Soft is a terrible word, right up there with moist, and when you couple it with skills, it becomes even more gag-worthy. If the title to this article wasn’t so catchy, I’d start a petition to rebrand “soft skills,” cause there is nothing soft about the cost to small businesses.
The term, that I shall henceforth refrain from using, refers to critical thinking, communication, conflict resolution, problem solving and whatever else makes life survivable. It is literally a skill set you develop in your most awkward, cringeworthy, preadolescent years (I shudder when thinking of myself back then) when failure or embarrassment is a daily occurrence.
It is now one of the biggest challenges we are facing as small business owners. The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) cited labor quality as our number one issue, ahead of inflation, with 89 percent reporting few or no qualified applicants for open positions.
This isn’t about degrees or technical certifications; it’s about people who cannot communicate, solve problems independently, or navigate basic workplace dynamics, and it is costing us a lot of money.
In a small business environment, every single thing an employee does or does not do has a direct impact on operations, and when these skills are missing, we become the default solution for everything. Instead of focusing on growth, strategy, and actually running the company, we end up mired in details and problems employees should be able to work through on their own.
Nearly half of Gen Z employees say the pandemic hindered their educational or career goals, and 68 percent feel stressed or anxious all the time. The result is a generation entering the workforce without the tools to listen more than they talk, think before they act, or put in the effort before expecting to see results.
You can blame it on helicopter parents, the educational system or the pandemic. Maybe it’s a combination of all three; whatever the cause, we have a generation entering the workforce ill-prepared for what life is gonna throw at them.
It’s kind of on us to fix.
The workplace has changed, and we have to acknowledge and accept the old way of doing things is just not how this generation operates. We can either spend our energy wishing things were different, or we can adapt.
I know what you’re thinking: “We had to figure this out on our own, so they should too,” but sacrificing our growth and future by just not hiring is not a solution I am ok with.
Maybe it is just my Gen X feralness coming out, or maybe it’s that coupled with being neurodivergent, but the fact is someone has to fix this, and I don’t see anybody stepping up.
It is also gonna require a pretty different approach than most people are used to, because it is about addressing the mental and emotional alongside the professional. You cannot separate how someone handles stress from how they handle a difficult client conversation.
Small business owners have the opportunity to lead this in ways large corporations never will, because we are closer to our people, we are more nimble, and we actually care whether they succeed.
The cost of doing nothing is one we already cannot afford.
P.S. I am going to host a conversation about this, if you want to be involved, email me at [email protected].
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