Why Strong People Skills are Essential for a Successful Leader
When you think of people skills, the ability to socialize with others is probably what comes to mind. But the ability to communicate with others isn’t the main ingredient to effective people skills. In fact, many elements contribute to good people skills; having patience with others, showing empathy, strong listening skills and good manners are all traits that a person should have to be an effective leader.
10 Essential People Skills You Need to Succeed
How do you really connect with people and show them your authentic self? Master these essential tips to level up your people skills.
People skills are an essential part of work, life, and social success. When you have strong people skills, you are better able to:
Pitch yourself
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- Overcome social anxiety
- Communicate your ideas
- Influence others positively
What are people skills? People skills are the tools you use to communicate and interact effectively with others. Individuals with strong people skills are able to predict behavior, relate to others, and socialize easily. People skills also are known as soft skills, interpersonal skills, social skills, emotional intelligence, and interpersonal intelligence.
Research has even found that those who have strong people skills make an average of $29,000 more per year!
People skills are one of the most underappreciated areas of career development. In career development, we are lucky if we have the occasional soft skills training or communication course. I believe interpersonal intelligence, or PQ, needs to be honed. Just like we develop our IQ, we need to work on our PQ. People smarts are just as important as book smarts. READ MORE
How Good Are Your People Skills?
In almost all jobs, your people skills – also known as “soft skills” – have as much of an impact on your success as your technical skills.
That’s especially true when you’re in a management or leadership role.
The importance of having solid people skills transcends industry and profession; so, whether you lead people, aspire to lead people, or work within a team of professionals, you need to apply people skills to achieve your objectives.
So, how good are your people skills? Take this short quiz to assess your current skill levels.
Once you’ve answered these questions, we can then point you toward specific tools and resources that you can use to develop and improve this important area of competency.
10 Simple Ways to Improve Your People Skills
Much of your success in life hinges on your ability to understand and interact with people. Use these tips to up your people-skills game.
No matter what new technologies and systems you put in place to grow your business, how to work with people will always matter most. Developing natural charm and innate people skills requires effort along with trial and error. Here are ten simple ways to help improve your natural charm and create real connections to build more powerful people skills:
1. Talk to others about what they want to hear
2. Take a training course
3. Show appreciation
4. Give genuine, sincere compliments
5. Act honorably and treat others with respect
6. Identify personal core values
7. Commit to good business ethics
8. Remain true to your authentic self
9. Build confidence to make stronger connections
10. Tackle problems with a positive mental attitude
Free Online Training – People skills
Introduction to Interpersonal Skills
Learn about the influence of interpersonal skills on communicating effectively at work with this free online course.
Improving Communication Skills
This course is part of the Achieving Personal and Professional Success Specialization