How to Improve Your Soft Skills

Soft skills play a vital role for professional success; they help one to excel in the workplace and their importance cannot be denied in this age of information and knowledge. Good soft skills -- which are in fact scarce -- in the highly competitive corporate world will help you stand out in a milieu of routine job seekers with mediocre skills and talent.

The Smyth County Industry Council, a governing body based in the US, conducted a survey recently. The results of the survey was called the Workforce Profile which found "an across-the-board unanimous profile of skills and characteristics needed to make a good employee." The people most likely to be hired for available jobs have what employers call "soft skills".

Here were some of the findings according to the workforce study:

The most common traits, mentioned by virtually every employer, were:

~ Positive work ethic.

~ Good attitude.

~ Desire to learn and be trained.

Mohan Rao, a technical director with Emmellen Biotech Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Mumbai [ Images ] defines a 'good attitude: "It is a behavioural skill, which cannot be taught. However it can be developed through continuous training. It represents the reactive nature of the individual and is about looking at things with the right perspective. You must be ready to solve problems proactively and create win-win situations. And you must be able to take ownership ie responsibility for your actions and lead from the front without calling it quits at the most critical moment."

Most of the business leaders observed that they could find workers who have "hard skills" ie the capability to operate machinery or fulfill other tasks, but many potential hires lack the "soft skills" that a company needs.

CEOs and human resource managers said they are ready to hire workers who demonstrate a high level of "soft skills" and then train them for the specific jobs available. The ever-changing impact of technology has given hard-skills-only workers a short shelf life.

According to results of the Workforce Profile, (source: www.workforce.com) the more valuable employee is one who can grow and learn as the business changes.

Soft skills "are as important, if not more important, than traditional hard skills to an employer looking to hire -- regardless of industry or job type. This could offer a major breakthrough as educators and training providers seek to develop and cluster training courses to fit business and industry needs."