By: Yadi Caro
Dealing with conflict between co-workers and managers costs companies about $359 billion per year or at least 3 hours a week per each worker. Bad team communications cost companies at least US12k a year. On the other hand, companies that prioritize emotional intelligence are 22x more likely to perform higher than companies that do not.
These statistics reflect a reality: if you are not investing in teaching soft skills to your employees, you are losing your competitiveness in the market.
Communication, conflict management, dealing with our emotions are all known as ‘soft’ skills. These are the skills we use to interact with other humans like communication, listening, managing time, resolving conflict.
The term was first seen used in the 1940s by a US military training command, where the researchers referred to soft skills as “those which involve little or no interaction with machines whose application on the job is quite generalized because the situation or context contains a great deal of uncertainty.”
Uncertainty is the name of the game today with a competitive job market where we must be able to work from anywhere, and where machines will one day master the hard skills we take pride on. Generally, we would attribute soft skills to the manager-types who may know little about the technical work done by engineers.
Managers would come in and save the day settling the conflict among the team members, communicating with customers to translate technical jargon, or ensuring that the hot-tempered star in the room is not bothered by others.
We need soft skills not just to play nice with others. These are essential to help us navigate the workplace to get work done effectively, save time, reduce our stress, and help us succeed. Harvard research shows that 85% of job performance is due to having a high emotional intelligence. When it comes to hiring, a LinkedIn careers survey said 92% talent professionals consider soft skills matter as much as hard skills.
Tech leaders like Bill Gates have expressed how essential is to be able to communicate and work with others. Google’s Satya Nadella cited how empathy is an important business skill, that we should not even call it “soft.”
Therein lies the critical fact about soft skills. Seems few companies and people are actively trying to master them. It is estimated that at most only 10% of company budgets is spent on soft skills.
The next time your brainstorming session becomes a blame party as team members do not know how to give feedback, after you have wasted multiple hours working on unclear requirements from a customer, or when you think how you could have asked for a better salary, think of how you and your organization could have benefitted from soft skills training.
What kills projects and tech teams is not a lack of technical talent, it’s a lack of soft skills. Soft skills make hard skills work, so prioritize them just like any tech skill.
