I met with a CEO who had a problem with one of his lieutenants.
The guy was super smart.
Excellent at the technical aspects of his job.
But he was near impossible for others to work with.
Negative mindset. One upping teammates. Seeking more leadership without first proving his performance.
The CEO didn’t know how to manage him, so he just kept rambling on about developing his “soft skills.”
“What Soft Skills?”
I asked him.
“What do you mean by that?”
He looked at me blankly, “You know, those soft skills.”
And maybe this sounds strange to some people but I haven’t heard that term in years.
I’ve certainly never used it in the context of my work.
I do remember back in the day people using that phrase.
But no-one whose serious about winning thinks about skills that way.
When you think about it, it’s a strange phrase, right?
Are the skills themselves “soft” in some way?
We diminish them as though they are.
Like they’re skills that don’t really matter, that perhaps maybe you might want to learn.
Yet, when you look at what “soft skills” actually are, you see they’re the…