The Importance of Social Skills in Your Career

How important is developing these skills for your career?

Using these skills is important in jobs that require regular contact with customers, but even if your job doesn't involve direct customer interaction, you need to develop the social skills to communicate with your colleagues, supervisors, and other employees and do your job effectively.

• Empathy

Empathy plays a vital role in communicating with others. It is an important skill that helps you get along with everyone in the workplace. It is the basis for success in social relationships, as it makes you understand the feelings and thoughts of others, better understand the viewpoints of colleagues, and instill a spirit of cooperation among team members.

• Positive

Positive behavior affects all your other social skills. Positive behaviors include greeting your coworkers, using polite language and being kind. If you act positively with your coworkers and customers, they will definitely act positively towards you. This creates a positive and generally beneficial work experience for the entire company.

Communicate effectively

As it is the secret to the success of any person or any workplace, as communication is the only way to achieve management goals and improve the positive work environment.

How to improve social skills

Improving your social skills will benefit you in every area of ​​life, help you communicate more effectively and efficiently, and enable you to build and maintain successful relationships with colleagues and clients.

10 Ways to Improve Your Social Skills

1. Interact with others

Since many of us spend most of our waking hours in the digital world rather than the real world, you may find it difficult to come back to reality and fit in social situations. But you can start developing your social skills in a simple way by engaging in conversation with the people you interact with on a daily basis and trying to find ways to extend conversations with your acquaintances.

2. Ask open questions

Closed questions are questions that can be answered with either “yes” or “no.” This type of question is not suitable for situations where you want to prolong the conversation or get to know people. Open-ended questions are an effective way to get people talking and help you understand your friends, family, colleagues, and bosses better.

Open-ended questions grab colleagues' attention because they show you're interested in their ideas. Try the following open-ended questions: “How do you feel about…?” “Can you tell me more about…?” “What do you think of…?”

3. Notice the social skills of your coworkers

Notice the nonverbal communication, body language (such as smiling and nodding), and vocabulary your colleagues use to start a conversation, and incorporate them into your own communication skills.

4. Maintain eye contact

Practice maintaining eye contact while speaking. Eye contact is a type of body language and is very important during communication and conversation. Sometimes eyes and body language speak louder than words. Maintaining eye contact with the person you are talking to shows that you are listening attentively and interested.

5. Develop listening skills

Active listening is much more than just hearing words, it involves understanding the full meaning of what is being said and communicating that understanding to the other person. Listening is the key to successful communication, be an active listener so that you make others feel comfortable sharing their thoughts with you.

Develop your listening skills by maintaining eye contact, using nonverbal communication such as nodding when you agree, and asking clarifying questions when you hear something you don't clearly understand.

6. Trust yourself

One of the main reasons why some people fail to interact with others in the workplace is that some of these individuals lack confidence. They fear the consequences of what they say, and thus remain silent and tongue-tied. Lack of confidence prevents them from offering their opinions when there are group discussions, and this of course has a negative impact on their performance at work. Note that silent individuals who do not express their opinions are often exploited and this leads to failures. So first you have to make sure that you are completely confident in yourself.

7. Invite a coworker over for lunch or coffee

Building relationships with others can seem difficult at first. Find a teammate who has a similar role to you and invite them over for lunch or coffee. The shared job responsibilities will give you something to talk about. Then, expand your circle of contacts by connecting with people who work in different roles. This will help you grow your professional network and gain a better understanding of how the work you do impacts the business as a whole.

8. Give genuine compliments

Complimenting others and congratulating them when they do something good is a great way to show kindness and appreciation to others, but be honest. A backhanded compliment can backfire and make you look like a hypocrite.

9. Find resources to develop your social skills

There are many classes, books, podcasts, and tools available online that will help you improve your social skills. Try searching for resources on a specific topic such as body language, communication, or active listening, and then put what you’ve learned into practice.

10. Keeping up with current events

Stay up-to-date on current events and news stories to find topics to talk about with others but avoid controversial topics such as politics or religion to keep the discussions friendly and professional.