Soft und Hard Skills in der IT: Was ist wichtiger?

If everything were limited to technical skills and knowledge, it would be much easier for us HR managers to quickly find „the same dream candidate.“ But there are always nuances!

What are hard skills and soft skills?

First, we should define the terms.

Hard skills are   about the ability to perform a specific task.  Soft skills  are more about how professionals do this, including how they adapt, collaborate with others, solve problems, and make decisions.

A bit of history. As early as 1959, the U.S. military began developing a scientific approach to officer training. During the development of this program, they recognized the importance not only of professional skills (hard skills), but also of universal qualities (soft skills) that cannot be systematically trained. Later, these concepts were referred to as “ hard “ for working with machines and “ soft “ for working with people. After gaining a foothold in the military and psychology, they also became relevant in the corporate environment. The classification of skills into these subcategories is very common in job descriptions, and today they are relevant to many professionals in various fields.

Global market trends and the experience of most managers in various industries show that soft skills are more important than hard skills. However, it all depends on your job title. For example, hard skills have always been more important for technical jobs, while soft skills have been more important in the service sector. Today, everyone, from managers to trainees, must have a so-called „hybrid“—a mix of technical and „soft“ skills.

The most important soft skills include the following:

• Critical thinking  – the ability to consciously analyze and make independent decisions based on available information.
• Effective communication  – the ability to clearly express one’s thoughts and vision, both to a technically savvy audience and to a person who does not work in that field.
• Emotional intelligence  – the ability to understand emotions and feelings, both one’s own and those of others, to control one’s own emotions and to influence the emotions of others.
• Problem-solving skills  – the ability to identify problems and find opportunities and resources to solve them.
• Curiosity  is the inner drive to find answers to current and important questions. This involves asking the question „Why?“ because an answer is not enough.
• Business acumen  – understanding where the company stands, what it needs and in which direction it needs to develop.

According to a LinkedIn study, the most popular hard skills in the IT industry are   :

• Blockchain  – appeared in 2009 and was developed to support cryptocurrencies. It is primarily used to securely store, validate, authorize, and move digital data across the internet.
• Cloud computing  is a tool that enables easy access to information over a network to a shared pool of computing resources that require initial configuration (e.g., communication networks, servers, storage media, applications, and services) and can be quickly deployed and released with minimal time expenditure.
• Artificial intelligence  is a branch of computational linguistics and computer science that deals with the formalization of problems and tasks that are similar to human actions.
• UX design  is a discipline that supports the process of user behavior through the convenience, usefulness, and desirability of the product they use.
• Business analysis  – Identifying business needs and opportunities to solve business problems. Decisions often concern the development of software systems, but can also involve process improvements, specific organizational changes, or strategic planning and policy development.
• Scientific computing  is a rapidly growing field of applied computer science and mathematics. It uses advanced computing power to understand and solve complex problems.
• Data science  is a field of scientific methods, processes, and systems concerned with extracting knowledge from structured and unstructured data in various forms.
• Video production  – the process of creating video content. Essentially, it involves filming with images that are digitally recorded.
• Affiliate marketing  is a tool for promoting and developing a product online.
  Sales is the goal of understanding the needs of potential customers, developing a value proposition based on what they hear, eliminating objections, and securing a deal.

How can you improve your hard and soft skills?

Now let’s try to understand how we  can improve hard skills and soft skills :

• Identify your strengths and weaknesses.  Create two columns in Word, Excel, or simply on a piece of paper and mark them with „plus“ and „minus.“ Or create three columns: „Well-developed skills,“ „Needs improvement,“ and „Underdeveloped skills.“ Get feedback from colleagues who can provide an independent assessment.
• Set priorities for yourself , from most important to least important, what you can work on later, taking into account current challenges and immediate career plans.
• Expand your priority skills . Look for resources, websites, courses, programs, lessons, seminars—anything that will help you solve this problem and improve the required skills.  Coursera, Udemy, and Prometheus  will help you develop hard skills, but only if you complete the course!
• Assess your level before and after . Hard skills are easier to follow than soft skills. For example, did you master Adobe Photoshop in two weeks? Did the two-week negotiation course help you improve your communication skills? Do you notice a difference in your communication with your colleagues and relatives?
• Apply the acquired knowledge in your professional and everyday life . There’s nothing worse than wasting time, effort, and sometimes even money. If you don’t learn from the lesson, the experience is simply lost. No wonder there’s a 72-hour rule: If you don’t use the data from your notebook or presentation within three days, it disappears.
• Look for new learning opportunities, articles, resources, and improve what you’ve already learned  —there’s no limit to perfection. Move on to point 2 on your priority list, but don’t forget point 1—it, too, may need further improvement and refinement.

Finally, I’d like to say: each of your experiences is unique. So you have to keep improving your skills, learning new things, and keep going!