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Soft Skills Resistance

By National Soft Skills Association 10 Comments

It has been 100 years since the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching released a study on engineering education authored by Charles Riborg Mann. In his study, 1,500 engineers replied to a questionnaire about what they believed to be the most important factors in determining probable success or failure as an engineer. Overwhelmingly, personal qualities were considered seven times more important than knowledge of engineering science.

A second circular letter stating Mann’s results was sent to 30,000 members of four large engineering societies, and each member was asked to number the six qualities needed for top engineers. The top six qualities were:

  • Character
  • Judgment
  • Efficiency
  • Understanding of others
  • Knowledge
  • Technique

Notice that the top four are soft skills while only the last two were hard skills?

Education Has Not Changed

A quick study on curriculum used in high schools, community colleges, colleges and universities across this country reveals that nothing has changed in 100 years. Educational institutions simply ignore the research on soft skills along with the requests of their local employers. They continue to teach the technical knowledge and skill sets for an occupation but leave out the soft skills assessment and training that are critical to success in any occupation.

After working in this industry for over forty years, I have come up with the conclusion that soft skills are not taught because there is an assumption that students already have these skills, even when employer advisory panels tell them that their graduates do not.

Bad Assumptions Lead to Bad Results

In most situations, educational institutions assume that their students posses these skills, learning them either from their families or other life experiences. This may have had some validity in the past, but if parents or other adults do not possess soft skills, how can they teach them to others?
This incorrect assumption leads to costly errors in the hiring process. I don’t have to go into the cost of a mis-hire. It is sufficient to say that, when a student leaves a college, enters the working world, and does not even know enough to show up on time every day, the cost to the employers is in the tens of thousands of dollars, to say nothing of the cost to the self-confidence of the employee.

Check the Standards

I once asked a good friend of mine who worked for a state Department of Public Instruction if he could give me the standards for freshmen algebra. After several weeks of searching, he came back to me and was embarrassed to say that there were no standards other than seat time. Since then, there has been a push to create state and national education standards for academics. A quick check on those reveals that there are still no standards for soft skills.

80/20 rule

It was established back in 1918 by Mann’s study on engineering education that approximately 80 percent of success is due to soft skills while 20 percent is due to hard skills.
I ask a simple question—why has this fact been ignored by the educational establishment for 100 years?

Filed Under: Research & Publications

About the Author

National Soft Skills Association™ (NSSA) is a national clearing house on past and present research and to identify the best practices within the soft skills field.

Comments

  1. nassim says

    April 27, 2020 at 9:02 am

    Excellent information

    Reply
  2. nassim says

    May 15, 2020 at 5:51 am

    Merci pour ce très bon billet introductif

    Reply
  3. simon says

    May 31, 2020 at 8:31 am

    beautiful article thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  4. simon says

    May 31, 2020 at 8:43 am

    thanks for sharing such a nice post

    Reply
  5. kamal_hadjafsi says

    August 26, 2020 at 3:12 am

    Good topic

    Reply
  6. Messeguem says

    September 25, 2020 at 3:54 pm

    thanks

    Reply
  7. warda M says

    September 25, 2020 at 3:54 pm

    Thanks for sharing

    Reply
  8. ferahtia_FS says

    January 14, 2021 at 2:32 am

    thank you for sharing this article post

    Reply
  9. ferahtia.FS says

    March 21, 2021 at 4:51 am

    I have read your blog its really good.

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Why is it so hard to close the soft skills gap? – Chronicles 247 says:
    September 29, 2020 at 6:23 pm

    […] been more than 100 years since the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching released its groundbreaking study that revealed a surprising truth. What really works when it comes to career and workplace success? […]

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