Why A Modern Employee Needs Soft Skills
Many people challenge the label “soft skills,” saying that these should be “essential skills”—which couldn’t be farther from the truth. Skills such as critical thinking and time management are necessary to survive the “real world,” as the adults call it.
From the moment children begin school, mentors teach to focus on studying, which means memorization and learning how to solve math equations. There’s not much emphasis on developing critical thinking and socialization skills—skills that will later be essential in their resume. From general labor staffing to an art job, soft skills are vital for every employee.
What are soft skills?
Soft skills are the interpersonal skills that make it easier for people to coexist in a work environment. These contribute to a satisfactory output in the workplace, especially an ever-changing and fast-paced one. When you come to think of it, these are skills that employers look in a “star employee”:
- Collaboration
- Critical thinking
- Work ethic
- Confidence
- Communication
- Creativity
- Grit
- Time management
Since these traits are not very teachable, it can be difficult for other people to develop them over the years. Unlike their counterpart, the hard skills, soft skills are mostly learned through social situations and life experiences.
Soft skills are needed to thrive in a modern workplace
In today’s society, workspaces are turning into collaborative and innovative spaces. It’s not only between co-workers, too, but also outsiders. According to Forbes, “companies ranging from Google to Barclays have offered up space on their premises to innovators and start-ups.” This kind of strategy benefits both the people and the company. First, the employees get to meet hundreds of new people. Second, the company can discover new potential talents to hire. Third, it keeps the company up-to-date on various start-up industries.
From this alone, soft skills such as collaboration and communication play significant roles in surviving the modern workplace. Welcoming different kinds of people from various industries would need a lot of socialization and exchange of ideas.
Soft skills keep hard skills useful
Being great at something like math, science, and other technicalities of a job could be rendered useless if not accompanied by a good work ethic, creativity, and confidence. For example, a writer may have perfect grammar, beautiful use of language, and hits every point of narrative rules, but if this writer is drowning in self-doubt, a story could remain unedited and might not see the light of day. In the workplace, an employee who consistently reports with a fantastic output but fails to work with the team and accept criticism could be one of the favorite topics of office titter-tatter.
It is through these soft skills that people truly impress each other. Soft skills involve connecting with other people while also working on self-improvement. As a result, a person grows to become a pleasant company.
The takeaway
Overlooking the significance of soft skills may only lead to producing incompetent employees in the future. Therefore, schools and other training ground should double their focus on developing these skills to mold a productive future.
