Once cringily termed ‘soft skills’, in our new reality, drastically shifted by that damndemic, these crucial skills have finally landed up on a more realistic name: POWER skills!
It might seem like just a simple rebrand, but really, it’s an important perspective shift. The changes in the way we organise our work lives over the last few years have thrown what makes a person successful at work into stark relief.
Top power skills include:
Udemy Business uses the term Power Skills to describe these abilities in its 2022 Workplace Learning Trends Report, and reports that they have skyrocketed in demand. They cite them as the top skills necessary to be successful at any level within an organization.
Questionmark’s Modern Skills for 2022 corroborated the trend with communication and collaboration, critical thinking and problem solving, empathy, teamwork, creativity and adaptability all popping up in the top 10 of the most in-demand skills employees need to succeed.
And, as an article on Forbes way back in 2021 pointed out, ‘as more and more job activities become automated, soft skills, which cannot yet be replicated by machines, have become more important.’ As a result, ‘soft skills - such as emotional intelligence, mindfulness, adaptability, integrity, self-motivation, grit, and resilience — have become crucial success factors.’
And this was well before anyone even knew about ChatGPT!
Ready to talk about crucial success factors for your team?
Think about the people you’ve worked with that you really relished having in the team. These could be leaders or managers, or staff-members whom you wished you could hire ten more of!
Got someone in mind?
GREAT!
Think about what made working with them such a positive experience:
What did they do?
How did they make things flow?
Wash those warm memories of satisfying progress with your superstar performer against the power skills slides below.
Recognise anyone?
If so, you're remembering right - they really were a superstar!
Power skills give us the ability to effectively collaborate with, motivate, and lead ourselves and others even in uncertain circumstances. We’ve all had more than our fair share of those in the past few years, so it’s never been clearer that the ability to manage the human side of work is essential.
When you’re working remotely, communication and people skills become even more critical than they were before. And for many of us, the human demands of simply existing in the world are more complex than we’ve ever known them to be.
It takes an emotionally intelligent manager to understand when their employees are starting to hit a wall; and courage and communication skills to help them figure out what to do about it.
Power skills are about our mindset. They are about our thinking. They are about our ability to manage our daily work operations, our mental health, navigating social situations, and our understanding of personal biases.
They are an effective shield against burnout as they foster ways of thinking and being that allow us to manage our own wellbeing and get the maximum juice out of interactions with others.
There’s nothing soft about power skills.
Power skills are a success primer for your people. Power skills help your people find meaning in their work, they boost resilience and make day to day life a happier experience. As a result, power skills make all the other learning you invest in significantly more effective.
Ready to talk about priming your people for success?
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