Find out the top 10 core skills you need to master as a cadd drafter and what hard skills you need to know to succeed in this job.

A CADD drafter uses computer-based design software to make drawings, which are used in the manufacturing industry or building projects. This means that they can work in a wide range of sectors such as civil, manufacturing, mechanical, and electrical.

Other duties of the drafter is to develop drawings which can then be used by engineers, surveyors, and architects to make decisions about procedures, materials, dimensions, and codes. Drafters can also specialize. For instance, architectural drafter designs for architects while civil drafters make designs for construction projects. Mechanical CADD drafters make designs for mechanical devices. Others include aeronautical, pipeline, and electrical CADD drafters.

Core Skills Required to be a CADD Drafter

Core skills describe a set of non-technical abilities, knowledge, and understanding that form the basis for successful participation in the workplace. Core skills enable employees to efficiently and professionally navigate the world of work and interact with others, as well as adapt and think critically to solve problems.

Core skills are often tagged onto job descriptions to find or attract employees with specific essential core values that enable the company to remain competitive, build relationships, and improve productivity.

A cadd drafter should master the following 10 core skills to fulfill her job properly.

Facilitation:

Facilitation is making tasks or life easy for others while ensuring the daily running of successful meetings or workshops or business at large.

A CADD Drafter must use facilitation to process and structure a system that meets the needs of either an individual or a team to help them achieve their goals as well as add value to their lives by making sure each participates.

Dealing with Difficult People:

Dealing with Difficult People is learning how to tactfully calm down an obnoxious person who is either verbally attacking you or stealthily criticizing you or your professional contribution.

A CADD Drafter must learn how to combat and tone the demanding customers or staff who are competing for power, privilege or spotlight which defy logic not with fights but with the truth and more listening skills as well as lots of patience.

Networking:

Networking is the process that encourages an exchange of information and ideas among individuals or groups that share the same interests.

A CADD Drafter is required to establish policies and procedures that govern networking to form professional relationships that will boost the future of business and employment prospects while maintaining regular contact with each other to gain each other's trust thus developing few quality relationships.

Supervisory Skills:

Supervisory Skills is the ability to lead and manage people effectively in a difficult and challenging atmosphere in the day to day life.

A CADD Drafter must cultivate, develop and refine management and supervisory skills to strengthen the present as well as build the future of the business by becoming competent in such roles like problem-solving, communication, managing people, time management, leadership, planning, etc.

Developing Others:

Developing others is an unremitting process that focuses on the broader, longer-term growth of individuals to nurture them to their potential and promote future development.

A CADD Drafter needs to support, coach, positively impacts and effectively aid in developing talents of their staff by motivating them to become outstanding in their behavioral change and performance improvement that opens up development opportunities in the organization.

Potential for Advancement:

The potential for Advancement is the ability to make something better by being more skillful, more efficient, and more useful to produce high-quality results.

A CADD Drafter needs to invest in his employees by creating room for individual advancement that encourages stronger job performance because it positions the employees to demonstrate just how well they can perform their jobs through motivation and feedback that are critical to the employee performance.

Role Awareness:

Role Awareness is the ability to be informed of your role in a given environment as well as understand the expectations placed on a position and to see how they are met apparently.

A CADD Drafter must assess, measure and quantify his employee's awareness of their roles to see if they are transparent about what is required of each of them and review what kind of results they are delivering from their understanding.

Deadlines - On time:

Deadlines - On time is the ability to prioritize the important tasks and setting up a plan on how to work on them first to deliver within the set period.

A CADD Drafter must have the art of managing deadlines by being able to prioritize the work that is set for scheduling to the workers according to how vital the projects are and how soon they need to be executed and submitted.

Business Trend Awareness:

Business Trend Awareness is the capacity to be conscious of the changing ways in which the companies are developing in the marketplace.

A CADD Drafter should have the required knowledge of new business trends that he can instigate or follow and the understanding of how they are impacting the business decisions which will eventually bring success to the employees as well as the enterprise

Technology Trend Awareness:

Technology Trend Awareness is staying updated with the useful upcoming trends that can serve your business better and easier.

A CADD Drafter must be able to look back at the setbacks and success of the company and consider new possibilities for the future by the use of technology looking for a better, faster, more practical approach that can make business more productive.

Hard Skills Required to be a CADD Drafter

Hard skills are job-specific skill sets, or expertise, that are teachable and whose presence can be tested through exams. While core skills are more difficult to quantify and less tangible, hard skills are quantifiable and more defined.

Hard skills are usually listed on an applicant's resume to help recruiters know the applicant's qualifications for the applied position. A recruiter, therefore, needs to review the applicant's resume and education to find out if he/she has the knowledge necessary to get the job done.

A cadd drafter should have a good command of the following hard skills to succeed in her job.

CADD Drafter: Hard skills list

Analyze Survey Reports, Maps, and Data to Plan Projects
Assess Environmental Impact and Risks
Assemble Project Deliverables
Assist With Staging, Testing, and Shipping of Equipment Prior to Deployment
AutoCAD
Communication
Compile and Submit Permit Applications to Local, State, and Federal Agencies
Create Blueprints Using CAD (Computer Aided Design)
Critical Thinking
Decision Making
Design Public Work Projects
Develop Designs, Layouts, and Design Calculations
Develop Project Scope and Timeline
Ensure Job Sites Meet Legal Guidelines, and Health and Safety Requirements
Experience with Civil 3D
Experience with Microstation
Experience with Reinforced Concrete and Steel Design
Experience with On-Site Construction Observation and Management
Highly Detail Oriented
High Level of Analytical Thinking
Identify Possible Design Improvements
Leadership
Listening
Manage and Monitor Each Stage of Project
Manage the Repair and Maintenance of Public and Private Infrastructures
Map Reading
Mathematics
Organizational Skills
Perform or Oversee Soil Testing
Perform or Oversee Surveying Operations
Physics
Prepare Designs and Estimates
Prepare Conclusion and Analysis Reports
Present Environmental Impact Statements to the Public
Proactive and Willing to Take on New Challenges
Project Management
Provide Cost Estimates for Materials, Equipment, and/or Labor
Recommend Modifications for Design Improvements and Simplification
Sound Knowledge of Engineering Fundamentals
Technical Skills
Technical Writing
Test Building Materials
Understand and Design Within AASHTO Guidelines
Understand Diagrams, Drafts, Flow-Charts, and Other Information and Documentation
Use Software to Design Within Industry and Government Standards
Work Effectively Under Pressure

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