There's Nothing “Soft” about People Skills: 3 Reasons Why the Term Needs to Die

This may sound like a weird thing to have a very strong opinion about, but I despise the term “soft skills.”

It’s a lazy, reductive, and condescending term that encapsulates things like (but not limited to) communication, collaboration, problem solving, leadership, decision-making, consensus building, and creativity. You know, all the essential human skills that we use every day to interact with other people, build social capital, and actually get things done.

Instead, I use the terms people skills or critical interpersonal skills, because they are the basis of every job that ever existed, and every major accomplishment ever achieved. Not to mention the skills we use when we interact with friends, relatives, neighbors, strangers out in public, and so on.

Here are my 3 biggest beefs with the term “soft skills.”

“Soft” Sounds Unserious and Unimportant

Sure, it’s a matter of semantics, but in professional settings the term “soft” is usually used as a modifier to mean incomplete or weak. A soft launch or a soft opening are not the real thing - just a practice. The (detestable and often sexist) phrases “don’t be soft” or “don’t get soft on me” are used to chastise someone for daring to display empathy into the workplace. Heaven forbid!

When applied to interpersonal skills, the term soft makes them sound squishy and less significant than “hard skills” that require technical knowledge or subject matter expertise. Sure, technical skills and subject matter expertise are more objective and quantifiable, but in no way are they more important to achieving the high degrees of success that companies want to see. Have you ever gotten anyone to do anything simply because you demanded that they do it?

Didn’t think so.

Which brings me to my next point.

Work Is Miserable Without Positive Human Interaction

Most of us intuitively practice people skills in our personal lives because 1) we value our relationships and 2) we don’t want to be cranky all the time.

We use these interpersonal skills so much in our personal lives that we don’t even know we are using them.

From an early age we learn that saying “please” is essential to get people to do something for you, so we take the extra millisecond to say please.

In our close relationships (romantic and platonic) we know that actively listening to what people are saying is a great way to make them feel supported and cared for. So we sit back, tune in, and let our loved ones vent.

When we run into a problem, we call up our friends and family members to get their input, because they help us see the situation in new ways and identify possible solutions.

We just know that every relationship has a certain amount of give and take, so we can’t just lash out at or ignore the people in our lives and expect the relationship to stay intact.

In the workplace, though, it’s a different story.

Yes, the environment is totally different. We don’t choose our colleagues. We often find ourselves in conversations and situations that aren’t fun or interesting, so we aren’t motivated to show up as our best selves. We have to communicate through specific platforms, and are under a lot of pressure to be efficient and productive (ugh…don’t get me started on why those terms are so damaging. You can read that rant here.)

People skills are hard. They require us to check our initial assumptions and instincts for how we act and what we say, and to consider the greater good. Your best friend may still love you if you snap at them if they ask you a question when you are in a testy mood, but your colleagues will not. They might write you off as someone who doesn’t care about other people, who isn’t a team player, or who doesn’t take their work seriously.

Which leads me to my final point.

People Skills are the MOST IMPORTANT for Success

Dealing with a colleague who has decided they just don’t like you because you exhibited poor people skills is much more difficult than using the people skills in the first place.

It’s an undeniable fact that work sucks less (and might even be a meaningful and engaging aspect of our lives) when we have good relationships with those around us.

But wait, there’s more!

The outcomes of work are better when people are engaged, when they feel like they belong and are valued. There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of rigorous social science studies showing that:

• Companies with better cultures have stronger bottoms lines because when employees know, like, and trust their colleagues they are more invested in their work.

• When employees and leaders establish positive relationships with colleagues, they feel more accountable and are more motivated to succeed.

• Better relationships at work mean better coordination and communication, which translates to fewer costly mistakes and time-consuming rework.

Happy, engaged employees also stick with their jobs and feel loyalty to their companies, and are less likely to leave.

People skills are a prerequisite for any company looking to build and maintain the kind of culture where people are set up to thrive.

Conclusion

Nearly all workplace tensions boil down to interpersonal dynamics, which means that can't be solved without people communicating and working together. Investing in people skills just as much - if not more than - technical skills pays off in dividends.

The best approach to building people skills in experiential learning because it gives people a chance to hone these skills in real time.

That’s the reason we believe in game-based learning so deeply. At its core, every game is a problem solving opportunity that requires people to think, communicate, and act in different ways to achieve an objective. Many of the same people skills that are so necessary at work are also important within games. The stakes are much, much lower when playing games, which makes them the perfect setting for practicing using people skills in real time with their real-life colleague. And as a bonus, the shared experience enhances relationships and provides moments of joy and laughter to build social capital.

To learn more about Barometer XP’s approach to game-based learning and development, visit our website and follow us on LinkedIn to stay up-to-date about our monthly free virtual game sessions.