Key takeaways
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Employers are currently looking for employees with a wide range of employability skills, both hard skills and soft skills, for an ever-changing workplace environment.
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Hard skills are technical, non-transferable skills that require training or education. Soft skills are non-technical, transferable skills that relate to how you work and are developed through modeling, intentional practice, clear feedback, and self-reflection.
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Soft employability skills such as communication, adaptability, and emotional intelligence are in increasingly high demand in today’s technology-driven workforce.
In our high-tech, success-driven world, workplaces are rapidly changing, and employees need a variety of skills to land a job. Employers are looking for people who possess a healthy balance of employability skills – both technical abilities honed through education and training (often referred to as hard skills) and non-technical, interpersonal attributes that cannot be taught but rather are developed (often referred to as soft skills). This balance of skills helps employers ensure employees can perform their job duties effectively and efficiently, and results in a more productive and successful workplace.
What are employability skills?
Employability skills are the characteristics and abilities needed to succeed in the workplace. They can be divided into two categories: hard skills and soft skills. Hard skills are learned and easy to measure, while soft skills are developed over time and harder to quantify.
In the workplace of the past, employees could get away with being qualified and experienced in a specific technical skill while lacking soft skills like communication and adaptability. Now, employees with a combination of hard and soft employability skills are most highly valued by leaders looking to grow their organizations and maximize productivity, teamwork, and overall organizational success.
While there are systems in place for learning or acquiring hard skills (e.g. trade and technical schools, colleges, and universities), soft employability skills are much more abstract and difficult to develop.
What are hard skills?
Hard skills are technical, non-transferable skills learned through education or training. They can easily be measured and are required to perform job-specific tasks. For instance, learning to operate a forklift is a hard skill that requires training and is not transferable to another job. Becoming an accountant is another example of a hard skill, as it requires education and certification to work in that field.
Hard skills are acquired through formal training at a trade or technical school or through education at a college or university. This type of employability skill takes time and effort to learn and prepares an employee to perform a specific job or task in the workplace.
What are soft skills?
Soft skills are non-technical, transferable employability skills. Soft skills are often considered personal attributes, competencies, or characteristics that define how an individual works and allow an employee to succeed in any work environment. They are sometimes referred to as “people skills” because they relate to how you interact with colleagues.
Soft skills can be broken down into four competencies: mindset, learning strategies, personal skills, and work ethic. These skills are highly valued by employers, as they help maintain productivity, foster teamwork, and enable team members to navigate changes in the work environment, leading to a more successful business or workplace.
This type of employability skill is developed through modeling, intentional practice, clear feedback, and self-reflection. While there are no formal systems in place to help students learn soft skills, as there are for hard skills, schools can help students develop and hone these skills through career readiness opportunities. These opportunities might include work-based learning initiatives, extra-curricular activities, and real-world practice or simulations. Additionally, a variety of career readiness resources are available to help schools implement such opportunities for students.
Soft skills are in particularly high demand right now, as employers compete with ever-changing technologies and artificial intelligence that are rapidly altering entire industries. Many leaders are returning to the basics of human connection in their businesses and workplaces, placing greater value on employees with strong soft employability skills to get ahead in their industries.
Examples of Employability Skills
Job candidates with a combination of hard and soft employability skills are in high demand right now.
Examples of hard skills include: data analysis, technical writing, computer programming, information technology (IT), project management, foreign languages, machine or tool operation, and accounting. These are all employability skills that require formal training, education, or certification. Most jobs require employees to have certain hard skills to perform specific tasks as part of their duties.
On the other hand, soft skills of employees examples include communication, teamwork, collaboration, adaptability, problem-solving, organization, self-management, and critical thinking, as well as traits such as reliability, punctuality, and initiative. These skills must be developed over time and consistently practiced. Many schools are now placing greater emphasis on developing these skills in students, as the job market changes and requires more of them.
Top 5 Most Common Hard Skills Employers Look For
While many hard skills are currently in demand in today’s job market, advancing technologies are requiring employers to spend more time and energy recruiting for these highly specialized, technical roles.
5 hard employability skills that employers are currently looking for include:
1. Artificial Intelligence
With artificial intelligence rapidly changing the landscape across many industries, employers are increasingly seeking employees with technical skills in programming languages, machine learning and deep learning, data management, and artificial intelligence frameworks. These artificial intelligence skills have rapidly become the most challenging to find in the labor market.
2. Cybersecurity
There is a wide variety of technical skills in cybersecurity that employers seek to keep their businesses and networks safe. These skills include proficiency in network and infrastructure security, cloud security, scripting, risk management, and incident response. As network security breaches become more common, cybersecurity skills are becoming increasingly critical to employers.
3. Cloud Computing
Cloud computing is a highly technical employability skill that many employers seek. Specific skills that are currently in high demand include knowledge of various cloud platforms, cloud security, artificial intelligence integration, and database management.
4. Digital Marketing and Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
In our technology-driven world, businesses are relying heavily on digital marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) to sell their products and services. Thanks to ever-changing technologies and algorithms, finding employees with experience in sub-skills such as data analytics, keyword research, email marketing, web design, and content management systems (CMS) is crucial to the success of many businesses.
5. Data Analysis
With more and more information available at the click of a mouse, data analysts are a hot commodity. They are responsible for gathering, organizing, and interpreting data, and identifying trends and patterns critical to a business’s health and success. Specific expertise in statistical programming and analysis, database management, and data preparation is in high demand.
Top 5 Most Common Soft Skills Employers Look For
In recent years, many employers have placed greater importance on recruiting employees with a variety of soft employability skills rather than relying solely on candidates with specialized knowledge and skills. These soft skills are quickly becoming as in demand as any hard skill, putting greater pressure on schools to support students’ development.
5 soft employability skills that employers are currently looking for include:
1. Communication
Communication skills include active listening, awareness of non-verbal communication and body language, and clarity and conciseness. Strong communication skills result in more effective collaboration among colleagues, stronger, healthier relationships with colleagues and clients, and reduced conflict in the workplace, making them a high priority among employability skills employers seek.
2. Adaptability and Flexibility
Unexpected changes and challenges are bound to occur in the workplace. Employers seek employees who can adapt to these changes easily and pivot, as needed. Flexibility enables employees to quickly and seamlessly adapt to these obstacles while embracing them as opportunities for innovation and creativity.
3. Interpersonal Skills
Interpersonal skills can be broken down into the following categories: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and decision making. These skills are crucial to the health and productivity of a workplace and to employees’ ability to collaborate, communicate, and resolve conflict. Interpersonal skills are a soft employability skill that can make or break a workplace culture, directly impacting employee satisfaction and retention.
4. Teamwork and Collaboration
The ability to be a team player and collaborate successfully with colleagues leads to greater innovation and creativity, increased productivity, and higher employee morale. The result is a strengthened organizational culture, fewer workplace conflicts, and happier employees.
5. Time Management and Organization
Employees with better time management and organizational skills have better work-life balance and less stress, reducing burnout and positively impacting the overall health and sustainability of the workplace.
While acquiring hard employability skills through training, schooling, or certification programs remains necessary for most jobs, focusing on the growth and development of soft skills is critical to an employee’s success in the workplace.
