It’s time to leverage your soft skills – here’s how

The Momentum Files #42

… and which skills to focus on!

When it comes to confidently showcasing your skills and abilities, people typically talk about their hard skills because they’re much easier to quantify. But more than ever, your soft skills are in high demand – and highly valued.

Hard skills are role-specific and entail competencies, skills, and abilities needed to perform a specific task.

Soft skills are people-specific and entail personality traits, skills and knowledge needed to perform interpersonal activities. Think of soft skills as human skills.

Soft skills are more difficult to articulate and quantify but also some of the most important skills in our current climate where your ability to adapt, lead, communicate and problem solve is not only desired by employers… but a must-have.

So, the question is… how do you leverage your soft skills?

To leverage your soft skills, you must showcase how you implement them in your professional role and the impact that follows.

Let’s talk about four of my favorites.

👉 Soft Skill #1: Communication

We all need great communication skills. There’s no way around it. We are now in a world of remote, in-person and hybrid work environments that come with an increasingly overwhelming number of communication tools (Slack, Trello, Zoom, Voxer, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, phone calls, emails and more!). Your ability to effectively communicate – and listen! – must be on point.

Depending on your role, your communication skills are needed for things like:

Negotiation, persuasion, public speaking, writing reports and proposals, demonstrating emotional intelligence and empathy (one of the top-needed skills!) and storytelling – which comes into play in your marketing, presentations and influencing others like a customer, team member or CEO.

To leverage your communication skills:

  • Identify where, how and when communication impacts your role.

  • Take advantage of opportunities to showcase your communication expertise - including your resume, performance reviews and interviews - and how this ability has resulted in desired results and impact.

  • Prepare yourself by having a relevant story in your back pocket. For example: I leveraged our online presence to build strong relationships with industry leaders which, in turn, prompted them to invest $300k in our company.

👉 Soft Skill #2: Critical Thinking & Problem-Solving

We work with people in-person, on screens, in different time zones and using a gazillion different methods to collaborate. To succeed in this rapidly evolving environment where things can change on a dime or in ways you might not anticipate… your ability to think critically and come up with creative new ideas is more challenging (and more needed) than ever.

To leverage your critical thinking and problem-solving skills:

  • Think about situations where you’ve had to identify and understand problems, analyze potential outcomes, devise solutions and make informed decisions quickly.

  • Use your creativity (which I consider a first cousin to critical thinking and problem-solving) to articulate what you can do – and have done – with these soft skills to get good results.

  • Remember there are many ways these skills come into play: Curiosity, flexibility, critical observation, design ideas, innovation, research skills, resourcefulness, tolerance of change or uncertainty, troubleshooting and a willingness to learn.

👉Soft Skill #3: Leadership

Don’t be distracted by job titles! You don’t need the word “manager” or “leader” in your job title to implement and demonstrate leadership skills. You can be an influencer and leader on your team even if you’re not the person in charge of the team.

To leverage your leadership skills:

  • Think about how you inspire and motivate the people around you.

  • How do you manage people, manage situations, make decisions and hold yourself accountable for your choices?

  • Demonstrate – and talk about, when appropriate – how you’ve effectively managed conflict, resolved difficult problems, made innovative decisions, delegated, facilitated, given clear feedback, worked with people remotely, led projects and mentored. ← All especially important if you’re looking for advancement opportunities!

👉 Soft Skill #4: Teamwork & Collaboration

I don’t think there’s a single job posting that doesn’t talk about your ability to collaborate. We all do it, but again, it’s about showcasing how you do it. And this is key - how do you show that you’ve achieved results because of your ability to collaborate?

To leverage your teamwork and collaboration skills:

  • Highlight moments when you have given and accepted feedback, dealt with challenging situations, navigated office politics, promoted diversity and disability awareness, demonstrated empathy, established interpersonal relationships, accomplished goals alongside those with difficult personalities, influenced a team or shown your approachability.

  • Have a relevant story at the ready. For example: I collaborated with internal stakeholders and clients to create new systems and protocols that support our changing needs. Our work resulted in a renewed contract. Another: After leading a project with a new team, there was a significant increase in employee morale.

❗️ Remember this…

To leverage your soft skills, you must showcase how you implement them in your professional role, and then convey the results and the impact that follows.

When you identify where and how you’ve used your soft skills, recognize the achieved results and tell these stories in the right moments – you shine a light on the value you bring.

And in today’s fast-changing environment where the ground seems to repeatedly shift under your feet, these soft skills – and your ability to show how you’ve mastered them – can open doors to new opportunities.

Was this helpful to you? Reply and let me know what you think… and how I can help you!

 
Cindy Haba