The workforce can be a daunting place, especially when you are in an environment where everybody is looking to make their mark within the organization.
So what sets you apart from the crowd?
You can learn about the workskills you possess and how to cultivate them.
Whether it be hard skills or soft skills, we all have these in our toolbox, but it is how we use them.
After all, a poor workman blames his tools.
Learning workskills will empower you to be the best version of yourself.
There are two types of skillset that we possess. However, there are always skills born from skills that make us evolve more in a workplace setting.
Below is a list of skills you can acquire and improve on in no time.
Soft Skills
What are soft skills? Soft skills are also known as a core skill, a learned behavior as you go through kindergarten to college to the workplace.
It is a necessary skill that centers around people.
Public speaking, critical thinking, and teamwork are all soft skills you can learn and acquire.
Public Speaking
Public speaking is a great soft skill to have, and it makes a fantastic point on your resume.
To prospective employers, you are confident, outspoken, and charismatic, which is helpful for projects and presentations involving clients.
An easy method to speaking with confidence is to practice removing vacant sounds and word fillers such as ‘erm, ah, and “you know.”
It can lower your credibility and can distract you from the point you are trying to make.
It also makes you come across as unsure about the topic you are referring to and that you could be floundering on the spot.
The solution to this would be to pause to gather your thoughts which shows that you think before speaking.
Great speakers speak instead of mumbling and pause between their speeches to add more weight to their words.
They are also great planners and critical thinkers, which helps to deliver their speech effectively.
Toasmasters is great place to start practicing your Public Speaking skill.
Critical Thinking
It is one of the most sought-after skills an employer looks for in a candidate.
Critical thinking is essential because it is easy to form an opinion rather than a solution.
Thinking impartial allows you to develop a judgment after all the information is gathered.
The best practice of improving your critical thinking skills is to ask simple questions and contemplate the responses.
Thinking backward rather than chronologically will help develop foresight as you look for different angles to your decision-making.
Questioning general assumptions will keep you focused on the facts, which makes you less likely to form a false opinion.
Teamwork
Teamwork is a partnership between members of staff to work together towards a common goal or task.
It is a soft work skill that is common in the workplace but not always executed well.
Working in a team means working with lots of different personalities and temperaments.
Not everyone will get along, but a good team player can set aside their differences and remain professional so that team members can meet targets.
Teamworking helps enhance your existing skills such as collaboration, communication, active listening, and trust.
A good team player volunteers to take on tasks if another member struggles to complete, which shows reliability and trustworthiness.
Being a team player is a good stepping stone for anyone wanting to further their career into a leadership role.
Now that we have looked at soft workskills like public speaking, critical thinking, and teamwork, we can look at hard skills relevant in the workplace.
Hard Skills
Hard skills are tangible through education and learning. Skills like computing, research skills, and marketing can land you a very lucrative job.
These workskills focus on educating yourself over time, but you can fly through them once you know the basics.
The hard skills we will be looking at that don’t usually get as much acknowledgment are computing, research, and marketing skills.
Computing Skills
Since the pandemic, we have drifted into new territory, the digital era where computers, laptops, and smartphones have become necessary.
Knowing how to use a computer and all the things that come with it, such as social media, software developments, and marketing immediately increases your employability.
Learning these workskills need not take a long time as now you can access free courses online in your free time.
Learning how to code, use cloud computing, or design logos shows your ability to be creative and keep engaged as you know how to analyze data and present them effectively.
Hard workskills such as computing is a desirable attribute to have which does require dedication to learning.
By qualifying in a computing course, you will enhance your skillset in other areas such as creativity, research skills in your studies, and clever marketing in computing.
Research Skills
Research skills are not always mentioned in resumes or job descriptions as much as they should.
Employers are thrilled when they meet a candidate that has done thorough research into their organization.
It shows that an employee is interested in what makes the organization a right fit for them and is ready to impress them with their findings.
Researching areas that interest you increase your knowledge, passion, and confidence to deliver projects with ease.
Research skills also help identify a problem, collect relevant resources to tackle and explore whether it is appropriate.
Marketing
Marketing is an extremely useful work skill that you should look to include in your resume.
Having skills in marketing shows that you can persuade clients through creativity.
When it comes to marketing and dealing with a client, listening skills must be the highest priority as you tailor the needs to a particular job.
Marketing releases your ability to be creative, thus making you confident in your work.
As well as the increase in confidence in their ability to do the job right.
Learning to use new software and systems such as google analytics reveals that you can learn recent trends, which subsequently leads to better decision making.
Learning this upskill can be done without the need to go back to college to retrain.
There is a wealth of information on the internet to create logos, digital content, and photoshop.
Employers love creativity as it shows your ability to try new things.
Even if your field of work is not marketing or advertising, but working on projects, you can still communicate strategies and execute the task effectively with new ideas.
Conclusion
So there you have it, learn all about workskills and how to acquire them in no time at all.
You can learn any work skill if you put your mind to it—skills such as communicating, thinking critically, and working within a team come over time.
Soft skills are just as essential as it is all about how you interact with other people.
Acquiring these skills requires finesse, and reading up on how to get the best out of yourself is the first place you can start.
Drawing from personal experiences also shows that you had such skills all along and all you needed to do was re-evaluate your goals.
Hard skills like marketing, research methods, and computing are more tangible and may require you to go back to education to gain that promotion you desire.
It takes a little longer to do than soft skills, but if you are motivated to learn a work skill, you should be able to acquire them in no time at all.
