Top 12 Direct Support Professional Skills to Put on Your Resume
Crafting a compelling resume as a Direct Support Professional means showing the mix of people skills, calm-in-a-storm judgment, and steady technical know‑how that helps someone live the life they want. You’re proving you can support with dignity, communicate clearly, think on your feet, and document what matters—without losing the human thread.
Direct Support Professional Skills
- CPR Certified
- First Aid
- Medication Administration
- Behavioral Support
- Crisis Intervention
- American Sign Language (ASL)
- Therapeutic Restraint
- HIPAA Compliance
- Autism Spectrum Support
- Developmental Disabilities Knowledge
- Electronic Health Records (EHR)
- Positive Behavior Support
1. CPR Certified
CPR certification confirms you’ve been trained to respond to cardiac arrest with chest compressions and rescue breaths. In a DSP role, that means you can act fast, bridge the gap to EMS, and keep oxygen flowing when seconds count.
Why It's Important
It safeguards lives. Quick, correct CPR can double or triple survival odds while help is on the way—vital for people who may have complex health needs.
How to Improve CPR Certified Skills
Sharpen your CPR chops and keep them sharp:
Renew on schedule: Most certifications expire every two years; follow your state or employer requirement if stricter.
Drill the basics: Hands-on practice beats theory. Use manikins with feedback when available to refine depth, rate, and recoil.
Add-on training: Pair CPR with First Aid or AED courses so your response is seamless from start to finish.
Scenario refreshers: Short, frequent refresh sessions keep muscle memory alive and reduce hesitation.
Track guideline updates: When standards shift, adjust your technique and teach-back accordingly.
Competent CPR isn’t just a checkbox. It’s a promise that you’ll be ready when it’s loud, chaotic, and urgent.
How to Display CPR Certified Skills on Your Resume
2. First Aid
First Aid is immediate care for injury or sudden illness—control the bleeding, keep airways open, reduce harm, and steady the situation until the crisis settles or medical help arrives.
Why It's Important
For DSPs, it’s the frontline. You’re often the first responder in the room, and swift action protects health, comfort, and dignity.
How to Improve First Aid Skills
Make First Aid second nature:
Refresh regularly: Take updated courses and follow your organization’s protocols.
Practice scenarios: Role-play likely events—seizures, falls, choking—so your responses become automatic.
Know the person: Learn health histories, triggers, allergies, emergency plans, and preferred supports.
Scene safety first: Pause, scan, then act. One unsafe step can create two victims.
Communicate clearly: Calm voice, short directions, explain what you’re doing and why.
Use tools wisely: Keep kits stocked; learn how to use tourniquets, epinephrine auto-injectors, and naloxone if required by your setting.
How to Display First Aid Skills on Your Resume
3. Medication Administration
Accurate, safe delivery of prescribed meds—right person, drug, dose, route, time—with monitoring, documentation, and prompt reporting of side effects or concerns.
Why It's Important
It keeps treatment on track, prevents errors, and protects health. Small mistakes can snowball; vigilance stops them early.
How to Improve Medication Administration Skills
Raise the bar on med safety:
Ongoing training: Stay current on protocols, formulations, and high-alert meds; review your state’s scope of practice for DSPs.
Double-check culture: When feasible, verify labels and doses with a second trained staff member for riskier meds.
Use eMAR cleanly: Adopt electronic MARs, standardize entries, and close out tasks in real time.
Clear communication: Confirm orders, clarify ambiguities with pharmacists or prescribers, and document changes immediately.
Five Rights plus two: Right person, drug, dose, route, time—plus right documentation and right reason.
Monitor and report: Track adherence, watch for interactions, and escalate concerns promptly.
How to Display Medication Administration Skills on Your Resume
4. Behavioral Support
Strategies that make challenging behavior less necessary and positive behavior more likely—through understanding function, teaching skills, adjusting environments, and honoring preferences.
Why It's Important
It improves safety and quality of life, reduces restraint or exclusion, and builds independence through consistent, respectful support.
How to Improve Behavioral Support Skills
Level up your approach:
Know the person: Map triggers, motivations, sensory needs, and strengths. Individualization beats one-size-fits-all every time.
Relationship first: Trust and rapport lower the temperature before it rises.
Positive Behavior Support: Reinforce desired behaviors, teach replacement skills, and tweak the environment to prevent problems.
Plan for crisis: Train in nonviolent de-escalation, define steps clearly, and practice together as a team.
Continuous learning: Seek coaching, observe skilled colleagues, and review data to refine plans.
How to Display Behavioral Support Skills on Your Resume
5. Crisis Intervention
Short-term, high-impact support to stabilize acute emotional or behavioral crises, reduce harm, and restore control with the least restrictive actions possible.
Why It's Important
Because safety comes first. Fast, skillful intervention protects people, prevents escalation, and preserves dignity.
How to Improve Crisis Intervention Skills
Prepare before the storm:
Targeted training: De-escalation, mental health first aid, suicide risk, and communication under stress.
Active listening: Reflect, validate, and slow the pace. People calm down when they feel heard.
Empathy in action: Name feelings, offer choices, and keep your tone steady and respectful.
Safety protocols: Know when to call for backup, how to clear space, and how to exit if needed.
Team sync: Shared plans, common language, and quick post-incident debriefs tighten the net.
Self-care: Recovery matters. Rest, supervision, and peer support reduce burnout and sharpen judgment.
How to Display Crisis Intervention Skills on Your Resume
6. American Sign Language (ASL)
ASL is a complete language using hand shapes, movement, facial expression, and body grammar—widely used by Deaf and hard-of-hearing communities in the U.S. and parts of Canada. For DSPs, it opens doors to accessible, respectful communication.
Why It's Important
It removes barriers. People get information, make choices, and connect—without waiting for an interpreter or settling for partial understanding.
How to Improve American Sign Language (ASL) Skills
Build fluency that sticks:
Take structured courses: Programs from colleges and Deaf-led organizations provide foundation and feedback.
Practice daily: Short, frequent sessions beat marathon cramming. Record yourself; check clarity and facial grammar.
Immerse: Attend Deaf community events, join practice groups, and prioritize Deaf culture learning alongside vocabulary.
Use apps and videos: Tools like The ASL App and visual libraries help reinforce on the go.
Seek feedback: Mentors and peers can correct small errors that quietly block understanding.
How to Display American Sign Language (ASL) Skills on Your Resume
7. Therapeutic Restraint
A last-resort safety intervention that temporarily limits movement to prevent imminent harm—used only when legally permitted, clinically justified, and no lesser alternative will keep people safe.
Why It's Important
When risk spikes and all de-escalation fails, correctly applied restraint can prevent injury. But the real goal is to avoid needing it at all.
How to Improve Therapeutic Restraint Skills
Do less, safer, and smarter:
Prioritize prevention: Deepen skills in trauma-informed care, PBS, and sensory supports to reduce crises.
Train and recertify: Use approved, evidence-based programs; practice techniques exactly as taught.
Assess continuously: Identify triggers early, adjust environments, and offer alternatives before escalation builds.
Follow policy and law: Know state regulations, documentation rules, time limits, and required notifications.
Document and debrief: Record objective facts, injuries, and outcomes. Debrief with the person and team to prevent recurrence.
Care for staff and person: Monitor for distress, offer support, and ensure medical checks when indicated.
How to Display Therapeutic Restraint Skills on Your Resume
8. HIPAA Compliance
Protecting the privacy and security of health information—paper, electronic, or spoken—under the HIPAA Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Rules.
Why It's Important
People trust you with sensitive details. Compliance keeps that trust, prevents harm, and meets legal obligations.
How to Improve HIPAA Compliance Skills
Lock down the basics:
Regular training: Refresh on minimum necessary standards, PHI handling, and breach procedures.
Secure systems: Strong passwords, device locks, encrypted messaging where required, and clean desk habits.
Limit disclosure: Share only what’s necessary for the task, with authorized parties, in private settings.
Report quickly: Escalate suspected breaches immediately per policy; time frames matter.
Audit yourself: Periodic checks of charts, access logs, and conversations keep drift in check.
How to Display HIPAA Compliance Skills on Your Resume
9. Autism Spectrum Support
Person-centered assistance that respects sensory profiles, communication preferences, routines, and interests—aimed at increasing autonomy, comfort, and connection.
Why It's Important
It helps people learn skills, navigate sensory worlds, and engage in community on their own terms.
How to Improve Autism Spectrum Support Skills
Refine support with intention:
Keep learning: Study autism-informed practices and co-occurring conditions; integrate evidence-based strategies.
Individualized plans: Co-create goals that reflect strengths, interests, and priorities, not just deficits.
Communication clarity: Use visuals, plain language, and predictable routines; check understanding rather than assume it.
Build independence: Task analysis, prompting and fading, and meaningful choice-making—at the person’s pace.
Positive behavior supports: Identify function, teach alternatives, and shape environments to reduce triggers.
Sensory awareness: Offer regulation options—movement breaks, noise control, lighting adjustments, preferred tools.
Community inclusion: Align activities with interests; prepare in advance and debrief afterward.
Partner with families: Share strategies, listen to insights, and align routines across settings.
Team up with pros: Coordinate with therapists, educators, and clinicians to keep plans consistent.
How to Display Autism Spectrum Support Skills on Your Resume
10. Developmental Disabilities Knowledge
Understanding lifelong conditions that begin before adulthood, how they affect learning, mobility, communication, and daily living, and how to support people to reach their goals in inclusive, rights-focused ways.
Why It's Important
Knowledge guides action. It shapes supports that are respectful, effective, and tailored rather than generic.
How to Improve Developmental Disabilities Knowledge Skills
Widen and deepen your base:
Structured education: Courses, workshops, and certifications focused on intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Professional community: Engage with the National Alliance for Direct Support Professionals (NADSP) and similar groups for ethics, standards, and peer learning.
Current research: Read summaries, attend webinars, and translate evidence into everyday practice.
Hands-on learning: Shadow specialists, request coaching, and reflect on real cases with supervision.
Cultural competence: Learn how culture, language, and identity intersect with disability and support planning.
How to Display Developmental Disabilities Knowledge Skills on Your Resume
11. Electronic Health Records (EHR)
Digital records that centralize histories, medications, allergies, plans, and notes—so care teams share the same, up-to-date picture.
Why It's Important
Accurate, timely information improves coordination, safety, and continuity—especially across shifts and providers.
How to Improve Electronic Health Records (EHR) Skills
Make the system work for care:
Standardized training: Teach consistent data entry, narrative clarity, and smart use of templates.
Security first: Role-based access, strong authentication, and quick lockouts for lost devices.
Interoperability: Use systems that exchange data cleanly to reduce duplicate work and errors.
Feedback loop: Gather staff input to simplify workflows and cut clicks where possible.
Go mobile when appropriate: Real-time notes reduce memory gaps; ensure policies cover mobile use.
Update and maintain: Keep software current; patch promptly to protect data and performance.
How to Display Electronic Health Records (EHR) Skills on Your Resume
12. Positive Behavior Support
A proactive, person-centered framework that teaches skills, modifies environments, and uses reinforcement to grow desired behaviors and reduce behaviors of concern.
Why It's Important
It shifts focus from managing crises to building success. Dignity goes up, restraint goes down, and life gets bigger for the person you support.
How to Improve Positive Behavior Support Skills
Strengthen PBS in practice:
Learn the principles: Functions of behavior, motivating operations, reinforcement schedules, generalization.
Relationships matter: Know preferences deeply; choice and predictability are powerful interventions.
Individualize plans: Align strategies with history, communication style, culture, and goals.
Be proactive: Adjust routines, clarify expectations, and teach replacement skills before problems surface.
Use data: Simple, consistent tracking guides tweaks and shows progress that stories alone can miss.
Reflect and refine: Review outcomes, invite feedback, and adjust supports without ego.
How to Display Positive Behavior Support Skills on Your Resume
