In business today, “soft skills” might seem like a misleading term. These crucial abilities, often undervalued, are actually key to successful leadership. In the blog below, Ben Dowman, an experienced leadership consultant and coach, clarifies the importance of soft skills and illustrates how they significantly boost leadership effectiveness.
What are soft skills and why are they important?
In 2013 Google started Project Oxygen with the aim of proving that manager quality did not impact performance. Google analysed hiring and promotion data as well as employee engagement surveys but instead of proving that manager quality did not matter, they found that good management actually does make a difference and, seven of the top eight most important qualities were soft skills.1
Other research has focused on the importance of soft skills more generally and, in a paper entitled Hard evidence on soft skills, the authors wrote that “soft skills predict success in life and that they causally produce that success.”2
As a Leadership Consultant I think ‘soft skills’ is not the best description for a set of skills that are so important for leaders and, ironically, soft skills can be the hardest to learn. A better name might be ‘super skills’ or perhaps just ‘people skills’.
In every organisation I work with, leaders with highly developed soft skills are better able to engage and motivate their teams and people, fostering ownership and empowering their people to improve performance and results.
What are the top “soft” skills for leaders?
1. Listening
The vast majority of people assess their listening skills as being above average3 but listening is one of those skills that is hard to self-assess. How do you know what you haven’t heard or understood? Jennifer Garvey Berger4 describes three common types of listening that leaders exercise. The first is ‘listening to win’ which is where someone is listening long enough to gain information to prove their point and be right. The second is ‘listening to fix’ where we listen to a problem or situation and (with good intent) then jump in with solutions or ideas of what the speaker could do. The third and most valuable type of listening for leaders is ‘listening to learn’. This is where we listen without preconceptions, without jumping ahead to what we might say or what the person could do, and instead stay present, listening to not only what is said, but how it is said.
2. Empathy
In simple terms empathy is being able to understand the perspective and feelings of others and demonstrate that understanding with intention, care, and concern. Empathy has a direct effect on innovation, engagement and inclusivity. In her now famous talk on empathy Brené Brown says that empathy fuels connection.
I highly recommend diving into the detail of a report by Catalyst5 which found that 61% of people with highly empathic senior leaders report often or always being innovative at work compared to only 13% of people with less empathic senior leaders and 76% of people with highly empathic senior leaders report often or always being engaged, compared to only 32% of people with less empathic senior leaders. 50% of people with highly empathic senior leaders report often or always experiencing inclusion at work, compared to only 17% of people with less empathic senior leadership.
3. Curiosity and asking good questions
As an Executive Coach I have spent a lot of time thinking about questions and in my own book6 I devote several chapters to the skill of asking questions. Asking ‘good’ questions is underpinned by a state of curiosity and of wanting to understand rather than judge. As humans we love to judge and, in my experience, the more intelligent someone is, the quicker they are able to assess and make judgement. Unfortunately this is often a barrier to understanding as it stops us asking and wanting to discover more.
Leaders who develop the ability to ask good questions are able to engage, understand and coach performance more effectively and coaching is a great vehicle for developing this skill. A simple starting point is to suspend your own judgement and thinking, and be present, taking time to enquire through open questions like these.
4. Giving and receiving feedback
Ken Blanchard famously said that, “feedback is the breakfast of champions,” a quote which probably makes many people squirm or roll their eyes. Yet, effectively delivered feedback can improve performance, motivation and engagement.
A study by Gallup found that managers who received feedback about their strengths showed 8.9% greater profitability7. In another study 92% of respondents agreed with the assertion, “Negative (redirecting) feedback, if delivered appropriately, is effective at improving performance8.
I make a distinction between praise and positive feedback. Praise often sounds like “well done”, “thank you” or “great job” and, while this is important and valuable, it isn’t feedback. Positive feedback tells a person what was good with specific information about what was valuable. This is important because it lets us know what to do next time and how to replicate great performance.
Giving improvement feedback is an art and a science. A simple 3-step formula is to start by describing factually what a person said or did (without judgement), then describe the impact this had on you (being sure to own this – using “I felt” or “I experienced”) and concluding with a suggestion about what better might look like.
Receiving feedback is also a skill and, in my opinion, there is only one response, “thank you” or “thank you for your sharing your thoughts/opinion”. Modelling how to receive feedback is important for leaders and too often people feel the need to justify, explain or dismiss.
Can leaders develop these soft skills?
I firmly believe that leaders can develop soft skills and have seen thousands of leaders do so. Regardless of the starting point everyone can improve their soft skills and I would assert that the way to do so is through practice. Soft skills aren’t just theoretical or about having knowledge, they are practical and, just like learning to drive, they can only be developed by practising. If you want to improve your soft skills, read, practice and practice some more.
Author: Ben Dowman – Leadership Consultant, Executive Coach and author.
About Ben Dowman
Ben Dowman is a leadership consultant, executive coach and author and has trained, mentored and coached thousands of leaders over the last 20 years through his businesses Real People Consulting and Irrational Coaching. He has a background in Psychology and is a qualified Teacher, NLP Trainer and Master Coach. He has also studied Emotional Intelligence, MBTI, Transactional Analysis, Organisational Constellations and Mindfulness.
Ben has worked with leaders from Google, Bosch, Sir Robert McAlpine, Zoopla, Airbus, NHS, Velux, Wickes, a host of small to medium organisations and not for profits as well as elite sports teams.
Ben is the author of Adventures in Coaching published by Nicholas Brealey & Hodder and Stoughton (2020). Adventures in Coaching introduces Coaching as an approach for managing people, improving performance and solving problems.
References
- https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/12/20/the-surprising-thing-google-learned-about-its-employees-and-what-it-means-for-todays-students/
- Heckman, James J. & Kautz, Tim, 2012. “Hard evidence on soft skills,” Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(4)
- https://hbr.org/2016/07/what-great-listeners-actually-do
- https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/trapped-rightness-when-our-instinct-believe-we-right-us-jennifer/
- https://www.catalyst.org/reports/empathy-work-strategy-crisis/
- Adventures in Coaching – Benjamin Dowman https://www.amazon.co.uk/Adventures-Coaching-Unlocking-personal-captivating-ebook/dp/B08CY3L1YY/
- https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/146351/strengthening-company-performance.aspx#:~:text=And%20in%20another%20study%20of,has%20a%20distinct%20performance%20advantage.
- https://hbr.org/2014/01/your-employees-want-the-negative-feedback-you-hate-to-give
Excellent and very helpful article, many thanks!