Soft skills or soft skills in English are at the heart of the news in the world of work. The new corporate culture requires a strong commitment from employees and the mastery of soft skills. Indeed, these so-called non-technical skills, but transversal and transferable, are very useful for increasing productivity and well-being at work.
What are soft skills, these 21st century skills?
Soft skills are character traits and intrapersonal and interpersonal skills that characterize a person's relationships with other people and their reactions to specific situations. In the workplace, these soft skills are seen as a complement to so-called "technical" skills or hard skills in English, which refer to a person's professional knowledge and skills.
Soft skills have more to do with who people are, their attitudes, than what they know. As such, they encompass character traits that determine the quality of interactions with others, events or environments, and are generally an integral part of an individual's personality.
They are much more difficult to acquire, at least in a conventional way, and also more difficult to measure. Hard skills, on the contrary, represent skills specific to a profession and are therefore more easily defined and measured.
A quick example to understand the difference between soft skills and hard skills
Suppose you want to improve your skills in using Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. In this case, you need to take a course, read articles online or in books, or learn from someone more experienced, and practice to acquire or refine your skills or hard skills in Excel.
Now suppose you need to return an important Excel spreadsheet to your supervisor. But you have to do it with your co-worker who doesn't like you.
In this case, it is not enough to master a spreadsheet or data collection, but also to know how to approach your colleague to put aside your differences and work constructively. This is a classic case where you have to mobilize soft skills.
Why are soft skills important in the 21st century?
As technology advances, it impacts and even revolutionizes entire industries, potentially making our jobs easier and our lives better. And while we don't always know the full scope of these technological advancements, it's clear that artificial intelligence (AI) and robotization are going to impact nearly every industry in one way or another.
AI transforms the notion of work
While experts debate whether AI will ultimately create more jobs than it destroys, we know it's already being used to help humans do their jobs better and increase the number of tasks people do. 'they can manage simultaneously. It is everywhere and its adoption is quickly becoming a necessity for companies wishing to remain competitive.
Driven by improvements in operational capacity, data management, the ubiquity of the internet, and technological innovations, the use of AI will evolve more and more rapidly in the coming years.
Machines will complement and help humans perform certain tasks. They will replace humans for tasks requiring calculation and memory capacities that we humans do not possess.
To mitigate the disruption ahead and facilitate a smooth transition to the “Age of AI,” it is essential that human employees consider new skills that will not be easily automated. The skills to be developed must focus on what AI and robots cannot or do poorly, such as empathy, critical thinking, management in uncertain environments, flexibility, leadership, creativity and work ethic.
In business, employees who have a good combination of technical skills (hard skills) and non-technical skills (soft skills) bring undeniable added value to their function.
But now let's see what, precisely, are the most relevant soft skills and why they are important for improving efficiency in the workplace.
artificial intelligence - soft skills
Artificial intelligence (AI) promises to fundamentally change the way we work
What are the most relevant soft skills in the workplace?
Now that we have given a definition of these transversal skills, let's try to understand what these skills are in practice.
Before giving you examples of soft skills, let's make a first basic distinction, useful for understanding the next concepts in this article. We can distinguish :
Intrapersonal skills, which concern the ability to learn and reflect and also different knowledge and attitudes;
Interpersonal skills, which relate to how you deal with others.
To give concrete examples, let us now see a non-exhaustive list of intrapersonal skills:
Self-confidence
critical thinking
Resilience
Initiative
Perseverance and taste for effort
Power of decision
self motivation
Time management
Creativity
Systems thinking
Stress management
Problem solving
And interpersonal skills:
Collective intelligence
Communication
Self-promotion
Presentation
Cooperation
Power of persuasion
Non-verbal communication
Rhetorical skill
Team work
Delegation
Moderation
Conflict management
Empathy
Off-centering
Influence and leadership
Networking
Can these soft skills be acquired and developed?
Now that we know what soft skills are, you are probably wondering how to acquire them.
Let's start from a basic assumption: according to Albert Bandura's theory of social learning, people learn mainly through the observable behavior of others.
According to him, most human behavior is learned by observation through modeling. Thus, from the observation of others, an idea of how the new behaviors are performed is formed, and then the coded information serves as a guide for action.
From there, we come back to the principle of “social proof”: this axiom tells us that on average, people tend to consider the choices made by a large number of people as valid.
That said, it won't be hard for you to understand how our behaviors, and their consequences, are shaped based on social interactions with our fellow human beings.
In fact, although most of these skills are innate, it is possible to perfect them and acquire new ones. How? 'Or' What ? The best way is to observe the virtuous and productive behaviors of others and make them our own.
We must try to understand what the needs of others are, learning to put ourselves in their place, with empathy. Changing perspective is a good start to improving our understanding.
It is essential to learn to actively listen to the people who work with us, to understand their difficulties and to try to help them by working in a common direction.
To acquire and develop soft skills, it is useful to rely on experiential training products that make it possible to build, step by step, learning programs to enhance and consolidate the skills of employees.
As Aristotle said, “What we must learn to do, we learn by doing. The principle of learning through experience is to propose a situation in which decisions must be made, actions taken, errors made, understanding and corrections. It engages learners by making participants actors in their learning and by sharing the situation with their colleagues and/or their environment to solve a problem or overcome a challenge. The debriefing with the trainer then makes it possible to discuss and reflect on the experience lived and on the future daily implementation of the skill.
Our training product, Best Factory, offers this scenario-debriefing link. Through the playful mechanics offered and its narration, it engages the participants in a memorable experience where they will mobilize different soft skills effectively, or not... Best Factory brings to life an experience that combines actions and emotions in order to offer a truly impactful training.
Active listening, nonverbal communication, and empathy are just a few of the traits employees need to possess in the modern workplace. But what benefits does soft skills training bring to a company's bottom line? Why is it important to hone soft skills in the workplace?
Many organizations focus, for example, on performance management and product knowledge training, as these have a direct impact on the profitability of the business. But they fail to recognize the importance of soft skills. Even though skills such as communication, conflict resolution and problem solving underpin all aspects of business operations. In each department and in each function, employees must improve their intrapersonal and interpersonal skills to improve their performance and strengthen team dynamics.
Here are some of the benefits that highlight the importance of building soft skills in the workplace.
5 examples confirming the importance of Soft Skills in the workplace:
1. Increase productivity in the workplace
Soft skills improve the performance and productivity of employees in all areas. They are able to manage their time more effectively and communicate their thoughts with ease. This allows them to speed up task turnaround times without compromising quality. Stronger team dynamics, through interpersonal skills, also facilitate greater collaboration. When everyone understands their role and also those of their colleagues, and works together to achieve common goals, then it is possible to talk about cooperation.
2. Reduce risk
Lack of self-awareness and self-confidence makes things risky in the workplace. For example, an employee is unable to communicate with his superior or adapt to new policies or protocols. Thus, he violates the rules or the policy of the company. Soft skills help them mitigate risk and solve problems on their own. They use creative reasoning to consider all possible approaches and implications. Then they follow up to get the best results. Their strategic planning allows them to look into the "crystal ball" of performance management to avoid compliance violations.
3. Build a stronger team spirit
It's not just customers who reap the rewards of soft skills training. The collaborator becomes a cohesive unit because he is able to collaborate and respect the point of view of others. These skills strengthen team spirit and the feeling of belonging to a community. Everyone stays positive and faces challenges with optimism. They view each new obstacle as an opportunity to grow and identify personal areas for improvement. In many ways, training focused on soft skills makes them more balanced.
4. Adapt to all situations
Adaptability means being able to change in order to succeed. Adaptability is a soft skill that employers look for when hiring candidates. Employees in leadership positions often have to deal with unusual circumstances for which there are no explicit instructions. They must learn to rely on their own judgment and have the confidence to make difficult decisions. The year 2020 shows the importance of knowing how to work in a volatile and uncertain environment.
5. Manage stress
Resilience is the process of being able to adapt well and bounce back quickly after a period of stress. This stress can manifest itself in family or relationship problems, serious health problems, problems in the workplace or even financial problems, to name a few. Developing resilience helps to adapt and bounce back from changes, challenges, setbacks, disappointments and failures.
