5 Durable Skills to Grow by the End of the Year

Are you looking for durable skills to grow before the end of the year, whether at a foundational level or striving for greater advancement? I’ve created a list of five foundational, intermediate, and advanced durable skills to help you get to the next level.

Foundational skills are the core skills you should have as you enter the workforce. Intermediate skills will expand your knowledge base and help you stay competitive in your career path. Finally, advanced skills promote your abilities to lead others, which are often the skills that help you get to the next level of your career.

5. Accountability

Accountability falls under the foundational skills category and refers to taking ownership of actions and responsibilities. Accountability is one of those things that everyone should know but often avoids out of fear of retaliation or judgment. In my career, I have often respected leaders who modeled accountability.

In fact, I can recall one instance of a leader who took responsibility when his development team inadvertently created the opportunity for a major patient data breach. Although he wasn’t directly responsible for the issue or a data breach, he took ownership of his team’s work and understood that someone needed to be held accountable. Unfortunately, he was let go because of this incident, which is a very extreme example of how this skill was modeled. In our own lives, accountability can and should be at the core of projects, mistakes, failures, and communication breakdowns.

4. Financial Goal Planning

Financial goal planning is an obvious skill to have in the last quarter of any year. As teams and companies look toward finances for the upcoming year, this is a critical time to begin or continue developing this skill. Financial goal planning is considered an intermediate skill defined as simply setting and managing financial objectives.

Financial goal planning doesn’t have to be relinquished to the accounts payable or finance departments. Individuals can use this skill in their own budgeting on a daily basis. Additionally, as individuals move up in a company, consider a side hustle, or engage in entrepreneurship, this skill is critical to enable solid fiscal sustainability and understand where money is going. In my own corporate career, I’ve never actually been responsible for a budget. However, in my own business and personal finances, I have had to learn how cash flow, budgeting, and profits and losses can affect my financial security. Oftentimes, this is not a skill directly taught to us, unless we enter the finance field. Instead, it is passed from leader to teammate in the corporate setting, or parent to child in households. Nonetheless, end-of-year is a great time to ask your leader to support you or guide you on financial goal planning within your department or company.

3. Experimentation

Another foundational skill to grow by the end of the year is experimentation. With the seemingly constant onslaught of new information, ways to accomplish tasks, and technological advances, it’s important to maintain a willingness to try new approaches and learn from the outcomes. Experimentation supports fresh perspectives, regardless of the industry or role you’re in or looking to transition into.

Experimentation could be as simple as testing out a few new AI tools to see which one might work better to create audio for a course. We often think that kids and researchers experiment; while that is true, everyone should continue exploring new ways to do things. As adults, we tend to stagnate and do the same things, the same way. This could be due to a fear of being wrong, failing, or simply looking silly for doing something differently. In reality though, it helps us continue to evolve in our careers and lives, and helps us navigate change more effectively. Experimentation naturally involves an increased level of resilience and an opportunity to let go of an expected outcome. Experimentation is about seeing what happens and then making necessary shifts.

2. Performance Measurement

While performance measurement often is left to senior leaders or analytics teams, it’s a critical skill for anyone looking to advance in their career. That’s why this skill is considered advanced and can help you shine in quarterly business reviews or end-of-year team meetings. Performance measurement is the ability to measure progress and outcomes. Sounds simple, right? How progress is measured at your company may look different. For instance, some companies use KPIs, others use OKRs, and still others may use something completely different, or a blend of the two. Find out what that measurement is in your organization (or make up your own if nothing exists), then work to evaluate data to understand if you’re meeting goals.

1. Teamwork

I am listing teamwork as number one because, as companies continue to enforce return-to-office mandates, many of us must re-learn how to work as a team in person. Additionally, to help reach year-end goals, most of us must partner with fellow teammates, which can sometimes be difficult. Especially if a layoff, departmental re-org, or budget crisis affected any of the team. Leaders and teams must consider the impact on project timelines and deliverables when there is a change in the organization or team. Do you have some big projects and/or deliverables that need to be accomplished by the end of the year? Make sure to build in a teamwork activity or focused time to get to know other teammates and how they work best during your next team meeting. While this soft activity can sometimes be considered a “waste of time,” I assure you that even a simple activity of learning how others on your team like to be communicated with can significantly shape and support ongoing communications as the heat intensifies on accomplishing goals.