What skills do employers want most?

I teach courses and executive programmes in leadership and management and, as part of my introduction to the class, I explain to participants why what they are there to learn is vitally important: these skills are among the most important keys to lifelong career success.

Regardless of the country, industry or job they work in, leadership, the ability to work well on a team and communication skills – among the package known as ‘the soft skills’ – are what will make the crucial difference in their career.

While some business schools screen for these soft skills through admissions essays, recommendations and interviews, we need to go further in developing these skills. In most business schools throughout the world, the emphasis is on the ‘hard skills’ of economics, accounting and finance rather than the soft skills.

At the same time, many business schools use teams in a wide variety of courses, yet few teach much about how teams really work (for instance, beyond forming, storming, norming and performing) or how to ‘unstick’ a stuck team – important skills for much of the work our graduates will do over the course of their careers.

I’m not alone in thinking this, either. Several recent studies with employers also point to leadership and other ‘soft skills’ of graduates as being in very high demand – and in short supply.

Bloomberg research

On the premise that business schools should be producing graduates who have the abilities companies need most, Bloomberg set out to find which skills employers most covet in business school graduates – and which of these skills are hardest for them to find.

Recruiters, 1,320 of whom from more than 600 companies responded, picked the five qualities that are most important to them in hiring MBAs, as well as the five that are hardest to find, from this list of 14:

    Ability to work collaboratively
    Adaptability
    Analytic thinking
    Communication skills
    Creative problem-solving
    Decision-making
    Entrepreneurship
    Global mindset
    Industry-related work experience
    Initiative/risk-taking
    Leadership skills
    Motivation/drive
    Quantitative skills
    Strategic thinking.ReaD MorE
SOURCE; university world news