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Answering key selection criteria is a difficult task, even for professional resume writers, like me. They are time consuming, challenging and call for a lot of focus and attention to ensure they sell your skills inline with the question being asked

However with a little practice and preparation it does get easier and the rest of this article gives you a system that you can use that will help you provide the best possible responses you can, in answering key selection criteria.

Step 1. Ascertain that there are, in fact, Key Selection Criteria that need to be responded to for your application to be considered. Download any job descriptions and skim read from beginning to end, highlighting key words and phrases that look to be the key to success for this position. Are there any KRAs - Key Results Areas? Is there an importance weighting on any aspects of the role? Is there a word or character count limit?

Step 2.Once you have completed step 1 pull together all the terms you have highlighted and use them to create a paragraph about the key elements for success in the role. This can act as a guide for your responses to the Key Selection Criteria. Is it necessary for you to answer each criterion as an outline or in-depth?

Step 3. Now you can start to attack the Key Selection Criteria. Highlight key words such as: Demonstrate; Experience, Knowledge of, capacity to acquire, qualifications, problem solving, team, leadership.

Step 4. To build your confidence select the criterion you consider the easiest, this could be one about qualifications and experience, perhaps. Create a brief statement that outlines your qualifications and years experience and state your qualifications in full. If your experience includes titles that you deem relevant include them too. This is your outline response. If a more in-depth response is needed back it up with with an example of your experience.

Step 5. For all criterion you repeat as before. A great way to help you create strong examples is to use C, A, R - circumstance, action, result or S, A, O - situation, action, outcome. For each criterion construct a story following one of these formulas. As an example, if you are writing about customer service - the circumstance might be: There was a backlog in getting Christmas gift mailings out on time. The action would be: I investigated the possibility of using express post parcels - this was still within the budget and the parcels arrived on time, with happy customers. The outcome: Without this there would have been many returns and refunds due to late delivery. I have paraphrased the above and if I was responding to such a criterion I would add more detail, but not too much.

Step 6. Since you have written a story for each criterion, re-read and edit each one, making them only as long as they need to be. You want to make every word count. Remember also to keep your answers in the first person, action oriented - by making use of verbs and positive.

Step 7. Get someone else review your responses. You can even get someone to read them out loud to you, or just do it yourself. This is a proven way to check for clumsy language and any mistakes.

So there you have it, 7 steps to answering key selection criteria that will keep you on point and should assist in your success, as long as you follow it.