One of the challenges most of us have, as technical professionals is, we believe
all we need for success in our career is to be the best we can at our chosen technical skill
We think being terrific technically is all we need for career success
This all makes perfect sense early in our careers. Since we're heads down, tails up, as busy as a snow-making machine at the start of winter, working on developing our technical skills
Whether it’s a Developer, Network Engineer, Help-desk Technician, Business Analyst, Technical Writer, Data Base Administrator, or any other technical role, virtually all of us think, all we need for career success is to be outstanding technically
Unfortunately, what most of us don’t realize is that being excellent technically isn’t the whole story
We also need Soft Skills
Now this is not surprising, since the reality is that it's not being taught in our schools, universities and technical colleges. It’s not in the curriculum
Which means it's not your fault, because no-one is really raising the awareness of Soft Skills and helping you to recognize the value of learning them, both personally, and for your career
As we've seen, Soft Skills are the critical non-technical capabilities we need to add on to our technical, or domain, skills for long term success.They are 2X as important as technical skills for career success
Businesses are recognizing it more and more - and expect new hires coming into their organizations to have Soft Skills.
But, we're just not teaching it
Which leads to the question: "How do we solve that problem?"
And perhaps even more importantly for you as a self-motivated IT Professional:
"If I'm motivated to learn Soft Skills, how to it go about that?"
Now, you might be thinking:
- “This must be difficult”
- “This isn’t for me” …
But Soft Skills are learnable skills – anyone can learn them
And the good news is there's a bonus: Soft Skills will also help in all areas of your life – not just at work
And as you move up the ranks managing and leading … Soft Skills become increasingly important