Despite its name, soft skills are increasingly becoming the hard skills of today's professional world. It is not enough to be highly trained in technical skills without understanding and developing the softer, interpersonal, and relationship-building skills that are critical for professional growth. While technical, "harder" skills may present opportunities for you, it is your soft skills that will maintain those opportunities and provide avenues for new opportunities to present themselves. Your ability to identify and master these soft skills, ranging from critical thinking, dressing for success, networking and personal branding, are critical for achieving professional success. While these soft skills are often undervalued and/or not presented sufficiently to young professionals and pre-professionals, you will learn in this book that...Soft skills are anything but soft!
What's the hard truth? Soft skills get little respect but will make or break your career. Master your soft skills and really get ahead at work! Fortune 500 coach Peggy Klaus encounters individuals every day who excel at their jobs but aren't getting where they want to go. It's rarely a shortfall in technical expertise that limits their careers, but rather a shortcoming in their social, communication, and self-management behaviors. In The Hard Truth About Soft Skills Klaus delivers practical tools and techniques for mastering soft skills across the career spectrum. She shows how to: manage your workload handle the critics develop and promote your personal brand navigate office politics lead the troops and much more! Klaus reveals why soft skills are often ignored, while bringing their importance to life in her trademark style—straightforward, humorous, and motivating. Perfect for readers at all professional stages—from those who are just starting out to seasoned executives—this book is essential reading for anyone who wants to take his or her career to the next level.
***BUSINESS BOOK AWARDS 2021 WINNER: SELF DEVELOPMENT BOOK OF THE YEAR*** Everyone says a great leader needs EQ, Emotional Intelligence, soft skills, blah, blah, blah. What does that even mean? Where do you start? Where’s the line for that on the P&L? You might think that business is all about facts and figures. You probably prefer it that way. The truth is that as uncertainty and business complexity increases, successful leaders need to embrace soft skills to get the best out of their people in a sustainable manner. In this succinct, no-nonsense approach, Anne Taylor shares: Key soft skills relevant for leadership and practical applications of how to use them every day drawn from real-life case studies Straightforward tools to better understand yourself, because your leadership starts with YOU Simple frameworks to communicate with others to get things done while building a stronger relationship with them (at the same time, how efficient!) Logical ideas you can try immediately with on-line support if you want it. All done in an easy to read, logical, organized manner for people who prefer facts and don’t consider themselves natural ‘people people.’ In a direct yet professional manner, Anne combines the results-oriented focus from her extensive business background in Fortune 100 corporations with her passion for personal awareness and conscious choice to help you get better results through your people, fast. The Practical Principles in this book, when applied, practiced and honed, can improve your effectiveness, impact and bottom-line results.
Navigate the hot topic of student engagement with a true expert. The author explores the many factors involved in bringing out the best in students, such as relationships, emotions, environment, and expectations. Become empowered to demand an authentic joy for learning in your classroom. Real-life notes from the field, detailed discussions, practical strategies, and space for reflection complete this essential guide to student engagement.
A Step-by-Step Guide to Showing the Value of Soft Skill Programs As organizations rise to meet the challenges of technological innovation, globalization, changing customer needs and perspectives, demographic shifts, and new work arrangements, their mastery of soft skills will likely be the defining difference between thriving and merely surviving. Yet few executives champion the expenditure of resources to develop these critical skills. Why is that and what can be done to change this thinking? For years, managers convinced executives that soft skills could not be measured and that the value of these programs should be taken on faith. Executives no longer buy that argument but demand the same financial impact and accountability from these functions as they do from all other areas of the organization. In Proving the Value of Soft Skills, measurement and evaluation experts Patti Phillips, Jack Phillips, and Rebecca Ray contend that efforts can and should be made to demonstrate the effect of soft skills. They also claim that a proven methodology exists to help practitioners articulate those effects so that stakeholders’ hearts and minds are shifted toward securing support for future efforts. This book reveals how to use the ROI Methodology to clearly show the impact and ROI of soft skills programs. The authors guide readers through an easy-to-apply process that includes: business alignment design evaluation data collection isolation of the program effects cost capture ROI calculations results communication. Use this book to align your programs with organizational strategy, justify or enhance budgets, and build productive business partnerships. Included are job aids, sample plans, and detailed case studies.
Harness the power of emotions - so you can leverage differences, build engaged teams, and create healthier organizations Whether you work group stretches from here to Dubai or can easily meet in a conference room down the hall, anger and frustration are easy to come by when others don't do things your way, follow directions, or respond the way you think they should. But when emotions manage workplace relationships, the result is conflict, disengagement, and low morale. Emotional Intelligence for Managing Results in a Diverse World delivers a novel prescription for managing effectively in today's workplace: Use the dynamic principles of EQ plus insights from the author's pioneering diversity work to increase your competence in managing emotions and enhance your effectiveness in work, relationships, and life. The book also gives you the know-how to use this approach in coaching and developing others to help them be more successful on the job.
If you are ready to propel your career to the next level, if you are striving for both a successful career and a fulfilling life, Skills That Build provides the missing credential in your healthy success tool kit. Skills That Build is the intersection of science, business, and well-being, from the perspective of a seasoned management consultant and executive coach with an academic background in cognitive psychology. It offers readers an accessible means to coach themselves on skills in four critical areas, which promote psychological health and generate success both in the workplace and at home. Demand for leadership coaching has skyrocketed worldwide in the last five years, but few people can afford a professional coach. Even fewer receive coaching for career development and personal growth through their employer. Busy racking up buzzworthy credentials on their own time, today's emerging workers and mid-career professionals teeter precariously between personal and career aspirations. If ever there was a need for preventive mental health practices and accessible tools for workplace empowerment, the time is now. Just over a year ago, the workforce was focused on ascending the career ladder, with less attention paid to maintaining a healthy grip on personal well-being. Since then, the pandemic has underscored the need for resilience and effective ways to cope on both professional and personal fronts. While successful leaders build success from within, they must first lead themselves. This book becomes the virtual coach on the bookshelf, as readers learn and master career-advancing skills that promote psychological health and well-being. Anyone can learn these behaviors and enhance their current repertoire using this evidence-based guide for skills that build us. Through stories from coaching clients, groundbreaking scientific research, examples of business applications, and exercises to hone and master new behaviors, Skills That Build demonstrates actionable techniques and empowers readers to jump-start their uniquely personal strategies for growth.
This high-impact book has been written by an experienced industry professional with a corporate perspective. The author is a Master Trainer who approaches the soft skills training from the point of view of a corporate soft skills training. Written in a business storytelling format, the training in the book is imparted by a skillful industry leader. This has not been written as the theoretical exercise. No boring theory, no wasted time! Rather, each chapter has been approached as a working session: Imparting soft skills by solving real problems and discussing workable solutions which the reader can apply immediately and keep for life. The structure of the book is in the form of a Personal Development Compass developed by the author. Just as a compass guides travelers through their journey and helps them to reach their destination, in the same way, the Personal Development Compass too guides the reader to navigate their way through the maze of the different soft skills and help them to polish their personalities. The methodology applied is `Learning-By Doing': This approach can be summed up as follows: `Educate Briefly-Then Train at Length'- On other words, less focus on theory, more real-world action, and solutions. The training imparted in the book starts with the Personality Development objective in mind and then facilitates and demonstrates methods to achieve those objectives.VERTICAL 1: Theme: CONFIDENCEHeadings: RELATIONSHIPS & WELL-BEINGThis vertical helps the reader in gaining the mental strength, motivation & confidence to approach their lives with a Positive Mental Attitude. The ability to be optimistic even in dire situations enables them to develop Emotional Intelligence and have meaningful relationships with their peers and colleagues, paving the way for the next level of Competence.VERTICAL 2: Theme: COMPETENCEHeadings: COMMUNICATION & CAREERGood Communication is a huge demand from recruiters and employers today. In fact, it is a pre-requisite for success. Effective Communication helps the reader to get a head start in their careers. They are able to think fast and creatively, impress and convince others of their point of view, they develop good listening skills thereby gaining an edge over others. They become the candidates of choice for promotion and progress.VERTICAL 3: Theme: COURTESYHeadings: ETIQUETTE & HABITSThere is a popular saying: The First Impression is the last Impression. A good first impression is created through effective habits and an ability to say the right thing at the right time to the right person. To develop these skills, the reader learns to exhibit appropriate behavior in all situations: personal and professional. Sustained behavior becomes a habit. This then becomes part of the reader's basic nature. A Good professional need to have strong Language skills. Recognizing this need, the book has a section in every chapter that highlights important words and Business phrases used in the corporate industry along with their meanings.ContentsSoft Skills: An OverviewEmotional IntelligenceSelf-Image ManagementTeam building and cooperationTime Management and Goal SettingCommunication SkillsVerbal Communication Part 1Verbal Communication Part 2Non-Verbal CommunicationLevel 2: CareerLevel 3: Courtesy & HabitsResume Writing & Job ApplicationsGroup DiscussionPersonal Interviews and Interactions
An international bestseller, SUPERHUBS offers a startling new perspective on how the world's elite make the decisions that impact all our lives. A BLOOMBERG Best Book of the Year Winner, Silver Medal, Axiom Business Book Awards 2018 FOREWORD BY NOURIEL ROUBINI $UPERHUBS is a rare, behind-the-scenes look at how the world's most powerful titans, the "superhubs," pull the levers of our global financial system. Combining insider's knowledge with principles of network science, Sandra Navidi offers a startling new perspective on how superhubs build their powerful networks and how their decisions impact all our lives. $UPERHUBS reveals what happens at the exclusive, invitation-only platforms - The World Economic Forum in Davos, the meetings of the International Monetary Fund, think-tank gatherings and exclusive galas. This is the most vivid portrait to date of the global elite: the bank CEOs, fund managers, billionaire financiers and politicians who, through their interlocking relationships and collective influence are transforming our increasingly fragile financial system, economy and society.
Soft skills are the cluster of personality traits, social graces, communication, language, personal habits, friendliness, and optimism that characterize relationships with other people. In increasingly competitive environments, soft skills training can be a vital resource. Soft Skills Revolution offers trainers, organizational leaders, and HR professionals a handy guide for building their soft skills through a variety of methods including individualized exercises and activities and structured training programs, as well as informal learning, mentoring, and coaching. The book offers readers information on the background of soft skills development, and suggestions for enhancing soft skills through traditional learning programs as well as informal learning approaches. Soft Skills Revolution contains practical guidance for creating an engaging learning experience that highlights such important concepts as: Components for Clear Communication The Power of Yes Listening and the Language of Acceptance A Nine-Step Model for Problem Solving Interventions for Moving a Team to Results Giving Helpful Feedback Moving from Conflict to Cooperation In addition, The Leader's Connection section is designed for upper level management and facilitators who want to help organizational leaders integrate the book's important concepts and skills into their interactions with team and staff members. "Kamin's engaging writing style, deep and down to earth at the same time, makes this book an easy learning experience of the 'hard' soft skills we all need to master. By developing these soft skills we can make our world a better place!" Isabel Rimanoczy, Legacycoach, Director Minervas, Women Changing the World and author of Big Bang Being "Kamin has mastered the challenge of bringing soft skills to life. Her simple definitions, clear examples, references to seminal authors, focused questions, conceptual frameworks, and helpful hints invite and encourage the reader to make these soft skills her/his own." Ernie Turner, president, LIM LLC and author of Action Reflection Learning
