How can you improve your soft skills as a software developer?

Self-awareness helps a lot here. If you are honest with yourself about your pros and cons, you know where to improve. Asking for feedback is also a great way to understand things better. Understanding where to improve and then being driven and motivated to make improvements is the recipe to be successful when improving.

First thing which I always do and prefer is "Taking Feedback". So I can say - Seek feedback from peers, managers, or mentors to gain valuable insights on your soft skills performance. After this the important thing is "Self Evaluation/Analysis" - Think about your own life and the situations you've faced. Consider how your people skills, like communication and teamwork, have affected how you deal with those situations and what results you've achieved. and yes at the end you can use online tools to asses your soft skills.

The ability to clearly convey complex technical information to both technical and non-technical stakeholders is paramount. Be willing to step out of your comfort zone, practice written and verbal communication, and participate in team discussions or presentations to improve your public speaking. Number two for me is adaptability. As Agile Manifesto says, it's "Responding to change over following a plan," so developers must embrace change and be ready to pivot when project requirements shift. Finally, understanding and empathizing with end-users and team members is crucial. So practice active listening, gather feedback, and act on it.

I've never used these online self-assessment tools. I believe reflection on your past experience through a soft skills lens is really useful in determining the strengths and weaknesses. Also I've noticed the 360 reviews procedure tend to help as well as you get feedback from peers, subordinates and managers. If you want to speed up the process, a mentor from your domain is the most useful as he can offer feedback and also strategies on how to develop your soft skills.

Better soft skills not only boost the career graph but they also help us get unfiltered and constructive feedback from our peers, staff and managers. The way this works is that people are comfortable sharing their thoughts around us and that gives us a head-start on which areas we need to improve and which areas we need to sustain. Good people managers are always soft spoken and know when to take a stand for their people in the most respectful way and how to communicate issues with leadership to get a favorable outcome gaining trust and recognition from both their leadership and their staff.

SMART is good framework, but here's what's been working for me: 1. Pinpoint the soft skills crucial to your career trajectory. Aspiring for a leadership role? Hone in on communication and leadership. 2. If specializing in a domain, deepen that expertise. Diversifying? Expand your knowledge palette. 3. Draft a tangible plan. Prioritise practicing what you learn. 4. Tackle weaknesses but leverage strengths to prevent burnout. 5. Revisit and adjust your goals regularly.

Continuous commitment to the goals is essential in the ongoing process of soft skill development, even in the face of seemingly gradual progress.

A dream without a goal, is only a dream. You can chase your goal, but without consistency you will never be able to achieve it. The whole point here is to identify the goals and be consistent and never give up. You might not be able to succeed from the first time, but if you keep doing it you’ll be better and eventually you will reach your goal.

I'm not sure if the SMART framework is the best tool here. It's important to not try boiling the ocean and select 2 or 3 skills you want to develop, then you can re-iterate through the process. I'd recommend to put an action plan, and share your plan with someone (manager, peers, mentor ....) who can help you on your journey but will also held you accountable for your progress, and can give you "real time" feedback on your progress

Using the SMART framework is a good option, but to be honest, the most important points are: - to set small goals - to always feel comfortable with those goals When you're too ambitious it's common to be very motivated the first few days only to completely forget or even avoid making big changes a week or two later. Remember, it's a step by step process. At the same time, if you don't feel comfortable with the goals you set you can always adjust them. It's ok if it takes you a short or long amount of time to go from A to B. And just as the post indicates, it's good to practice giving presentations or writing better documentation, that's quite useful for this industry.

In meetings pay close attention to the way others communicate: What posture do they have? Are they confident? What gesture do they do? Do they make eye contact? How are they handling criticism?

"HAVING ACCESS TO PEOPLE SMARTER THAN YOU IS A BLESSING, NOT A THREAT!" Firstly figure out your skills which you want to improve, find a person in your surrounding who is more skilled in that particular topic, try to observe what that particular person do in a tough situation where you lack behind. If you are comfortable talk to that person about how they acquired that particular skill, and try to practice.

Try to find a mentor outside of your organisation, alternatively someone outside of your department. If you don't already have one, ask to have a regular one on one with your manager where you can seek feedback and advice. Make sure you are specific on the feedback, if you ask someone to give you feedback without being specific you'll whether get nothing or something that is really high level, for example ask how did you do at listening in this meeting

I believe that one of the best ways to learn from others is by practicing Active Listening: By concentrating on what the speaker is saying, as well as using non-verbal cues (e.g. nodding) you can improve how well you learn.

Be active in meetings. Listen and observe others and try to learn good things from them. Try to participate in discussions and provide your inputs to them. Soft skill is not a skill to learn, it's basically a practice which needs to be done in regular format.

Consistency is very important here, if you want to master a skill just make sure that you are under a context that allows you to exercise that skill. Try to get outside your confort zone as that makes the learning more efficient.

I would agree that practice is key to master any skill. One thing that will help here is taking the first step as soon as you realise that you want to improve. The step that I took was to join the club, where you get the chance to speak in front of people and get their feedback to work on yourself.

Practice is underrated. Here are a couple of ways to practice better. One, take on bigger projects at work. You need to step outside your comfort zone to become a better developer. And the good thing is you'll usually find seniors who are willing to help. Two, when you take a course, build something different from what is being shown in the course. Many engineers follow the courses verbatim. This limits learning. Don't copy the code shown in the course, just use it for learning the concepts.

This is probably one of the most important aspects in improving your soft skills in my opinion. Once you have an idea on what areas you would like to improve and have had enough time to learn and practice stuff; it’s time to get on the stage and just send it. Trust me when I say this, I was bad at presentations, not the worst, but I knew that I had the potential to do better. So, the first thing I did was accept that I needed to improve here, saw a few public speaking courses, read about it - and guess what, the next presentation I did at my company, a bunch of people texted me saying your presentation was great. I honestly would have never thought that I actually was making progress until I stepped up and faced my fears.

All situations you are involved in help give you confidence and maturity in managing your soft skills in your next role or project.

Seeking feedback I think is an important aspect of a healthy work culture. However, it requires deep maturity on the part of the recipients to spot the opportunity in any feedback they received, be it positive or negative or neutral as their perception may be of the feedback. People can be blind to certain elements of their own characters at work, feedback could be an avenue to see how others peoples lenses and make appropriate adjustments where necessary. In my professional life, have received what I perceived to be positive feedback and what I perceived to be opportunities for improvement and communication skills. Perception is vital to interpreting any feedback received.

Seeking feedback is often hard, because it means we accept the option of our past work or actions not being perfect, being flawed, and sometimes that can hurt our ego. In order to be better than we were yesterday, as a professional and a person, it’s crucial to know how to seek feedback, take it in, and use for the sole purpose of improving ourselves.

Engaging in consistent self-reflection to evaluate the soft skill development progress helps everyone recognize their strengths and pinpoint areas that require improvement.

I don't think code review or stack overflow is relevant here. When getting feedback, it's important to be open minded. You may not agreed with what the person is saying, the person may well be wrong as well. However, it's crucial to try to understand why they think that, try to put yourself in their shoes and reflect on yourself

Seeking feedback is not just about gathering opinions; it's about creating a culture of continuous learning and growth. Embracing feedback from various sources, including online communities, can lead to a more well-rounded understanding of one's soft skills. Additionally, implementing tools that facilitate regular feedback within a team can foster a more collaborative and transparent work environment. By actively seeking and applying feedback, software developers not only enhance their individual skills but contribute to a more cohesive and effective team.

A great way to keep improving and learning from your actions is to do a self-reflection of your actions and decisions that you made daily. Every evening take 5-10 minutes, where you think through: - the way you communicated and responded to particular interactions, - how did you make decisions, did you involve others?, - if something was not done the way you would like, think through how would you do that in the best case scenario.

"THE BEST WAY TO LEARN IS TO TEACH!" Try teaching bunch of Juniors a technology in which you have good knowledge. By doing so you will revise your concepts, the repetition makes it rock solid and will have a good and genuine bond with the juniors. You will definitely learn something new each time you teach. Also publish blogs or articles this will maintain your online presence, help others to learn and even you can refer your blogs as notes. Learn about how and why tech companies shifted from one architecture / technology to another, there are plenty of articles and YouTube videos on this topic.

Here's what I learned about soft skills in my three decades of experience in software development. Soft skills are as crucial for a software developer's growth as technical skills. Many developers don't realize that what others perceive you is as important as who you are. This is where soft skills play a key role. Since the space here is limited, let me give you one important method to improve your soft skills. The keyword for this method is called "Preparation". Always consider any interaction you have with your higher-ups as a job interview. Keep in mind that you are being constantly evaluated. Do your homework on all topics that may be discussed in a meeting, and remember all the numbers and relevant facts. Good luck!

With experience, you will find yourself progressing in your job and claiming different positions and dealing with different teams and clients. Different teams/clients ,might have different approaches so don’t be surprised if what you have learned is not helping you now. This is normal, you need to adapt and keep learning and improving your skills. There are numerous resources available for you to learn from, once you identify the problem you can start searching for solutions!

I think we learn the most when we are asked to do something way out of our comfort zone or something we have never done before. I suggest looking for projects, tasks or technologies that make you feel uncomfortable - that is a sign of your potential growth. Also, don't be afraid to make mistakes or even fail. Failure is as an opportunity for improvement. Reflect on what went wrong in your implementation or code and determine how to prevent it from happening again.

Soft skills are all about things like: - responsibility and ownership - technical expertise and communication - how you approach problems - leadership and mentoring skills - scope of your influence So how can you grow in these areas? Here are a few ways I’ve grown my skills to level up in my career ?? 1?? Study consistently, don’t rush 2?? Ask for help when you get stuck 3?? Make friends with growth-minded people 4?? Welcome imposter syndrome as your friend 5?? Don’t be afraid to look bad at new things 6?? Record and review your wins 7?? Volunteer for hard projects 8?? Look for ways to be a force-multiplier 9?? Work on your communication skills ?? Read books on teamwork, networking, effective communication and leadership

In software development, having strong soft skills is just as important as technical skills. Communication, Problem-solving, Teamwork, Time management, Attention to detail, and Creativity are some examples of soft skills that are valuable in software development.

Problem-Solving and Critical Thinking: Analytical Thinking: Enhance your ability to break down complex problems into smaller, manageable components. Creative Thinking: Foster creativity by brainstorming and exploring innovative solutions to problems. Time Management and Organization: Prioritization: Develop skills for determining which tasks are most important and tackling them first. Time Blocking: Allocate specific time blocks for focused work, meetings, and breaks to improve productivity. Adaptability: Embrace Change: Be open to new technologies and methodologies in the ever-evolving tech industry. Learn Continuously: Cultivate a growth mindset and commit to continuous learning to stay relevant.

Be a swiss army knife. Do the jobs nobody else wants to do. In a software context that's usually documentation and scrum master. Do the jobs that you haven't done before. Get out of your comfort zone. When you've established a reputation as a swiss army knife, people will come to you for many different things and leveling up in a variety of skills becomes a self-sustained cycle.

When I think of improving soft skills as a software developer, I remember a lecturer in university mentioning that employers are asking him to not send them a coder, send them a human. As a coder it is easy to remain behind a computer screen where everything is logical as interacting with humans can be more unpredictable. Improving ones softer skills is preparing oneself to be vulnerable. Often times you will be wrong; you will interact with people with strong personalities; you will interact with people with fragile egos; and sometimes you will be right. The softer skill that needs to be improved depends on the emotions experienced in these situations. Always try to be diplomatic! Tip: Do not leave a meeting having said nothing!