How to be successful (8 Essential Soft Skills)
“Hard skills get you in. Soft skills get you far.” – Unknown
Why it works
The term soft skills was created by the U.S. military in the early 1970s after they realized that many of the skills needed to motivate soldiers, lead groups, and ultimately win wars were neither cataloged nor fully understood. At a 1972 U.S. Army conference on the topic, military experts defined soft skills as “important job-related skills that involve little or no interaction with machines and whose application on the job is quite generalized.”
Over the last decades, both the scope and importance of soft skills grew strongly. In a 2012 paper entitled Hard evidence on soft skills, Nobel Laureate James Heckmann (pictured above) defined soft skills “as personality traits, goals, motivations, and preferences that are valued in the labor market, in school, and in many other domains”. He also argued that they are crucial for success at work and at home, claiming that “soft skills predict success in life”.
While technical skills matter, soft skills separate top performers from the rest. Soft skills allow the most productive people to work smarter, collaborate better, and get what matters done. Here are 8 essential soft skills – and how to develop lasting habits around them.
How to do it
1) Deep focus
The ability to concentrate intently on what’s most important and tune out distractions. Practice working in focused 30-90 minute blocks on a single task. Take breaks in between to recharge. An excellent tool for pulling this off is Timeboxing. Used by Bill Gates, Elon Musk and many more, it’s simple: you turn everything you do in a workday into an appointment with yourself. Learn more about timeboxing deep focus sessions and breaks here.
2) Self-motivation
Having the inner drive to take initiative, set goals, and persist through challenges. Connect your daily tasks to your bigger purpose and values. Celebrate small wins along the way. Get there by using stress goals: set three ambitious, meaningful and difficult professional yearly stress goals; break these down into three weekly goals each Monday; and then do one thing daily to reach each goal. To delve deeper into stress goals, read this article.
3) Prioritization
Knowing how to zero in on the highest-value activities that will move the needle. Always tackle your most important and impactful to-do item first thing in the morning. For 75% of us, our motivation and focus are highest during that time of day. So, in the words of Marc Twain, eat that frog. If you want to learn more about how to get this done, check out this article.
4) Proactive communication
Sharing information clearly, concisely and preemptively to keep everyone informed and aligned. Provide quick status updates to your team regularly. Anticipate questions and share key details upfront. Most importantly, structure your communication hierarchically: give the core message first, support it with convincing arguments, and leave out everything that’s non-essential. Known as “The Pyramid Principle”, this approach was developed by communication expert Barbara Minto at McKinsey & Company. Learn more about it here.
5) Adaptability
Being flexible, solutions-oriented and unflappable amidst change and unexpected challenges. When faced with a roadblock, focus on what you can control. Get creative to find a path forward. One vital component of getting there is cultivating a good stress mindset – regarding both the stress response and stressful events. Here’s why and how doing so will allow you to make stress work for you instead of against you.
6) Collaboration
Working well with others by building trust, finding win-wins, and bringing out the best in them. Approach teamwork looking to both contribute and learn. Provide help readily and ask for it when needed. To become more effective and efficient with collaboration, have smart systems and habits around email and meetings. Here’s how to master your inbox with our “3-2-1 Method”, and here are 6 methods for having better meetings used by some of the most successful people on the planet.
7) Continuous growth
Always looking to expand your skills and knowledge to increase your impact. Block off time each week dedicated to learning. Read, take a course, get mentoring or coaching. To get the most out of the limited time you have for learning, ensure to nail Prof. Andrew Huberman’s three non-negotiables of learning: alertness to trigger learning, focus to engage with the material, and rest to rewire the neural circuits that underlie learning. If you want to delve deeper, read this article.
8) Emotional intelligence
Recognizing your own and others’ emotions and responding with empathy to build strong relationships. Put yourself in others’ shoes before reacting. Listen to understand, not just to respond. Top performers consistently rank high in emotional intelligence, making it one of the most important soft skills. As with all soft skills, emotional intelligence is a skill that you can develop. In this article, I lay out eight crucial ways to do so.
The most productive people make these skills a habit. You can develop these traits, too.
Pick one to focus on each week. Notice how it impacts your work.
Then keep practicing and refining.
And please share this post with one person who might benefit from doing the same.