Not so long ago quiz shows like University Challenge, Mastermind and Ask the Family were about general knowledge or your specialist subject. Typically questions ranged from ,who composed the 1812 Overture to who scored the winning goal at the last Cup Final to be held at the old Wembley? But the latest trend is for brain teasers, logical puzzles and lateral thinking. You will know exactly what I mean if you have watched The 1% Cub on ITV , Only Connect or House of Games on the BBC.

Lateral thinking and the ability to solve puzzles are skills organisations are coming to realise are more useful than what was previously referred to as ,”specific knowledge” on the Person Specification. The reason is that as organisations strive to become Agile organisation they put a higher value on transferable skills. They want people who can adapt quickly to new areas of business and have the skills to take on responsibilities in areas they have no professional  background in. Such individuals have transferable skills, that is skills that are equally applicable what ever the area of business. Examples of transferable skills are people management, budget management lateral thinking and problem solving.

In my own career there was a point when I was working in a large complex organisation that following a reorganisation and management restructuring meant I moved  from managing a range of health and social care services which I had a professional background in to Head of Resources responsible for HR , Finance and IT which I had no professional background or qualifications in. What I did have was transferable skills in people management, budget management and problem solving.

I applied the idea of transferable skill when it came to recruitment. I was willing to consider and interview people who did not have a background in the service /area of business they were applying for provided they could demonstrate transferable skills. I changed the PS to reflect the emphases on transferable skills. Clearly if someone was appointed to a post in an area they had no background in then they needed to be able to have the ability to get up to speed quickly-in it’s self a transferable skill. As more organisation redesign themselves to be Agile organisations expect them to start identifying transferable skills in PS’s and to specify a requirement for lateral thinking and problem solving.