The New Power Skills

Let’s re-frame the conversation about “soft” skills. Instead, let’s talk about how we’re all supercharging our New Power Skills..

It’s been months since the mandatory work-from-home policies were implemented due to the Covid-19 pandemic. This sudden switch to remote working is becoming more prominent across different verticals and has brought in changes to how the work is performed. One of the hottest topics in business today is upskilling, reskilling, and redefining jobs for the future of work.

As employees no longer interact with clients, team members and managers in person, they’re now required to rely on their interpersonal skills, be more proactive and display a greater degree of empathy to increase levels of trust.Team members are relying on various soft skills to virtually collaborate with each other in digitally enabled work environments

From communicating with clarity to being a team player with active listening skills, from adapting to change and being flexible in the need of the hour to displaying creativity in solving problems, from demonstrating time management skills to leading teams with humility -- all of these need soft skills!

Hard Skills vs. Soft Skills

Let’s unpack the word “skills.” It’s a complex idea. Hard Skills are soft (they change all the time, are constantly being obsoleted, and are relatively easy to learn), and Soft Skills are hard (they are difficult to build, critical, and take extreme effort to obtain). These skills are not “soft” – they’re highly complex, take years to learn, and are always changing in their scope. They are the most important skills we have in our companies, and we have to build them, nourish them, and continuously evolve them with vigor.

So we need to talk about these skills, assess ourselves against them, and build “academies” to teach them. Power Skills are developed through discussion, debate, and challenging situations. 

WHAT ARE POWER SKILLS ? THE SKILLS OF SUCCESS

Trends that are driving an increase in their demand

The nature of work is rapidly changing. Machines can produce and interpret data, but only humans have the critical thinking and creative skills to find ways to apply the data to gain a competitive advantage. Reading the minds of others and reacting, interpreting social cues, adapting and playing off each other’s strengths are skills that have evolved in humans over thousands of years. The ability to manage these interactions is at the heart of power skills and humans’ advantage over machines.

Power Skills create business opportunities: Power skills aren’t just about individual success. Developing power skills in employees can create tangible business results.

The pressure to innovate is intense: As technology facilitates new ways of doing business and enables insurance buyers to assume greater control, traditional companies are striving to remain relevant and at the forefront of superior customer experience. Meaningful innovation, not just increased efficiency, requires people with power skills that include deep empathy for the customer experience, the ability to think creatively and critically, the flexibility to adapt to new realities and the interpersonal skills to work effectively across department lines to accomplish difficult tasks.

The workforce’s expectations of leadership are changing. Projections indicate that within the next two years millennial's and Generation Zers will comprise more than half the workforce and will place a high value on the human element at work. They want to feel like they belong, to feel valued and to work in a supportive, culturally compatible environment. According to a 2018 study conducted by Rainmaker Thinking, a firm that monitors the impact of generational change in the workplace, “supportive leadership” and “positive relationships at work” rank as Gen Zers’ top two most important cons

Building Power Skills

Power skills are not new. Yes we need lots of engineers and scientists to succeed, but they need Power Skills too. Part of the problem is basic power skills are assumed. People figure that, by the time you reach the workplace, you’ve learned to get along with others, be part of a team, communicate your ideas, write clearly and solve problems. Once you enter the business world, especially in a field like technical training is a necessity, and management and leadership training tends to focus on more advanced skills (while assuming the foundational skills are already in place).

One of the most interesting new corporate competencies, “curiosity.” Curiosity, a word which we often attribute to children, has now drifted into the center of corporate thinking. Are your people “curious” about why customers don’t buy your new offering? Are they “curious” about how to make your offerings and products better? Do they have a growth mindset about curious ways they can become better? This is the newest “power skill” in business.

Colleges and universities are rushing to fill the skills gap, but businesses can’t afford to wait. They need the skills now, and the payoff can be significant. An MIT Sloan study found that power skills training in problem solving, communication and decision making yielded a 250% ROI in eight months. Success factors included an overall boost in worker productivity, faster turnaround on complex tasks, and improved employee attendance. A Harvard, Boston University and University of Michigan study showed that training on power skills that included problem solving, self-awareness and interpersonal communication produced real results on metrics such as productivity and retention. The ROI on the skills training was 256%.

To Sum Up...Investing in power skills can also turn team dynamics around and essential to the way we work today and closely tied to a company’s success. It’s time for power skills to stand shoulder to shoulder with technical skills in every organization’s training and development efforts. But it will take two fundamental changes in mindset to help employees at large achieve this hybrid skill set: firstly, unified recognition of the value that strong soft skills bring to a team and secondly, the will and resources to foster this valuable skill set in employees. Perhaps the first step is to stop using the word “soft” and champion the word “power.” With this mindset, we can get there.

I’m still working on my own skills as a leader, listener, and communicator. I try to remember this leadership gem from the late coach Bill Campbell: “Your title makes you a manager, but your people make you a leader.” To be a leader, you can’t just execute on your tactical priorities. You have to listen, inspire, and engage the people around you.

Shikha Bhatnagar

Human Resources