What is skill? Soft Skills: "Soft skills" of a hard character.

In modern career guidance, in trainings and in articles on pedagogy, American terms such as "hard skills" and "soft skills". In this article we will talk about their meaning, where they came from and what an ordinary person should do with them.

What are hard and soft skills?

Hard skills- (English “hard” skills) professional skills that can be taught and that can be measured. To learn hard skills, you need to master knowledge and instructions; the quality of training can be checked using an exam. Examples of hard skills: typing on a computer, driving a car, reading, mathematics, knowledge of a foreign language, using computer programs.
Soft skills- (English “soft” skills) universal competencies that cannot be measured quantitatively. They are sometimes called personal qualities because they depend on a person's character and are acquired through personal experience. Examples of soft skills: social, intellectual and volitional competencies such as communication skills, teamwork, creativity, punctuality, poise.

Short story

The terms hard and soft skills originate in military affairs. In 1959, the US Army began developing a science-based approach to military training. During the development, researchers identified the importance for military personnel of not only professional skills (hard skills), but universal competencies (soft skills), which are not amenable to systematic training. The understanding of the differences between soft and hard skills was expressed in the doctrine of the 1968 Military Training Design System in this way: hard skills are the skills of working primarily with machines, soft skills are the skills of working with people and papers. After the terms took root in military science and psychology, they became freely used in business. Today, in vacancies, including those in Russian, you can find hard skills and soft skills instead of the sections “professional skills” and “personal qualities”.

What are the differences between hard and soft?

To succeed in mastering hard skills intelligence (left hemisphere of the brain, IQ, logic) is required for development soft skills“emotionality” (right brain hemisphere, EQ, empathy) is required.
Requirements to hard skills remain the same regardless of the company you work for, the people and the corporate culture. Soft skills, on the contrary, are changeable and situational. For example, programming is a hard skill: the rules for creating good program code will be the same for any programmer in any company. Communication skills belong to universal competencies (soft skills): the rules for constructing an effective speech will depend on the audience to whom the speaker is addressing, on the speech situation (a conversation in the subway or a speech at a conference).
Master hard skills possible in various educational institutions (schools, institutes, additional courses). Usually they have certain levels of difficulty, which you can gradually climb, like a ladder. For example, English language proficiency is divided into levels Elementary, Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate, Upper-Intermediate, etc. To get a new level, you must pass an exam. Unlike hard skills, to master soft skills There are no easy step-by-step instructions: a person either has a quality from birth (for example, friendliness, a calm nature), or acquires it through experience, through trial and error (for example, the ability to work in a team, leadership qualities). Soft skills are learned more slowly than hard skills.
For hard skills There are certificates and diplomas confirming that the employee has the necessary professional skills. Soft skills do not have certification and it is much more difficult to prove their existence.

What skills are still more important?

This mainly depends on the profession and position in which the person works. Can be called 3 groups of professions according to the ratio of soft and hard skills:
1. Professions in which hard prevails over soft: For example, a nuclear physicist who can be a great specialist and excellent at his job, but at the same time lack the ability to work in a team and interact with people.
2. Occupations that require both types of skills equally: for example, lawyers, accountants, customs officers. These specialists require a set of professional skills, as well as communication skills, organization, patience, and kindness, as they work with people.
3. , in which soft skills prevail: for example, sales, business, politics or creative professions. Thus, there are skillful salespeople without marketing education who win clients with their charm. Effective sales involve a variety of social competencies: the ability to speak beautifully and competently, speak in public, the ability to listen, the ability to win over an interlocutor, self-confidence, etc.

It is worth admitting that soft skills are the competencies of the future . Of the two nuclear physicists, the one who develops his social competencies will be more successful. He will probably be able to have a more successful scientific career than his unsociable colleague.

How do you know if you need to develop soft skills?

If you want to understand how necessary soft skills are in your work, then answer a few questions:
1. How important is how I interact with others to my career advancement?
2. Are there people in the company in a similar position who move up the career ladder faster?
3. Does my temperament affect my advancement in the company?

If you answered “yes” to these questions, then working on your universal competencies is simply necessary. For reference, we will tell you, what universal competencies are most promising?(based on LinkedIn professional network research):

Communication skills
Organization
Skill to work in team
Punctuality
Critical thinking
Creativity
Flexibility
Friendliness
Leadership skills
Ability to solve complex problems

Our Center has developed a whole range of trainings for schoolchildren, allowing them to develop social, intellectual and volitional competencies in adolescence. This is the period when a person’s adaptation to society occurs. Communication takes on exceptional importance; an uncommunicative teenager will find it difficult to interact with the team, he will feel like a stranger and emotionally depressed. Trainings help identify problems in the development of soft skills and, with the help of activating techniques, turn them into personal strengths.
We will be glad to see you at our programs!

To find out which field of activity suits you best, you can

Skill - comes from the English word skill and is translated as ability or mastery. What is a skill in online games? It is a specific skill, ability or ability. At the same time, there is another meaning – the skill of the player, his ability to achieve results.

The term appeared in RPGs and only then moved to online games.

A skill in a game can be understood differently in the gaming environment, depending on what is being discussed in a particular case. To understand more clearly what this is, let's consider several cases.

In an online RPG

In Dota 2, World of Warcraft and other MMORPGs, these are the unique abilities and skills of the hero. It could be magic, jumping and punching that help him achieve success against his opponents.

In these games, skills can be divided into two types, differing in their operating principles:

Passive (abbreviated as passive) - do not involve choosing a goal and are often tied to time. For example, calling for help, passive and aura skills.
Active – targeted abilities for a specific purpose. Focus on a target or specific area. Causes targeted damage to a specific target and consumes mana or its equivalent.

In Counter-Strike

Here the term refers to the level of skill. The more opponents a person destroys, the cooler he plays and thus his skills become better. The level of battle skill here can be increased due to the successful completion of tasks, the number of deaths and frags, and the quality of shooting.

In World of Tanks

Here this term means clear and effective actions aimed at winning. A WoT player's skill consists of the following indicators:

Ability to penetrate the armor of different tanks.
Ability to act tactically correctly on different maps.
Own experience.
Quality of equipment in the tank.
Quantity and quality of game mods.
Communication with other people during battles.

Examples

“I’m pumping up my skills”

“Put your 1st skill on auto attack”

The role of universal competencies, or soft skills in Western terminology, is growing in the modern labor market. Soft skills are mental and interpersonal competencies that, unlike hard skills, are not quantifiable or certifiable. They are sometimes called personal qualities because they depend on a person's character and are acquired through personal experience. Soft skills include: organization, curiosity, good memory, ability to plan, etc. In this article we will talk about soft skills that modern employers value.
Read more about the contrast between hard and soft skills.

Why is the “baggage” of your soft skills important for building a career?

Without differences in the set of soft skills, all graduates of the same faculty who received the same education could apply for the same position and job. And they would do the job the same way. Obviously this is not the case.
Imagine two nuclear physicists. They have honors diplomas from MEPhI University, they work in a design bureau designing a nuclear power plant power unit. Their professional skills do not differ; their education and place of work are the same. But their “baggage” of universal competencies is different.

One of them works well in a team, is confident and friendly. And the second prefers to work with drawings rather than communicate with colleagues, but at the same time he is methodical in performing calculations. Most likely, their future careers will develop differently. The first will be able to remain a specialist or work in the analytical department, but he may also be entrusted with leadership positions with prospects for career and salary growth. And the second will only be able to grow as a specialist or analyst, that is, develop within the framework of his professional skills.
The described situation shows that the set of soft skills affects the breadth of professional choice: the more competencies a person has developed, the more options for professional development are possible in the future.

4 types of soft skills

To expand your capabilities in the profession, you need to develop 4 different groups of universal competencies: social, intellectual, strong-willed and leadership.

1. Social competencies are responsible for successfully interacting with people.

Communication skills
Competent written and oral communication
Ability to speak in public
Emotional intelligence (the ability to recognize the emotions and motives of other people)
Flexibility and accepting criticism

2. Intellectual competencies are responsible for ongoing professional development within their field.

Analytic mind
Ability to see and solve problems
Good memory
Learning ability
Creativity

3. Volitional competencies are responsible for achieving work goals.

Result oriented
Time management
Perseverance
Stress resistance
Willingness to do routine work

4. Leadership competencies are responsible for the successful use of resources to achieve common goals.

Decision making skills
Responsibility
Ability to form a team
Mentoring
Ability to resolve conflicts

Full list of competencies which will help you in writing your resume, download it from our website. But remember that simply listing soft skills will not impress the employer. The list must be supported by real facts and your achievements. Soft skills cannot be put on the table in front of a recruiter like a diploma; they should be demonstrated during the interview and during the probationary period.

When and how to develop soft skills

The foundations for some universal competencies are given to a person from birth, for example: perseverance, good memory, curiosity. But most soft skills can and should be developed throughout your life. They are not taught in school, but there are many ways to acquire them.

Example of parents: helps to adopt some of the competencies characteristic of parents. So, if adults know how to find the right way out in conflict and stressful situations, the child learns their behavior: he learns flexibility, calmness, and the ability to find compromises.
Sections and circles All types of competencies are developed for children. Sport develops strong-willed competencies, and team sport teaches, among other things, how to work in a team. Music and drawing develop both hemispheres of the brain and give impetus to all intellectual competencies. Logical thinking develops while playing chess.
Project work at school allows you to develop social, leadership and intellectual competencies. The project simulates real work in a professional team, where there is a manager, specialists, a communicator, an innovator and other roles. At each stage of project development, various types of competencies are trained: distribution of roles (leadership), discussion (social competencies), research work (intellectual competencies), project presentation (social competencies).
Children's camps- a place where children constantly communicate with each other. Camp is especially relevant in adolescence, which is the peak of the development of social competencies. Even more practical benefits are brought by developmental camps - language, sports or career guidance camps, like the "Professionals of the Future" camp.
Development training- the most effective option for soft skills training, available to both children and adults. During the training, the development of competencies is not a background task, but a target task set by the facilitator and the implementation of which is monitored. You can learn about trainings for teenagers and the competencies they are aimed at.

And, of course, many competencies come with experience. Learn and develop soft skills to live an interesting life and achieve more!

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Speaking about project management in particular and about success in management in general, it is necessary to reveal one of the fundamental terms - soft skills.

I have never seen a sane translation into Russian. The translation option “soft skills” literally breaks the mold. Just imagine that, for example, the phrase “up to you” will be translated to you as “up to you.” It's the same with soft skills. These are not soft skills! Because an attentive reader will immediately ask - what, are there also some hard skills? In a word, it’s not a matter of softness, hardness or any other adjective. What then? What are soft skills really?

I recently had a conversation with one person who argued that soft skills are a beautiful and correct wrapper for hard skills. I completely disagree with this formulation of the question, and below I will tell you why.

Soft skills are an umbrella term that refers to a variety of behaviors that help people perform at work as well as socialize successfully. And you and I know that socialization is when a person interacts with other people, even if this interaction does not occur personally face to face, but through the Internet, telephone or even through paper letters. In a nutshell, soft skills are the good manners and personality traits needed to interact with other people and build good relationships with those people. There are also bad personality traits, bad manners - but they do not help build good relationships, and therefore we exclude them from the set of soft skills.

In contrast to hard skills, which include technical skills and the ability to perform certain functional tasks, soft skills are used in any industry, any profession, any type of activity and any interaction between people. It is often said that hard skills will help you get an interview, but soft skills will help you get and keep a job, or even create your own company.

Soft skills include good oral and written communication skills, the ability to sympathize and empathize with others; ability to cooperate and; Willingness to solve problems and skills to resolve conflicts. We can say that soft skills are about emotional intelligence. Also soft skills often call people skills or interpersonal skills, which is already noticeably closer to the essence of this term than “soft skills”.

Another feature included in the set of soft skills is situational awareness. This means that you are able to monitor how the situation around you is developing, you know, know how and consider different ways to respond to it with actions that will give the best result for everyone involved in this situation.

Another important feature of soft skills is adaptability or flexibility, which is the ability to perform equally well in different situations and the ability to switch from one situation to another without becoming frustrated or becoming unable to continue performing your tasks successfully.

The ability to be diplomatic and respectful, even when others are present, is another key trait in the soft skill set. This ability means that you are able to maintain a professional tone and appropriate demeanor even when you are disappointed, upset or offended.

An employee with strong interpersonal skills is able to clearly articulate his needs, his expectations of the team and environment, and listen carefully to how others articulate their needs and expectations. He negotiates with others in such a way that each participant is left with the feeling that he was heard and understood, and all this was done in a respectful and professional manner, even if the participants do not get what they said they would. In such a situation, an employee with strong interpersonal skills understands when and at what point it is possible and when it is worth stopping. Understands when to speak, when to listen, and when to offer.

Serious companies highly value employees who can correctly formulate their thoughts, communicate correctly and respectfully with others, listen to others, understand and accept (not necessarily agree, but accept) other points of view and respond to various situations in a manner and in ways that do not offend other people's feelings - all this is likely to ensure that such people will be able to work well in a team.

They consider it very valuable to have such skills in their technical employees, since they often need these employees to be able to explain something purely technical without oversimplification or condescension, and in a style that is understandable to anyone. It is important for serious companies that their technical employees can understand and respect what their non-technical colleagues expect from their work and their products.

Companies believe that employees with these skills can not only produce better results, but also help create a positive work environment.

While many leaders have these abilities and use them intuitively, many others must practice and work to develop these skills. It has been scientifically established that a person is indeed given some such skills by nature, but their conditional strength is no more than 15% of the maximum that can be developed through regular practice. , books and articles on leadership, self-reflection and self-improvement can help develop those areas that you think need improvement. By asking friends and family, colleagues whose opinions you trust, you can also determine which skills from a large set of soft skills are worth developing and why develop them. Another way to improve your qualities is by observing and imitating people with developed soft skills.

Good luck in developing your soft skills!

Today you will learn what soft skills are and what skills you need to train in order to grow to the head of the company.

Today I will tell you what is hidden behind another newfangled word that has firmly entered the vocabulary of personnel officers, company owners, HR managers and simply those who like to flaunt all sorts of foreign terms.

We'll talk about what are soft skills.

Don’t be alarmed, everything is extremely simple (I was surprised when I found out what it is), but today it is vital for people who want to make a career.

Why did I become interested in what soft skills are?

No one will blame me, or my parents either, for nostalgia for the Soviet Union.

Firstly, because we are not at all used to looking back into the past, and secondly, because it really was a terrible era of repression, lies, propaganda and total shortages.

In short, there is absolutely nothing to regret.

But when I observe how difficult it is today, and even more difficult, to make a career, I inevitably think about how much easier this matter was before.

Everyone worked; there were more vacancies than there were residents of the giant country.

To rise to the rank of boss, you had to be an expert in your field and unconditionally believe in Ilyich’s precepts.

Today, even super-duper professionals are forced to spin like a squirrel in a wheel, constantly improve their skills, stay in training, study all their lives in order to be a sought-after specialist.

And all the same, some new trends appear every day, like, for example, soft skills, which people started talking about in our country not so long ago.

What is this mysterious soft skill?

I think that those who know English well, after reading the phrase, understood what we were talking about, because soft skills are translated as “soft skills.”

That is, these are skills that cannot be demonstrated instantly, such as, for example, a diploma of higher education, the ability to disassemble and assemble a Kalashnikov assault rifle in a minute, or recite a poem in Japanese.

Soft skills are also called social skills because they are mainly about interaction between people.

If you are applying for a job as a car mechanic or storekeeper, then it is unlikely that your future employer will be interested in whether you have these very soft skills or not, but if you are applying for a leadership position or want to work in the service sector, you will have to improve your social skills.

Today, more and more employers require their subordinates (especially those in management positions) and job seekers who just want to get a job in the company to have soft skills.

And this is not surprising, because, according to the latest research by scientists from Harvard, a person’s success in the professional field depends 85% on soft skills and only 15% on hard ones.

Therefore, do not be surprised if you are asked to take tests or asked interesting questions that, at first glance, have nothing to do with professional skills.

What skills does soft skills mean?

So, we figured out the definition of the term soft skills, what are they? This, I think, is understandable, but we need to dwell in more detail on exactly what skills and abilities need to be acquired in order to stand out among other job seekers or applicants for a leadership position.

You can confidently say that you have soft skills if you:

Show flexibility.

For example, don’t grimace like you have a toothache if your boss asks you to stay an hour after work or recommends you work on a report over the weekend.

Don't be afraid to take responsibility.

Leaders who, in difficult times, try to throw their subordinates into the breach while they themselves sit out in a bunker, must disappear as a class.

Get along well with people.

Alas and ah, misanthropes, no one still loves you.

You know how to work in a team, you don’t stick out your “I” at every step, but you understand that “We” delivered a successful project.

You can teach others.

Without yelling, psychos, screaming, swearing, without narcissism and humiliation of the newcomer.

Discuss like an educated person, not a wild monkey.
They are able to quickly and accurately set tasks for people, while ensuring high-quality work.
You can convince even a person without a car and a driver’s license to buy these cool tires.
You smooth out conflicts rather than provoke them.
We are always ready to offer an interesting idea to make the company work even better.

There are soft skills, but what are hard skills?

Logically, if there are soft skills, then hard skills must also exist.

Of course, they exist and are translated literally as stupidly as soft skills: “hard (hard) skills.”

That is, these are the skills that, in fact, make you a professional in your industry, which you can easily demonstrate to management or a future employer.

Hard skills include:

possession;
ability to type at the speed of sound;
the ability to change 4 wheels in a car in 5 minutes;
the opportunity to draw a portrait of the future boss right at the interview;
knowledge of the structure of an internal combustion engine, etc.

I think you understand exactly what I wanted to say.

Hard skills are the knowledge and skills that you directly need to work in the company and directly correspond to its activities.

And to become a good leader for your subordinates,

watch the following video:

Why was the career of a former teacher ruined by ignorance of what soft skills are?

Now many people listened to what I was talking about soft skills, and they thought: “It hurts! I can live without them.”

Of course, you will survive: in a low-paid, unpromising position!

And to confirm my words, I will tell you a sad story about the failed career of my former teacher.

The smartest man, a brilliant scientist, an intelligent teacher, was simply delirious about his career, and not a scientific one.

He dreamed of becoming a big boss with many subordinates.

During the time of our shameful ex-president Yanukovych, he managed to make a rapid career and literally in two years rose to a high position in the regional administration.

He lasted exactly a year and, despite the fact that he coped with his direct responsibilities flawlessly, he was let down by the lack of soft skills.

Even in those troubled times, when rudeness and an authoritarian regime flourished in the offices of power, when trembling with fear of the boss and carrying out his stupid tasks was the norm, my teacher was fired, explaining: “You don’t know how to get along with people at all, you don’t have even minimal flexibility.” and absolutely not a team player.”

And do you still think that you can build a great career without soft skills?

So you found out what are soft skills, and what skills need to be trained first in order to grow into a big boss in a large company.

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