you work in is an incredibly valuable soft skill that will be valued no matter where you apply.

In addition to knowing the value of your skills and being able to effectively communicate them on a resume, I also recommend reading some books on career change. Some books help with the skill of interviewing and changing careers, while others with mindset and inspiration. See my recommendations for the best career change books here.

39. Conscientiousness

Conscientiousness is more of a trait than a skill in itself, but this trait means that you have several other skills. People who are conscientious pay attention to detail, and ensure that things are done the way they’re supposed to be.

You use your conscientiousness to keep good records and data, make fair assessments, and analyze situations and provide feedback.

Transferable Skills from Teaching that I’ve Applied to My New Career

The job that I’m doing now couldn’t be more different from my job as a teacher. I now work from home, in front of a computer for a large portion of the day. I am my own boss, so I need to be self-motivated.

My main transferable teacher skills that I still use today are:

growth mindset
decision making
seeing potential in others, and delegating tasks (I hire people to work for me)
proof reading and editing
Research skills, critical thinking and organization

I use more soft skills than I do interpersonal skills, but this is just my preference and where my talents lie – it may look very different for you.

You can read more about how I went about leaving teaching here.

Teacher Transferable Skills FAQ

Here are the most commonly asked questions about transferable skills in teaching

What skills do you gain from teaching?

You gain many transferable skills from teaching; both interpersonal and intrapersonal – organization, problem-solving, decision-making under pressure, data analysis, technology, keeping thorough records and data, and building relationships; to name a few.

How to move up as a teacher?

Teaching is not often seen as a stepping stone to a ‘higher’ career; most people become teachers with the intention to stick with it. However, if you want to move ‘up’ from teaching, then one option is to become a principal, or a superintendent. you can also go into education consulting, curriculum writing, or politics.

Final Thoughts on Transferable Skills for Teachers

As a teacher who struggled with burnout, I reflected quite a bit on what my transferable skills as a teacher were that I could use in a completely different career. There are many teaching jobs outside the classroom setting, but personally, I wanted to get into something that wasn’t teaching-related at all.

School teachers have both interpersonal and intrapersonal skills which can be applied to a variety of positions – both employed, or self-employment.

Regardless of what you see yourself doing beyond the classroom, there are many transferable skills that you may not even realize that you use as a teacher. These transferable skills for teachers can be applied to other careers; even ones that are vastly different from teaching, and unrelated to education.