I graduated with a liberal arts degree and absolutely zero understanding of how to frame my skill set. My skills felt like a useless, random, confusing tangle of vague concepts that failed to point me in a clear direction.

It took years for me to understand that, even as someone without specialized expertise, I did have a solid skill set that was marketable, transferable, and valuable—what I didn't have were the right tools to help me articulate and understand it.

Read more about the skills are actually the most valuable and tools in your toolbox—and the ones that you can most easily take with you from job to job.

I'm headed to two graduations this weekend, and that sea of caps and gowns makes me think back to my own transition from those "time-honored walls" into the real world. 

Here's a snapshot of baby Carole Ann, with my mom adjusting my silly hat and glasses; I was SO ready to close the "good student" chapter of my life and take the world by storm. But there was a hitch: I graduated with a liberal arts degree and absolutely no understanding of how to frame my skill set. (Can I get an amen?)