Communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, professionalism, time management, accountability, resilience, adaptability; these are the skills employers need, and the ones we never thought we would have to teach.
If you’re sick of seeing posts, videos, or events of me talking about this…well, too bad. It is the biggest hurdle businesses are facing right now, and it’s costing us a lot of money. It’s why I give the talk, “The Hard Cost of Soft Skills.”
Have you noticed everyone is trying to rebrand “soft” as “durable” or “essential”? I think all of those are dumb; these are survival skills: for the employee, the workplace, and the employer.
There is no one-size-fits-all
We have to stop with the one-size-fits-all approach, which seems to lean heavily on digital and some AI talking head. Have you noticed we took the people out of learning? Stop sticking them in LinkedIn Learning, or sending them to a one-day workshop, and for the love of God, don’t put them in front of a screen; that’s what broke them in the first place. You cannot fix a generation broken by technology by training them with more of it.
The one-day workshop has a place…for trust falls (kidding); but in all seriousness, employees come back fired up about what they learned, but have no idea how to apply or sustain it, and you just threw $1,500 at a workshop and called it professional development. Awesome.
Everyone learns differently, which means you can’t apply the same technique to the introvert as you do to the person with ADHD. It has to be an integrated approach, meaning it hits things from all angles: in-person with other humans, e-learning to reinforce in-person learning, real-world application, one-on-one feedback, and a peer-to-peer community. The community piece is especially important; early-career professionals never built a network the way we did, and they don’t have one now, which means you have to give them the structure to build one (and maybe trick them into it just a little).
It is about integration, not isolation.
Step 1: Assign a mentor.
Assign them a mentor from inside the company who is not their manager; someone who embodies your core values, and really enjoys being asked questions (like a lot). Their job is to translate the unwritten rules of the workplace (no beanies and hygiene is cool) and answer the questions the younger employee is too afraid to ask their manager. Have them meet weekly for 30 minutes off-site, over coffee or lunch, because that mentor is the feedback and accountability they need, and they’re the person who builds loyalty to your company.
Step 2: Provide a framework.
Build a development plan, but build it WITH them, not FOR them; your job is to provide the framework, theirs is to fill it in. Stop asking “where do you want to be in five years?” because honestly, I don’t even know where I see myself in five years. Ask instead what skill they want to develop, what they actually want to learn.
And rethink the term itself, because “professional development” doesn’t mean anything to them. We use language we’ve been programmed to use, and they don’t speak it, and honestly, I’d like to stop using it. The focus should be on the opportunity at your company, but you have to actually tell them what that is. In the program we built, the through-line is literally called Career Moves, because they need to know what their future at your company could look like, which means you show them how to identify, find, and create their own opportunities.
Step 3: Overhaul your job descriptions.
If “entry-level” requires three-plus years of experience, it is not entry-level, and you need to fix it. I talked to a manufacturer recently who had a role titled “Assembly Line Worker II,” which tells someone they’re replaceable before they walk through the door…people don’t tend to stick around when you do that.
Most job descriptions don’t list a salary, don’t talk about what makes the company special, and frankly, read like AI wrote it. Fix it. List the salary, say how feedback is given, explain how decisions get made, and define what loyalty means to your company, because no one is handing out pensions and gold watches anymore – there is no 30-year retirement party. The realistic goal is three to four years, so tell them: “Give us three years, and tell us what you need from us in those three years.” Then live up to it.
Step 4: Fix your managers.
The loudest thing we heard at Uncomfortable Conversations from young professionals was that they want feedback, and they want it to be honest. Managers are scared to give it because they don’t think this generation can handle it, or they’re worried the person will quit, but those young professionals do want it, and they’re a generation that needs a lot of information. So train your managers; send them somewhere, anywhere cause they need a different approach.
Teach them to ask instead of tell. We run on EOS, and one of its tenets is to ask “why” five times over: “Why did you take that action? Why are you missing these deadlines?” You’re pulling them into the conversation instead of talking at them, which matters because they’ve spent their whole lives being talked at through a screen, and if that doesn’t change in person, the outcome doesn’t change either.
And please, don’t hand new hires off to Bob, who’s been there 30 years and hates his life. I’ve had recruiters tell me people walk off the manufacturing floor within four hours of meeting Bob.
The Good News.
The goal isn’t to teach them harder; it’s to change how they look at work, how they find opportunity, and how they approach what’s in front of them. You’re developing a person, not a workforce.
Skills Survival School‘s founding cohort kicks off in September: It’s integrated and only slightly more expensive than that one-day workshop.
If you have questions, ideas, or you just want to vent, you know how to find me.
