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Custodial officer skills for your resume and career

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted expert

Jennifer Gibbs Ph.D.

Below we've compiled a list of the most critical custodial officer skills. We ranked the top skills for custodial officers based on the percentage of resumes they appeared on. For example, 22.7% of custodial officer resumes contained emergency calls as a skill. Continue reading to find out what skills a custodial officer needs to be successful in the workplace.

15 custodial officer skills for your resume and career

1. Emergency Calls

Here's how custodial officers use emergency calls:

Respond to emergency calls, entering patient areas to restrain patients, control fights and riots or assault on staff.
Maintain security within the institution* Take emergency calls and dispatch appropriate resources* Gather warrant information/driver's license look-up/financial responsibility information for deputies

2. Security Checks

A security check is the processing of manually or automatically checking if a person is armed before entering a building. It's also the checking of a perimeter to see if it's secure. It goes further into the investigation on the background of an individual before the person is employed in an organization to check if there's any criminal record of the person in the past.

Here's how custodial officers use security checks:

Conducted security checks and inspections of working environment.
Perform head counts, pat down search on inmates, room search and security checks.

3. Law Enforcement

Law enforcement is the task of certain members of the community who work together to uphold the law by identifying, preventing, rehabilitating, or prosecuting others who break society's laws and norms. The phrase refers to the police, the judiciary, and the correctional system.

Here's how custodial officers use law enforcement:

Worked closely with local law enforcement and secret service on multiple sensitive initiatives.
Answer 911 lines Dispatch Law Enforcement Take calls from the public regarding ordinaces

4. Communication Systems

Here's how custodial officers use communication systems:

Communicate effectively and coherently with other officers and inmates using existing communication systems.5.
Monitor and control all communication systems, surveillance systems and emergency signal systems.

5. Booking

Here's how custodial officers use booking:

Assisted officers in the booking of suspects; searching, fingerprinting, transporting.
Perform booking procedures, searching, fingerprinting * Assist in training new employees.

6. Public Safety

Public safety can be defined as the well-being or protection of a community, citizen, or nation as a whole. There are 4 basic elements that come under public safety namely: national security, border policy, countering crime, and emergency management.

Here's how custodial officers use public safety:

Supervised offenders in a way that assured their needs are met and the public safety is assured.
Monitor several complex public safety radio frequencies.

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7. Criminal Justice

Here's how custodial officers use criminal justice:

Managed inmate files to include identification, court documents, inmate banking, inmate property, and other criminal justice related paperwork
Graduate of South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy as Class Leader.

8. Direct Supervision

Direct supervision is a term used to indicate that a person is supervising a certain task or a certain person while being physically present or in close proximity. It refers to the presence of a person and the availability of their supervision in something if it is needed.

Here's how custodial officers use direct supervision:

Provided 100 percent direct supervision of detainees that were located in housing units awaiting adjudication for release or deportation.
Monitored the security of the Detention Center through direct supervision and security cameras.

9. Emergency Situations

Here's how custodial officers use emergency situations:

Maintain accurate inventory of working radios and provide instruction for usage during normal operations and emergency situations.
Maintained necessary files and reference publications, required to respond to all mobilizations or emergency situations.

10. Incident Reports

An Incident Report, in a medical facility such as hospitals and nursing homes, is a type of paperwork filled out immediately after and in the case of an incident of some sort, with the goal of describing the incident and its consequences, as well as the measurements taken after or during the incident, as well as any other information relevant to said incident. Such an incident might be a patient acting out or a patient being injured.

Here's how custodial officers use incident reports:

Complete daily logs; equipment inventory, count sheets, entry and exit logs as well as disciplinary and incident reports.
Operated and maintained security equipment.Documented activities through log book entries and Incident Reports.

11. CPR

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation or CPR is a medical procedure that involves chest compression to help a patient breathe. This artificial ventilation helps in keeping the brain function in place and regulates blood throughout the body. CPR is a lifesaving procedure that is used in emergencies.

Here's how custodial officers use cpr:

Advanced training in First Aid, Cpr, takedown, defensive and handcuffing techniques.
Certified CPR instructor for the department giving regular training classes for new deputies and yearly refreshers for all deputies.

12. Intake Process

Here's how custodial officers use intake process:

Received and processed inmates from officers and the courts, maintained inmates' property and directed inmates throughout the intake process.
Book and Complete intake process of inmates inform inmate rights, take photos, and fingerprints.

13. Medical Appointments

A medical appointment is a scheduled / specific day and time for a person to be examined or treated by a physician, nurse, or other licensed healthcare professional. The aim of the medical appointment is for the physician to be able to identify health problems or illnesses at an early stage.

Here's how custodial officers use medical appointments:

Transport migrants to court and medical appointments.
Supervised inmate transport within the facility and medical appointments while maintaining security.

14. Emergency Response

Here's how custodial officers use emergency response:

Coordinated and monitored residents movements, conducted head counts, and provided emergency response.
Coordinated and monitored inmates movement, conducted counts & provided emergency response as needed.

15. Court Appearances

Here's how custodial officers use court appearances:

Handle the processing, detention, and court appearances of those arrested by the Ocean City Police Department.
Process documents for court appearances and mental health clinic.

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What skills stand out on custodial officer resumes?

Jennifer Gibbs Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Pennsylvania State University - Harrisburg

Police officers need many skills to be successful on the job. The most important are written and oral communication skills and the ability to make ethical decisions with limited information quickly. Written communications skills are crucial. If a police report is poorly worded or incomplete, it can derail a criminal case. Police officers also need to talk to people of all ages from all walks of life in any circumstance. Often, police meet people on what may be the worst day of their lives when emotions are running high. Police need to be able to help calm a person while gathering information. Police need to be able to use their words and body language to empathize with someone who has been victimized, and they need to project authority, so people making poor decisions obey their commands.
This may be common sense, but research has demonstrated that communication and ethical decision-making skills are important for police officers. (See the research article published in 2017 in the Journal of Criminal Justice Education, entitled "An assessment of the relative importance of criminal justice learning objectives," by Baker and colleagues.) Baker and colleagues asked students, professionals, and college professors to rate the skills of hypothetical job applicants. These participants rated the following as the most important characteristics for criminal justice applicants (including law enforcement officers):

Ethics
Oral communication
Critical thinking
Sensitivity to diversity
Written communication skills

Do you want to know more?

List of custodial officer skills to add to your resume

The most important skills for a custodial officer resume and required skills for a custodial officer to have include:

Emergency Calls
Security Checks
Law Enforcement
Communication Systems
Booking
Public Safety
Criminal Justice
Direct Supervision

Emergency Situations
Incident Reports
CPR
Intake Process
Medical Appointments
Emergency Response
Court Appearances
Correctional Facility

KYC
Control Room
Cell Checks
Computer System
Strip Searches
Head Counts
CCTV
Lims

Updated January 8, 2025

Zippia Team

Editorial Staff

The Zippia Research Team has spent countless hours reviewing resumes, job postings, and government data to determine what goes into getting a job in each phase of life. Professional writers and data scientists comprise the Zippia Research Team.

Updated January 8, 2025

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