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In the 21st Century, soft skills have been established to be a major differentiator for employability and success in life. 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). In another study by the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) The State of the Industry Report (Green and McGill, 2011), U.S. employers spent $171.5 billion on employee learning and development in 2010, and 27.6% of those training dollars went to soft skills training?
Soft is often attached to words such as modifiable, subtle, lenient. At times, it can have extreme negative connotations such as gullible, weak, less powerful. When soft skills are six times more important than hard skills for job success, it is about time to rename or redefine the term soft skills. When EQ or behavioural skills are harder to assess, learn and develop, why call them soft? With a baseline of technical skills, it’s the behaviour or attitude of a person that determines his success.
It was a wonderful interaction with fresh minds when they were given the task to rename ‘Soft Skills’. When techies realize that it’s not the technical skills that will make them successful in life, it makes it imperative to reposition the importance of Some interesting terms that came out after a brainstorming session were ‘ Essential social skills’, ‘Core Skills’, ‘Human Skills’.
A shout out to the HR fraternity to rename Soft Skills!!!
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