How to Develop Soft Skills?

Yes, you can work on your soft skills and improve yourself. But you should know that there is no single miracle technique for developing soft skills. The solution to improve is always to repeat different initiatives over time depending on the skill to be worked on. So here are two exercises to work on active listening and creativity.

Working on active listening with Ross and Rachel

Active listening is one of key communication skills. It allows you to pay full attention to what others are saying without interrupting them, to take the time to really understand the information being expressed and to create a climate conducive to exchange. To work on this skill, you can even draw on pop culture and the series Friends.

Active listening exercise

For this exercise, use the famous “we were on a break” scene between Rachel and Ross. Take the cult scene of their argument - you can find it on YouTube here - and rephrase Rachel and Ross' points of view objectively.

For each major line, note the factual elements described, the arguments put forward and the emotions felt by each character. The aim is to work on your perspective by analysing two ways of looking at the same situation.

If taking perspective is important, you also have to know how to handle yourself when you're dealing with someone. Normally, you notice quite quickly that Ross and Rachel are not active listeners. So here are some tips on how to apply active listening:

• Do not interrupt the speaker
• Adapt to the personality of the other person (if you are dealing with someone calm, don't rush him/her)
• Ask questions to make sure you understand what the other person is saying
• Make yourself fully available for the exchange
• Rephrase what is being said

Working on your creativity

Working on your opportunity framing skills, as applied to the internship or job search. Opportunity framing skills allow you to reorganise information to make sense of a situation.

Step 1: Mind-mapping

To begin with, you should list as many criteria as possible to consider when choosing your job. You'll have to give as many ideas as possible, such as working with a cool team, having responsibilities, taking initiative, having flexible hours, working for an ethical company, being able to wear trainers to the office, having a good restaurant nearby... In short, whatever you feel like.

Some tips to help you get even more creative:

1. Don't limit yourself in the proposals, write down everything that comes to your mind, even the craziest things
2. What is important is the number of different ideas produced 
3. Build on your existing ideas to generate new ones, inception style!

Start a timer and take 8 minutes to fill in this mind-map with your ideas.

Stage 2: Convergence

Select the 5 criteria that seem most important to you in your mind-map. And use this hierarchy as a comparative reference point when faced with an opportunity.

Step 3: Sharing

Where possible, share your criteria with others to get as much feedback as possible and perhaps start generating job opportunities you might not have thought of.

Obviously, this exercise can be applied to very different issues. The idea is to force yourself to break out of your conventional thinking, to be creative by putting constraints on yourself. You can do this exercise with friends and draw inspiration from each other. It's always good to have different points of view.