It has been 100 years since the 85% soft skills, 15 % hard skills concept has been identified for job success. However, the importance of soft skills training is not being heard. Here’s what Stephanie Miller (MS Environmental Science & Research Trainee at US EPA) states about her experience with graduate students and soft skills: Many graduate students are so focused on developing expertise in their field that they may neglect to realize how important it is to actively work on skills like communication, time management, or conflict resolution. These skills are critical in the workplace, and being able to demonstrate them can really help a student stand out in today’s competitive job market.

Obviously, this claim that graduate students often put soft skills on the back burner does not only apply to graduate students, as it can be extended to most students in educational and training programs today. However, no interviewers will ask students if they have a soft skill. Instead, they’ll ask for proof of the skill based on concrete examples. What they are looking for are well-rounded and skilled employees ready to contribute to an organization–not particularly the ones with the most experience.

The Graduate School at the University of Cincinnati has compiled a list of soft skills that employers seek. Here are the top ten soft skills that, when cultivated, will set you apart from the rest:

Dependability – Being dependable means that you do what you say you will, when you say you will. You can be trusted to complete any task, and you will do it well.

Motivation – You should be able to motivate yourself to get tasks done, and take the initiative to find new ways to improve upon not only yourself and your work, but also your organization.

Communication – This is one of those skills you hear about all the time, and that’s for a reason. Communication is the key to any human interaction, especially in the workplace.

Commitment – Employers want to know that you’re not only committed to the company and your job, but to turning out the best work you can, every time.

Creativity – Can you think about problems in a new and interesting way? Show your employer how.

Problem Solving – If you’re confronted with a problem, employers want to know that you will do everything you can to fix it. Your creative skills will come in handy here.

Flexibility – Sometimes, your job is going to be a little like a roller coaster. Can you adjust to the chaos?

Teamwork – You’re not done with group work after graduate school. Working in a team is an essential part of almost every job.

Leadership – You may not be a natural born leader, but can you step up and guide either a group of people or a process if necessary?

Time Management – Life gets busy, both in and out of the workplace. You need to be able to balance your workload and prioritize what gets done.

The “hard skills” learned in class are only a part of what’s necessary to be a successful employee. Business leaders are becoming more and more concerned with what they call the “skills gap” in today’s graduates. They’re concerned that today’s generation doesn’t have all of the necessary “soft skills” to succeed in today’s workplace. It’s time to ask yourself: Are you doing everything you can right now to develop the skills that will sell you as the best choice for a job? If not, it’s time to get started.

Reference: https://grad.uc.edu/student-life/news/soft-skills.html

Talk the Talk

Almost every community in this country has business leaders who have decided to make their feelings known about the lack of preparedness of recent graduates to enter the workforce. For years employers have been demanding that potential employees possess such skills as communication, social skills, professionalism, critical thinking and teamwork, to name just a few. These are all soft skills.

Employer surveys bemoan the lack of soft skills in new hires. Yet seldom, if ever, is the topic of soft skills addressed in our educational institutions. Even in our post-secondary career training programs the lack of soft skills training is clearly evident. (See Examination of Technical Skills Training—Hard Skills vs. Soft Skills, National Soft Skills Association, March, 2015 https://www.nationalsoftskills.org/examination-of-technical-skills-training-hard-skills-vs-soft-skills/ )

This failure is hard to understand since research conducted by Harvard University, the Carnegie Foundation and Stanford Research Center has all concluded that 85% of job success comes from having well-developed soft and people skills, and only 15% of job success comes from technical skills and knowledge (hard skills). These statistics were extrapolated from a Study of Engineering Education, authored by Charles Riborg Mann and published in 1918 by the Carnegie Foundation.

Almost 100 years have passed since this research was released and we still do not want to address the need for soft skills training. There are many reasons for this failure, however, it is now time for businesses to take it upon themselves to get this job done.

Who Is the Customer?

Every business leader knows that, in order to stay in business, you must ask yourself, “Who are my customers, and how can I address their needs?. The harsh reality is that a big difference exists between the public and private sector. In the private sector, if you do not address the needs of your customers, you are out of business. In the public sector, that is usually not the case. The question is if business leaders can address the needs of their customers, then why is it that the public sector cannot?

The answer is that leaders in education do not see their customers and their needs as clearly as the business leader does. Ask any educator who the customer is and you will mostly likely get a variety of answers, including education regulators at the state and federal level, school boards, teacher unions, parents, and students, to name just a few. What does not get identified is the true customer of our educational systems—our communities and the workplaces in those communities.

Here is a simple fact – if educators cannot recognize their customers then how can they possibly meet the needs of those customers?

A Call to Action

“All I can say as an employer and as a chair of a workforce development program preparing youth for the workplace, YES, YES, YES – I am shouting with joy that soft skills are being addressed. I have been moaning and grumbling for many years saying, “If soft skills are not there, it doesn’t matter if we can train brain surgeons.”

This is one of the many comments we have received regarding our efforts to infuse soft skills into training programs across the country. This person is in a unique position, as both employer and as an educational leader, to clearly see the negative effects of the lack of effort to address soft skills training in training programs. Unfortunately, most educational leaders and decision makers do not see it at all, to say nothing of clearly. This must change!

Walk the Walk

It is time to wake up for your very survival. Research shows that it now costs approximately one year of a person’s salary to hire and then be forced to let go an employee due to a lack of soft skills. The cost is staggering and most businesses cannot afford to do this. It is time for you to address soft skills in both your hiring and training processes. If you don’t, then who will?

There was a discussion in a recent FastCo Article on how colleges and universities will look in the next 10-15 years. This is how the process used to look:

1. Graduate high school
2. Pick a major
3. Pick a college/university with that major
4. Graduate
5. Get a job
6. Pay off loans

Technology is forcing higher education to look more at outcomes and teaching competencies rather than focusing on seat time. Competencies that employers are looking for go beyond the technical skills of a job. 60% of employers complain that job applicants lack interpersonal and communication skills. Another 93% of employers care more about critical thinking, communication and problem solving skills than an undergraduate’s concentration.

Focusing more on a holistic approach will foster better learning outcomes and meet the needs employers are looking for. Higher education is going to become even more competitive and finding a way to incorporate these skills into their curriculum is going to be crucial moving forward.

A manager of a medium sized manufacturing firm once said, “ I can teach my employees how to do most any technical skill, but I cannot teach them how to have a positive attitude.”

This statement mirrors what most educators and corporate trainers say when questioned as to why they choose not to address soft skills in their training programs.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Did you ever hear of a self-fulfilling prophecy? According to Wikipedia, Robert K. Merton is credited with coining the expression “self-fulfilling prophecy.” Merton defines it in the following way: The self-fulfilling prophecy is, in the beginning, a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the original false conception come true.”

The statement, “I cannot teach soft skills” is a self-fulfilling prophecy and it means “I cannot.” That is that, end of discussion.

Not so fast. This prevailing attitude among some educators and trainers is a defeatist attitude that will result in a self-fulfilling prophecy for, “Whether you think you can or think you cannot-you are probably right.” (Henry Ford)

Think in the Positive

The statement, “I cannot teach them a positive attitude,” is, in itself, an example of a negative attitude. Let’s take the positive approach. Try this simple exercise. “I can teach my employees how to have appositive attitude.” Now doesn’t that feel better? We have moved from the negative to the positive, from impossible to possible, from hopeless to hopeful. Remember, if you do not believe it, then how will anyone else believe it?

Step 1-Identify the Competencies of a Positive Attitude.

Let’s identify the competencies for a positive attitude. The way one thinks or feels about something is known as one’s attitude. The underlying competencies of attitude are key emotional intelligence traits that must be possessed in order to help build a positive attitude.

Each of these emotional intelligence competencies can be learned and developed into positive personal habits.

Next let’s take a closer look at the core competencies of a positive attitude.

When teaching each of these core competencies of a positive attitude, keep explaining these basic principles for developing a positive attitude:

• Avoid negative thinking and complaining
• Spend time with people who have a positive attitude
• Be thankful for your job
• Give yourself a chance to recharge
• Reward yourself for doing a good job

Step 2- Model the Behaviors

This is perhaps the most important step of them all for helping your program participants to develop positive attitudes- model that behavior yourself.
Behavior modeling is the proper demonstration of a desired behavior. According to the theory of behavior modeling, we learn not only by doing but also by watching what others do. So if you want to have someone learn a positive attitude, you must model that behavior yourself so that others can see how it is done.

Video modeling is a relatively new concept in behavior modeling. It is simply the proper demonstration of a desired or targeted behavior that is recorded in a video so that it can be viewed multiple times, especially in the real world in real time. The use of smart phones and tablets makes this a very popular and effective method of behavior management.

Step 3-Developing the Habit of a Positive Attitude

Once the competencies for developing a positive attitude are understood the next step is to teach your participants how to develop them into good habits.

A habit is a behavior that is repeated often without thinking about it.

Here is a simple procedure for developing a habit:

• Change what you say—positive affirmations
• Your verbal statements control your feelings
• Your feelings control your thoughts
• Your thoughts control your behaviors
• Your behaviors control your habits

Repeat these steps until the desired behavior becomes habit.

In summary, there is no reason to say that you cannot teach a person to have a positive attitude. It is simply not true. What is true is that, if you follow these simple rules about changing a negative attitude to a positive attitude, you will change a person’s life forever, in a very positive way.