We all hear this phrase “Soft skill” quite often in our offices and sometimes mentioned by employers that it’s becoming difficult to find a person for a suitable job. The Employer mainly looks for soft skills needed for today’s workplace. What exactly does this mean though? A wide range of Skills come under the Soft skills. They are also known as ‘Transferable skills’. They include interpersonal skills at times they are called people skills or Social skills.

Soft skills include common sense, ability to deal with people and a positive flexible attitude. Broadly it refers that dealing a job in a required way is your best skill. We will discuss some of the Soft skills which are in you and you can acquire with your experiences to be successful in your jobs.

COMMUNICATION SKILLSare always high on the essential skills list in any Job advertisement. People with strong communication can build an initial rapport to a longer team relationship. Always work on your communication as this is the key of expressing to others as it helps you in your job environment.

LEADERSHIP SKILS helps you to take a lead when need arises. This includes ability to manage, motivate others and delegate work, even the employers know that they need to praise you for smaller efforts so you can gain confidence and move ahead. This skill can be learned by your own effort it cannot be taught.

MAKING DECISIONS is a very important skill for any employee, being able to be decisive and taking correct decisions is valued by an employer. In our life we take lot of important decisions sometimes the actual decision doesn’t matter, what matter is that you have made one and moved on. Good decisions help you in Problem solving because it enables you to choose between possible solutions.

SELF MOTIVATION is very important aspect in our life. Self Motivated people get on by themselves. They don’t need any supervision.They are good with work. They are positive about life. Self motivated are closely linked with personal resilience or ability to bounce back when they face a problem and ability to change when needed.

TEAM - WORKING SKILL is broadly defined to work with other people effectively. These are basically interpersonal skills. Good communication skills, listening skills together with ability to build a good rapport go long way to work well in a team. One need to know the Task- and process focused skills.

CREATIVITY AND PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS are highly valued because they are hard to learn. It comes with lots of experience. It’s a belief that creative persons are born not made as some people find them very easy. One needs to work and explore the ways and an opportunity to solve problems in their directives and believe me it’s not difficult.

POSITIVE ATTITUDE or Positive thinking /ideas can really improve your life. We all love to work with the person who is enthusiastic, friendly and has a Can Do attitude. It is always depressing to work with the person who always sees the downsides and is harsh. Employers look for people who have positive attitude because they help everyone to feel better about themselves. They also achieve more than others.

TIME MANAGEMENT is a successful mantra to work under pressure. It can be describe as Good work ethics. It is highly valuable to the employers. In this process we must incorporate planning, prioritisation and organizational soft skills to complete our task in a better way.

TIPS TO IMPROVE THESE SOFT SKILS

• Pick a skill you want to improve and practice it consistently.
• Set goals to improve soft skills
• Observe and mimic the positive soft skills you observe in others.
• Find resources to learn Soft skills.

WHAT DO EMPLOYERS LOOK FOR IN NEW EMPLOYEES

• Professionalism and work ethics.
• Oral and written communication.
• Team work and Collaboration skills.
• Critical thinking or Problem solving skills.

If I sum up there is a huge range of Soft skills if you have these soft skills on your Resume it can catch the attention of an employer, the interview where you can showcase these skills will get noticed easily. Career builder reports that 77% of the employers look for candidates who possess these soft skills. Now that you are aware of Top Soft skills employers are looking for make sure that this is the part of your interview preparations. After all we live in the age of communication where you need to have technical skills to be a successful career leader.