Catch 'em young! Start Soft Skills Training right in School

Ask a school principal if they provide soft skills training to their students and they will say “Of Course”. Ask further and they will go on to give you examples of how they organize Quizzes, Debates, Elocution Contests and much more for their students and how their students have fared well in intra school and inter school competitions. This is their way of providing “best in class” education and overall training.

I get opportunities to visit schools and meet students in classes. I ask them a simple question, “How many of you would be confident of coming here and speaking on a topic?”, I must honestly confess that though the number of students have gone up reasonably over the years, but still I haven’t got even 20% of the students in a class raising their hands confidently. So clearly the best in class soft skills training offered by schools is restricted to some students in a class only.

The only thing required for a person to succeed in career is SKILLS. It is classified into two mandatory parts. HARD SKILLS AND SOFT SKILLS.

Unfortunately, there has not been enough focus on either hard skills (also known as vocational skills) or on soft skills. While there has been some awareness towards Hard Skills by the Government which is essential in a country like India for employment, research has clearly shown that possessing soft skills adds to the employability quotient significantly and has led to improved opportunities by at least 20% in terms of salaries. Add to it the growth potential and you have a flourishing career ahead – whether it is employment or entrepreneurship.

Let’s just understand some of the basic soft skills that every individual should possess specifically at the early stages of career.

Communication Skills - being able to listen actively to others, understand their message, frame your message verbally and communicate the same in a way that it is understood exactly the way you want.

Interpersonal Skills – one doesn’t work in silos these days and you have to work with people around. You will come across people from different styles, backgrounds, ideologies, skill-sets and personalities. You still need to work with them to get the best results. They may be within your organization or outside. You need to build trust, be empathetic and maintain good relationships – at least from a professional standpoint. Team work may be called a subset of interpersonal skills.

Presentation Skills – Being able to speak in front of an audience, motivate them to actively listen to you and to act as per your desired outcome. Presentation can be with or without a visual aid such as a PowerPoint. This is a skill that helps you stand out and is certainly a career booster.

Leadership skills - a skill most important during your career to ensure that you are on a growth trajectory and remain on the growth path. You need to define and communicate your vision in a way that inspires others to follow your instructions with dedication. Generally, mentoring, coaching and general management skills may be a subset of leadership skills.

Personal Appearance – you don’t wear swim suit to work and you don’t wear a three-piece suit at a beach. Dress for the occasion and maintain a basic personal grooming suited to the occasion.

Self-Management Skills – Apart from managing others, soft skills is more about managing oneself. One needs to have a growth mindset, think out of the box, manage emotions, be confident, manage stress and manage time so that work can be completed in time. These are just a few self-management skills that one should possess to succeed in life.

Well, so what’s the point? The point is that given the importance of soft skills and the wide area that it covers, it is impeccable that the soft skills training be started in schools as part of their curriculum. As part of ICA’s Institutional Training Program, we have conducted such training for students across various schools in India and have seen impressive results. Not only have the students been more confident than ever, we have also seen improved admission rates to premium colleges – a benchmark that evaluate schools’ success.