As Marcel M. Robles once said, “soft skills have more to do with who you are than what you know”.
We have machines to deal with hard skills that are physical, repetitive, and require basic cognition. Learning hard skills will prepare you to work with these machine-like abilities.
However, building up your soft skills will turn you into a lifelong-learner who is well-rounded and able to tackle any challenge. Soft skills teach you how to grapple with the abstract and work in the gray area of life. They teach you how to find common ground with others and build meaningful relationships with colleagues. Most importantly, they help you to become more emotionally aware and to have empathy for others.
There are 3 soft skills in particular that I like to call the 3C’s of consulting: confidence, collaboration, and communication.
1. Confidence
The first soft skill that will aid you in your consulting career is confidence. Within any consulting job, you will be given a problem to solve without an initial understanding of the project, and you will be expected to come up with the solution on a steep learning curve. Hard analytical skills can help you uncover the answers to questions. Within the world of consulting, however, there isn’t always a right answer or solution to the problem at hand. Soft skills such as confidence are there for you during times of uncertainty.
The case interview is a method designed to test your confidence before landing a consulting job. Calculations should be straightforward because you’re either right or wrong. However, business case questions require more thought than precision as there is often no definitive textbook solution.
Confidence can turn an imprecise calculation into a reliable recommendation, while a lack of confidence can sow the seeds of doubt into an otherwise exact analysis. Companies hire consultants when they are making decisions filled with uncertainty. Consultants need to be confident because they are being hired to reduce that uncertainty – not add to it. Confidence in the face of ambiguity is the difference between success and failure both on the job and in the case interview.
2. Collaboration
Good collaboration is vital to moving a company towards its goals. It’s important to understand the people you are working with in order to collaborate productively with them.
Taylor Hartman, Ph. D. published “The Color Code” in 1987, boiling personality types down to four colour categories: yellow, red, white, and blue.
As a blue, I’ve always been driven by the desire to create relationships with others and to pursue a meaningful purpose. However, other people are driven by results (red), peace (white), or fun (yellow).
Employers want to know that you can work well on a team of different personalities. Understanding these different personalities and what motivates people individually will allow you to work with, lead, and inspire other consultants within your team.
A student of mine, who has always been concerned with getting from Point A to Point B in order to finish her work in the most effective way possible, was recently assigned to a group of people that aren’t like her. They had good ideas, but weren’t able to put those ideas into action. Not everyone is going to be gung ho about getting their work done. Instead of becoming stressed and exasperated, this particular student decided to break the project down for her group into smaller, more manageable steps. A good leader knows how to build on other people’s strengths rather than focus on their weaknesses in order to produce quality work that represents everyone’s best efforts.
3. Communication
Last but not least, any consultant worth her salt must have good communication skills, which are necessary to gain buy-in from clients.
Consultants add value for firms through their specialized knowledge and effective working relationships with clients. These two capabilities are complimentary. Consultants should be able to both understand the business problem as well as break it down into layman terms that senior managers can quickly and easily understand.
According to Harvard Business Review, 90% of the message you send in your communication is determined by your body language and tone of voice. Consultants should maintain good posture and eye contact, appropriate hand gestures, and a positive tone of voice. Consultants should also take a genuine interest in their clients’s problems because positive emotional intent will be picked up by clients and set the tone of professional interactions. Since the clients’ goals are also the consultant’s objectives, empathy is non–negotiable.
The bottom line
Although the world’s top-grossing jobs are likely to shape-shift or be replaced in the coming decades, soft skills such as confidence, collaboration, and communication will always be in high demand.
Elle Cheney is a student at Brigham Young University with an interest in management consulting. She enjoys tennis, hiking, creative writing, travel, exploring new cultures, and mentoring K-12 students.
Image: Pixabay