Soft skills are the hardest ones to develop. They make you stand out in your team, either because you own them or because you are missing them.

And most of the time they are not a gift that you were born with it, but skills that you can learn and apply.

This time I will show you two essential soft skills that are tough enough to make the difference between an assertive person and a sloppiness one.

Straight Talk

Communication is the key. If you are not capable of saying things in a way that other people can fully understand your concerns, you are lost.

Your message has to be clear, transparent and direct. A formula that people often use to develop clear communication is to build the sentence like

Context + Problem + Request

You don’t have to build an entire talk to request something. That’s a waste of time, omit intro, get to the point. That doesn’t mean that you have to be petty and rude, people will thank you if you give their time the value that it deserves.

Give direct feedback

When you are giving someone else feedback give it in a way that they completely understand the message. If you are trying to minimize their chances of getting better by not making them feel bad, you’re not helping them.

Remember that truths without empathy are only cruelties. Give clear feedback with the intention that others grow, don’t take away their mistakes. Be honest and assertive, you won’t gain anything if they just feel dejected.

Grit

If you are going to make something, do it great. That means there could appear problems, obstacles and questions, but you have to be strong enough to take them and build a stairway to your goal.

When you quit a task just because you don’t know how to solve it yet, you are missing the opportunity to learn in a potential way.
The more productive people are well learners. The time that you invest in searching for a solution today may be time saved on a future task. You can’t avoid them all your life.

Soft skills may not be that soft but they are transversal. They will not fit in a job profile because they don’t depend on your career, they depend on you. Become a better version of yourself.