And How To Practice Them
Being able to perform the day-to-day tasks in your role is important, but there’s an even more important component to your career growth you should consider. Soft skills allow you to harmoniously work with others and contribute to a healthy company culture. In fact, employers will often hire or promote someone based on their soft skills over their technical skills on the job. Here are the top three soft skills you’ll need in your career and how to practice them daily.
Communication
There are many different ways to communicate including verbal, non-verbal, and written. On a daily basis, you’ll probably use all three of these methods to interact with your coworkers. As a professional, you may come to realize you may be stronger in one form of communication over another. For example, you may communicate your ideas easily in a meeting when your personality can shine through, but your written communication can come off as dismissive or disinterested.
One way to better your communication skills according to career development experts is to practice active listening. When communicating with someone – whether verbally or written – it’s important to truly listen. You can show active listening by asking questions, making eye contact, and positioning yourself to face them. You never want to be thinking of what you’ll say next when a colleague is talking with you. A lack of active listening can indicate a lack of empathy and respect. When writing, clearly state the goal of your communication and create a tone that encourages feedback and collaboration. Length isn’t important in a written communication as long as the reader finds your message clear and can easily identify action items.
Adaptability
Adaptability is your willingness to align yourself with new or different tasks in an unfamiliar way or environment. If you are a stubborn person, you will want to work on your reaction to change and learn to roll with it. Many workplace cultures will describe themselves as fast-paced and it’s not uncommon to have tasks that seem out of the ordinary. The best reaction you can have to change is optimism and an open-mind, willing to adapt to a new idea.
Workplace training experts identify a way to practice adaptability is to walk through your decision-making process through both routine and unexpected decisions. Learn how you think and what steps you typically take to solve a problem. When you understand your decision-making process, it’s easier to pinpoint where your frustrations are coming from when having to adapt to a new project. Find your main frustration points and practice both your emotional and rational responses when confronted with something new.
Work Ethic
Work ethic isn’t always about constantly pushing yourself from 8am to 5pm. It also includes workload prioritization, time management, dependability, and willingness to help others. You want to learn how to determine which projects are most important, how much time to spend on them, and who the projects will affect. If you consistently get your own work done, but rarely help a colleague in need then you may be seen as unhelpful and not willing to put in work to help your organization.
To practice your work ethic, start keeping two planners. In the first planner, write down what tasks you’d like to complete by the end of the week. In the second planner, break down those tasks by day. Top organizational websites say this method will keep the length and importance of your projects in perspective. If you have a long project, make sure to work on it for a little bit everyday as to not let your daily tasks fall the wayside. This also gives you room to add any unexpected cross-departmental projects that may come your way.
Practicing your soft skills is a great way to improve your leadership capabilities and progress your career. It’s important to always be mindful of how you interact with your teammates to create efficient processes and professional bonds. WebCE offers continuing education and training courses to make sure your industry-specific skills are on par with your growing soft skills. To learn more about how you can grow your tactical skills and become a leader in your industry, visit
www.webce.com or call our support service team at 877.488.9308.
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