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Hey, everybody, this is Connor and you're listening to episode 68 of the listening time podcast.
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Okay, so in today's episode, we're going to talk about soft skills.
This is a really important topic, especially for people who are looking for a job or people that are already working at a company and they feel like they want to improve in different areas to help them work better with other people or just stand out from the crowd.
In English, when we say that you stand out from the crowd, we're saying that you are different and people can notice you because you have some characteristic or you do something that other people don't do that makes people notice you in particular.
So this is standing out from the crowd.
So if you have good soft skills, you can stand out from the crowd and maybe you can get hired over other candidates for certain jobs, or maybe you can move up in your career more easily if you have these skills.
So I think this is an important topic.
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That's in the episode description below this episode.
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Okay, so first of all, what are soft skills?
Well, these are personal skills that can help you in any profession and that can help you work better with other people.
Okay, so the opposite of soft skills would be hard skills or technical skills.
These are skills that are very specific to your field of work.
For example, if you're a programmer and you know a certain programming language, this wouldn't be a soft skill, right?
That would be a hard skill or a technical skill.
A soft skill is a skill that you can bring to any job position, any company, and it will help you thrive in that position.
In English, when we say that you thrive, we're saying that you do really well in some context.
So if you thrive in a certain environment, that means you do really well in that environment.
It's kind of natural for you.
So let's talk about some different soft skills.
First, let's talk about the one that I think might be the most important one.
You might agree or disagree, but I think it's probably the number one soft skill, and this is communication.
I consider this to be the most important soft skill, because if you have a lot of technical skills, even if you have some of these other soft skills that we're going to talk about, if you're lacking communication, this will always hurt you in terms of finding a job or or working well with your coworkers or moving up in your career.
It's really hard to do these things without good communication.
And this is something that I notice a lot when I do job interview preparation classes with certain students, when we do some practice interviews is they have a really good work experience and they have a great CV and they look like a great candidate on paper.
But when we actually do the interview questions, they're really lacking in this domain, in communication.
They're not able to talk well to another person and they don't make the other person feel well or feel good when they're talking to them.
And that's a key thing that we should all practice.
So if you have good communication, you'll be able to do very well in many environments, because people will like to talk to you.
People will consider you a good person if you can communicate well.
So it's important to make sure that you practice with this skill and really think about how other people around you are receiving your words, your communication, and really put yourself in their shoes.
In English, when we say that you put yourself in someone else's shoes, this means that you imagine yourself in their position.
So it's really important to put yourself in other people's shoes, to imagine how they might feel when you say certain words, certain expressions or whatever.
This is important because if you're only thinking about the goal or your objective when you communicate with someone else, this might not come across very well when you're talking to someone.
In English, when we use the phrasal verb come across, we're talking about how someone communicates or how a message is communicated.
So if I say he came across very arrogant, I'm saying that the way I received his communication, the way I perceived him in the way he talked, is that he's an arrogant person.
So that's come across.
So, as you can see, communication is very important, because if you lack good communication skills, other people might not have a good image of you.
All right, next let's talk about teamwork.
This is another really important soft skill because nowadays a lot of people in maybe most industries have to work with other people.
Even if you don't have formal teams, you probably need to work with other people and you probably need to depend a little bit on the other people in your company and they probably depend a little bit on you.
And so it's very important to be able to work cohesively with other people.
When we say that you work cohesively with someone, it just means that you both work in a way that helps each other out and it's smooth.
You guys don't fight.
You have good communication.
All of that is included in this phrase when we say that you work cohesively with other people.
So that's a very crucial skill to have.
And if you've ever been on a team before, either in work, school or any other environment, and there's one person on the team that just doesn't work well with the other people, you You know that this can be really annoying.
This can be painful and this can make the process really hard and you might not be able to reach your goal on time and there might be conflict within the group.
Even if that person has good technical skills, even if they're a good speaker and they have other communication skills, if they lack this teamwork skill, then it really makes it hard for everyone else.
So teamwork is also a crucial skill to have.
Thank you very much.
And a lot of people, a lot of students that I have when we're practicing with interviews.
They ask me do I really need to talk about my leadership skills?
Because I'm not going to be a leader in this company that I'm applying to.
I'm not going to be a manager.
So I don't really need to think about my leadership skills and talk about that during this interview.
Right.
And I tell them that they actually need to show their leadership skills and be able to demonstrate these skills, even if they're not gonna be in a leadership position.
Companies don't only expect leadership from managers, right?
They expect a lot of their workers, or maybe all of their workers, to have some sort of leadership skills, to take the initiative, to help other people, to guide new workers, to lead teams, whatever.
They expect people to be able to do this even if it's not in their job description.
Companies managers, employers they like workers that are able to lead, even if that's not their position.
I'm not saying that you need to have a lot of experience leading teams and leading other people.
You just need to show that if the occasion arises, you're able to be a leader in some sense.
Maybe not in a formal sense, but you can demonstrate these skills.
That's something that's important for employers and that's something that you can talk about in an interview.
And if you're in a job interview, it's very likely that the interviewer can ask you some question related to your leadership experience or your leadership skills, even if you're not applying for a management position.
Next, let's talk about negotiation skills.
This is one that I don't really have.
I'm not very good at negotiation, so this is a soft skill that I can definitely improve in.
So if you have good negotiation skills, this is going to help you in a lot of different contexts and a lot of different situations.
So this soft skill can help you in a lot of areas, even just outside of your job.
For example, even when you're interviewing someone for a job, if you have good negotiation skills, you can probably get a better contract.
Or if you're in some other context, if you're just buying something else, a car or whatever you might be able to use these skills to get a better deal when you buy these things.
Or just in general.
You'll be able to really get what you deserve, what you feel like you deserve, in different situations if you're able to negotiate well.
If you're able to show the other person that you deserve more, or you're able to show the other person that it's okay if they give you a little bit more than that, they're still going to get a good deal right.
If you have the skill to show the other person that they're getting a good deal, even though they're giving you more, this is a skill that's going to help you in many different situations.
And like I said, I don't really have this skill.
So I often lose when I'm trying to negotiate with people, because I don't do this very well and I think that I can improve in this area so that I don't get taken advantage of in different situations.
So this is one that I need to work on.
Next, let's talk about problem solving skills.
So this is another really important one in any context being able to solve problems when they arise.
Of course, sometimes this involves technical skills.
Obviously, if there's a technical problem and you have the technical skills to solve that problem, that's gonna help you.
But obviously in general there are some people that are just more skilled at dealing with the unknown, or dealing with surprises, or dealing with problems that arise when you least expect it.
Right.
I've known many people like this and I see their skill in accepting the problem, analyzing it quickly, coming up with the solution, acting very fast.
It's very impressive.
I feel like I'm lacking a little bit in this skill.
This is something that I can work on more, I think, and I can work on maybe more not getting too flustered when a problem arises or something unexpected arises.
In English, when we say that you're flustered, it's kind of like saying that something causes you to lose your composure and you don't know what to do and you're a little bit confused and you're not able to act decisively.
In those cases you're flustered.
So I tend to get a little flustered if there's some big problem that arises suddenly that I wasn't expecting.
This can definitely catch me off guard as we say in English.
This just means that something takes you by surprise.
So these things can catch me off guard and I
I don't know what to do and I'm slow to act, and maybe I just focus on how bad the problem is, but I don't actually start acting and take the initiative to solve it.
So this is something that I also want to get better at, problem solving in general.
So like I said, your technical skills will be involved depending on what the problem is.
But in general it's the ability to receive the problem, analyze it and start to solve it and to actually do all this.
This is a soft skill that some people have and some people don't.
And, of course, employers really love when candidates or their employees have this skill, because in many different industries there are a lot of unforeseen problems that arise and employers want people that are going to be able to deal with these problems.
All right.
Next, let's talk about time management.
This is a skill that I've always valued a lot.
I think that it's really important to be able to manage your time well, to organize your day and to meet deadlines.
In English, when we say that you meet deadlines, this just means that you finish something when you're supposed to finish it or before the time that you're supposed to finish it.
So, meeting deadlines, arriving on time to different things.
This is very important.
When people arrive late to different things, it can leave a bad impression.
Other people can view you as not being able to manage your time well or not being responsible.
Even if this isn't true, this is the type of impression that you can leave if you miss a deadline or if you're late to something.
And so I think that time management is something that we should all work on, and it can make us look like a more responsible person, a better worker, etc.
So time management is crucial when it comes to achieving your goals as well, because if you have goals but you're not able to find time to actually work on that goal and you don't know when you're going to achieve it, you have no idea when you're going to accomplish each step along the way.
It's going to be really hard to achieve very big goals.
Time management will help you go along this process and pass each step on time.
It will help orient you and help you know what you're supposed to be doing, what you have already done, what you are falling behind in all of those different things.
In English, when we say that you fall behind, this means that you're not staying on track, you're not staying at the normal speed, you're going too slow and so you're falling behind.
And so time management will help you to stay on track, to do things on time.
And one thing that I really like about managing my time really well is that I can do a lot more during my day.
So I'm the type of person that does a lot of different things, and I like to try to do many things, as many things as I can during my day, when I'm awake.
I don't like wasting time.
I don't like feeling like I haven't done much during the day.
I like to feel like I've accomplished a lot of different things, and I'm able to do that if I manage my time well.
If I don't manage it well, then of course I'm not able to do this.
Okay, the last soft skill that we're going to talk about is flexibility.
This is another skill that a lot of employers are looking for.
If you're flexible, this means that you can adapt to different environments, different contexts, different problems that might arise.
You're not only limited to just one thing or one area or one type of work or whatever.
You're able to adapt according to the situation.
And so if you're not flexible, this means that if something changes or if someone else needs something from you that's a little bit different from your normal responsibilities, then you probably won't be able to do this thing or thrive in this type of situation.
And so if you're flexible, this means that you're able to deal with unforeseen things.
You're able to maybe help other people if they have some issue and they need you to do something that's a little bit outside of your job description or whatever.
You're going to help other people.
You're going to help your manager.
Probably you're going to help yourself because you're going to actually accomplish more.
Probably you're going to be able to do different things and work better in different environments.
And this is going to help you look like a good worker.
People are going to like working with you.
They're going to think that you're the type of person that can handle different situations and handle different problems.
And this is just going to help you overall in your career.
So this is something that I also need to work on a little bit.
I'm somewhat flexible, but I feel like I could definitely improve in this area.
I could definitely be more flexible.
So this is one that I definitely want to work on a little bit and become a more flexible person in general.
All right, why don't we stop there for today?
I hope this episode was interesting for you.
I hope it got you thinking about these different soft skills and about areas in which you can improve.
I know that I want to improve and have more of these skills.
So remember that you have the transcript for this episode in the episode description.
So just go down below this episode and click on that if you need it.
And remember that if you want my advanced episodes, if you want practice with real English at normal speed, then make sure to become a Listening Time family member and you'll get two new advanced episodes every month.
And so in those episodes I talk at normal speed.
But I provide the transcript so that you can see what I'm saying and you can practice with understanding real English, native English.
That's fast.
So make sure to go down and click on the link in the description to sign up to get my advanced podcast.
And, of course, if you like this podcast, then please give it a five-star rating and share it with anyone else who's learning English, who might find it useful.
All right.
Well, thank you for listening to this episode and I'll talk to you on the next episode of Listening Time.
