How Is Soft Skill Related To Our Future?

“The unemployment rate, at 4.9 percent, and the number of unemployed persons, at 7.8 million, changed little in October” (“The Employment Situation-October 2016” 1). The unemployment rate continues rising! Nowadays, globalization plays an extremely indispensable role in our lives. A great number of people are affected by changes occurred by globalization such as innovation and brand new technology. This brings about less demand of workforce as technology e.g. robots, smart phones and so on replaces human’s position. They are more intelligence and more durable in doing some tasks; therefore, there is a high possibility which humans will be replaced by robots. Even if we are in the tight corner, one of the best suggestions of future work is to have “soft skill”. It is absolutely vital for students to learn soft skills since it has an impact on future careers.

According to Wikipedia, “Soft skills are a combination of interpersonal people skills, social skills, communication skills, character traits, attitudes, career attributes and emotional intelligence quotient (EQ) among others” (“Soft skills” 1). In other words, the skill of life, or soft skill, is needed more than hard skill, technical skill for specific career, which was considered the most important in academic area (Smith 5). When our gadgets do not stop expanding their abilities to do more and more tasks, one thing they could not develop is building relationship with each other. The most essential fact about human being is we are social animals; living in group makes us safe.

Imagined if you had to choose between a real flower with a great scent and an artificial flower which, for sure, is more durable, but it is not charming at all, which one is your answer? Needless to say, it is the same as people who are drastically smart; still, they have no charisma. Nobody wants to deal, cooperate and talk with them.

The absence of soft skill results in mismatched employment; the employer said that it is quite hard for them to find the right employee. “What we see in survey after survey is employers saying qualifications are important, but that just as important to us are so-called soft skills, character skills, the ability to get on with different people, to articulate yourself clearly, confidence, grit, self-control. They are saying we are not seeing enough of this in kids coming out of school,” Nick Hurd, the former Minister for Civil Society said (Smith 7).

In these days, graduating with first or second class upper does not matter much compared with having the right soft skill (Salako 1). Nevertheless, school curriculum takes the action of training soft skills for granted which is one of the most key factors of success. Soft skill helps rise student performances as a result of being able to choose the right thing to do (Fuglei 3). After Graduation, schools rarely teach student how to choose the right job for them and how to behave in the certain way that they will get along with each other well. That is soft skill we need to practice in both school with the right strategy and daily life.

In order to have a truly happy life of success, we all want to find the job we love surrounded by fantastic people. We could have fun with coworkers while working is not a boring job leading to stressful environment. That is what soft skill can do. Furthermore, soft skill increases the understanding of each generation. To illustrate, it solves the biggest problem which is lacking of respect for one another. Baby boomers, those born during 1946-1964, find generation Y, those born during 1980-1997, not willing in time and effort; on the other hand, generation Y thinks that boomers are not open-minded (Alboher 15).

According to Smith, soft skills are the reasons why a great number of women i.e. Sheryl Sandberg (COO of Facebook), Kate Reardon (the editor of Tatler) and Cara Delevingne (famous supermodel) always get promotion in the workplace. Firstly, Sheryl Sandberg is good at working with people. Her boss stated that you could not help but like her. Next, Kate Reardon indicated about how important first impression is. “In a speech to a leading girls school, she said people with good manners are well liked, opening doors for them as they climb the career ladder,” Paton sated (3). Last but not least, Cara Delevingne who is the most famous supermodel recently is known for her politeness (12). Needless to say, soft skills are a highly powerful tool for future workforce.

Although soft skills are seen as a key to succeed, plenty of people advise against focusing too much on soft skill. It is understandable that hard skill is somehow important as every career needs one who can do specific jobs, namely, doctor, engineer and dentist etc. Despite hard skill’s importance, one could not be successful without soft skill. As a result, we could not deny soft skills which lead us to bright future.

All in all, learning soft skills is totally essential, for it brings about opportunities of career in the future when a good number of gadgets would be more intelligent. According to Noel, soft skills result in being a better leader also. One thing considered as the most important is your characteristics i.e. listening, recognizing good work, managing changes, negotiating and so on (2-8). I strongly believe in the potential of people in the 20th century. They could shift the world to be a better place as they have chances to learn what suit them the most.

List of works cited

• Smith, Julia Llewellyn. “Why 'soft skills' are more important than a great CV.” Telegraph.co.uk 9 Jan 2015. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-business/11326058/Forget-the-CV-Why-soft-skills-are-more-important.html. Accessed 2 November 2016.

• “Soft Skill.” Wikipedia. 30 October 2016. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_skills. Accessed 2 November 2016.

• Alboher, Marci. “Sharpening the Soft Skills (Which Aren’t Really Touchy-Feely).” The New York Times. 7 April 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/07/business/smallbusiness/07shift.html. Accessed 2 November 2016.

• Salako, Adetutu. “Don, experts charge students on soft skills.” The Guardian. 30 July 2016. http://guardian.ng/saturday-magazine/don-experts-charge-students-on-soft-skills/. Accessed 5 November 2016.

• “The Employment Situation-October 2016.” Bureau of labor statistics. 4 November 2016. www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf. Accessed 5 November 2016.

• Noel, Katherine. “19 soft skills every leader needs to be successful.” Businessinsider. 27 April 2016. http://www.businessinsider.com/soft-skills-leaders-need-for-success-2016-4. Accessed 5 November 2016.

• Fuglei, Monica. “Beyond the Test: How Teaching Soft Skills Helps Students Succeed.” Concordia University- Portland. 20 January 2016. http://education.cu-portland.edu/blog/news/teaching-soft-skills/. Accessed 5 November 2016.

• Paton, Graeme. “Tatler editor: manners 'as important as grades' for teenagers.” Telegraph.co.uk. 8 July 2014. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10953484/Tatler-editor-manners-as-important-as-grades-for-teenagers.html. Accessed 5 November 2016.

• Wells, Kelli. “The Holy Grail of Future Work.” Project Syndicate. 5 October 2016. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/soft-skills-for-future-jobs-by-kelli-wells-2016-10. Accessed 5 November 2016.