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https://doi.org/10.1177/23294906221148453

Business and Professional Communication Quarterly 2023, Vol. 86(4) 411 –426

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Article

The Top 10 Soft Skills in Business Today Compared to 2012

Shannon Fletcher1 and Kristen R. V. Thornton2

Abstract The work environment has drastically changed in the last 10 years, necessitating a new look at which soft skills are most relevant in today’s workplace. Because of COVID-19, organizations had to rapidly adjust where and how they work. According to the Pew Research Center, 71% of adults, who can perform their work responsibilities from home, are now working remotely. Then, the workplace shifted again during the “Great Resignation” where an all-time record of 24 million employees left their jobs between April and September 2021. This shift is ever more important as research in the last decade indicates that soft skills are being valued more compared to hard skills during the hiring process. The current study replicated Robles’s (2012) study of soft skills to find which soft skills are most relevant to a thriving work environment in 2022. Results indicate that soft skills emphasizing employee initiative and including others in processes are most relevant today, including Adaptable, Agency, Conscientious, Contextual Awareness, Create Clarity, Curiosity, Engage the Mess, Genuine Care, Integrity, Partnership, Play, Positive Energy, Social Skills, and Suppress the Noise.

Keywords Soft skills, thriving work environments, people skills, “Great Resignation”

While soft skills have traditionally been undervalued compared to hard skills in the workplace, employers in today’s market have begun to emphasize soft skills as more important than hard skills (Kasten, 2014). Hard skills typically consist of technical

1Northwest University, USA 2Seattle Pacific University, USA

Corresponding Author: Shannon Fletcher, Northwest University, 5520 108th Ave NE, Kirkland, WA 98033, USA. Email: [email protected]

1148453 BCQXXX10.1177/23294906221148453Business and Professional Communication QuarterlyFletcher and Thornton research-article2023

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expertise, experience, and acumen that enable employees to be productive at work (Hendarman & Cantner, 2018) and are often easier to measure. Soft skills generally refer to interpersonal behaviors such as collaboration, business etiquette, initiative, and emotional intelligence that help employees engage positively at work (Deepa & Seth, 2013). Additionally, soft skills are imperative for many organizational activities, such as communicating effectively, providing constructive feedback, untangling prob- lems, and contributing ideas (Raj, 2008). Employees who demonstrate soft skills effectively are superior communicators, which impacts their ability to get along with others (Jones et al., 2016), negotiate well (Raj, 2008), and be more productive in the workplace (Singh, 2013). Employers are recognizing employee soft skills as strong contributors to a company’s competitive edge (Caudron, 1999; Deepa & Seth, 2013). Even industries known for requiring technical skills, such as the energy sector, have increased their requirements for soft skills in job postings by 18 percentage points in the last decade while the demand for hard skills has remained flat (Lyu & Liu, 2021). Hard skills may yet be the basic requirement for job fit, but soft skills are the differen- tiator that sets apart the top candidate (Deepa & Seth, 2013), and those who do not demonstrate soft skills may, ultimately, be left behind (Binsaeed et al., 2017).

The increased importance on soft skills is evidenced in the skills that recruiters are seeking in potential candidates. A research study at a large state university investigated which employee characteristics were most desirable to recruiters (Jones et al., 2016). Researchers reported that soft skills were at the top of the list including positive atti- tude, respectfulness, and trustworthiness while hard skills were at the bottom of the list including knowledge of global or international business, involvement in student profes- sional organizations, high grades, quantitative skills, and work experience. The tradi- tionally valued hard skills were the least important factors while soft skills rose to the surface as more important (Jones et al., 2016). There is a lot, however, we do not yet understand about soft skills. The purpose of the current study is to discover which soft skills are most relevant to today’s workplace by replicating Robles’s (2012) study of soft skills with intentional focus on soft skills that contribute to a thriving environment. In the 10 years since Robles’s study was published, the workforce experienced massive transitions because of remote work, technological advancements, and unprecedented turnover. We believe that these distinctive shifts in the workplace warrant review to examine which soft skills are most important today and within a thriving workplace. To begin, we examine the literature on thriving workplaces, provide an overview of Robles (2012), and address key impacts to the contemporary work environment.

Thriving Workplaces

In this study we are specifically interested in soft skills as they apply to thriving work- places where there is sustainable, long-term team performance (Wallace, 2020). The term “thriving” as it pertains to the workplace was first coined in 2005 by Spreitzer et al. as concurrently experiencing vitality and learning at work. According to Spreitzer et al., thriving has two dimensions. The first, vitality, pertains to positive health and feeling alive at work; and the second, learning, relates to the employee pursuing

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continued personal growth and applying their skills and knowledge to work (Spreitzer et al., 2005). Additionally, Spreitzer et al. posits that thriving is agentic, and therefore employees in a thriving environment take action to seek personal growth and posi- tively impact their work context.

While there are many different terms scholars use to refer to a “thriving” environ- ment (e.g., well-being and flourishing), it is widely agreed that this positive employee experience predicts favorable work outcomes such as subjective health, increased work engagement, and increased performance (Fisher, 2010; Kleine et al., 2019; Porath et al., 2012; Walumbwa et al., 2016) and reduction in employee turnover (Page and Vella-Broderick, 2008; Qaiser et al., 2021). For this study, we decided to opera- tionalize the term “thriving” as one that is healthy and productive. This definition aligns closely with Spreitzer’s definition of thriving (vitality and learning) while also incorporating the employee outcomes associated with thriving (productivity).

Robles’s (2012) Soft Skills Study

In 2012, Marcel Robles launched a two-part study to identify the top 10 soft skills perceived as most important by business executives. In the first study, 45 students enrolled in her business communication course each invited two business executives to complete a survey and identify the top 10 most important soft skills they desire in a new employee at their respective organizations. Forty-nine executives responded with a total of 517 soft skills. Once coded and grouped with comparable themes, 26 soft skills emerged. In the following two semesters, Robles conducted the follow-on study asking new sets of executives to rank the importance of the top 10 most frequently listed soft skills from the first study (the 5-point Likert scale ranged from not impor- tant to extremely important). All 57 respondents in the second study indicated Integrity and Communication as very important or extremely important and three-quarters of the respondents viewed Courtesy as extremely important. Robles concluded that while many soft skills are viewed as important within the work environment, not all of them are valued as equally important by business executives. The top 10 soft skill categories identified by Robles along with the corresponding soft skills identified by business executives as can be found in Table 1.

Changes to the Work Environment

In the last 10 years since the Robles (2012) study on soft skills was conducted, the work- place has faced significant changes. Because of COVID-19, many companies shifted the structure of where work is completed. According to the Pew Research Center, 71% of adults, who can perform their work responsibilities from home, are working remotely. Among those adults working from home, 81% are frequently using video conferencing platforms such as Zoom and 57% are using instant messaging platforms such as Slack or Google Chat (Parker et al., 2020). Leveraging digital platforms to complete work is a drastic evolution from working in person with colleagues. Employees are continuing to be productive and effective at home (Kazi & Hastwell, 2021), but how tasks are

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completed and the soft skills utilized by teams to function interpersonally have changed dramatically. The need to understand the most important soft skills in today’s workplace is more important than ever as how we build relationships is adapting and our ability to read body language in the remote environment is diminished.

Then, March 2021 marked a new employee phenomenon that a Texas A&M profes- sor, Anthony Klotz, coined as the “Great Resignation” based on the backlog of 6 mil- lion resignations that did not happen during the pandemic (Klotz, 2021). According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS), an all-time record of 24 million employees left their jobs between April and September 2021 (as cited in Sull et al., 2022). Toxic corporate culture was cited as the number one reason for this voluntary turnover, and 10.4 times more impactful than compensation as the root cause (Sull et al., 2022). Furthermore, in 2022, the new phrase of “quiet quitting” was popularized by TikTok to describe employees who put in the minimum amount of work to fulfill work duties (Smith, 2022). Again, it seems that the work environment and people skills played a large role in employees’ reduced work motivation. Zenger and Folkman (2022) studied data from 13,000 employee rat- ings of 2,801 managers and found that poor management may be to blame. Managers who rated the highest in “balanc[ing] getting results with a concern for others’ needs” had 62% of their employees willing to go the extra mile and only 3% "quietly quit- ting." The least effective managers had three to four times as many employees “quietly quitting,” suggesting that an employee’s lack of motivation may be a direct response to the action of their manager (Zenger & Folkman, 2022). Understanding which soft skills contribute to a thriving environment may be a means for management to over- come voluntary employee turnover of the “Great Resignation” and the lackluster engagement of “quiet quitting.”

Table 1. Top 10 Soft Skills Identified by Robes in 2012.

Soft Skill Categories Specific Soft Skills Identified by Business Executives

Communication speaking capability, oral, written, presenting, listening Courtesy manners, etiquette, business etiquette, gracious, says please and

thank you, respectful Flexibility adaptability, willing to change, lifelong learner, accepts new things,

adjusts, teachable Integrity honest, ethical, high morals, has personal values, does what is right Interpersonal Skills nice, personable, sense of humor, friendly, nurturing, empathetic,

has self-control, patient, sociability, warmth, social skills Positive Attitude optimistic, enthusiastic, encouraging, happy, confident Professionalism businesslike, well-dressed, appearance, poised Responsibility accountable, reliable, gets the job done, resourceful, self-

disciplined, wants to do well, conscientious, common sense Teamwork cooperative, gets along with others, agreeable, supportive, helpful,

collaborative Work Ethic hard working, willing to work, loyal, initiative, self-motivated, on

time, good attendance

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Replication Study Purpose

Too often we neglect replication studies in lieu of discovering something new (Cai et al., 2018). However, replication research is imperative to the process of scientific study (Easley et al., 2000) to test and confront predictions made in previous studies so that theories can be refined, new predictions generated (Nosek & Errington, 2020), and the phenomenon can be understood more deeply (Cai et al., 2018). Replication studies are intended to provide greater confidence in the research findings by examin- ing the conditions in which the results appear (Cai et al., 2018). The purpose of this particular replication study is twofold. First, we seek to discover which soft skills remain important in the workplace and which ones have changed over the last decade. Second, we seek to understand how Robles’s (2012) findings apply to a specific popu- lation (external validity), namely, a thriving work environment.

The benefit of the current study applies to the workplace and the academic com- munity. It provides organizations and employees with clarity around which soft skills contribute to thriving (i.e., healthy and productive) workplaces by equipping individu- als with specific behaviors they can develop to improve how they work through digital platforms and their work culture. It also enables educators to incorporate the identified soft skills into their curriculum and prepare graduating seniors to navigate the business work environment effectively.

Method and Procedures

The design of the current study mirrored Robles’s (2012) methodology and approach so we could effectively evaluate if and how the top 10 soft skills have changed between 2012 and 2022. There were two main procedures we focused on, including the two- phased method to collect and evaluate the soft skills as well as collecting participants through undergraduate business courses.

The first phase was run in the fall 2021 semester where 50 undergraduate business students invited two business professionals to complete a survey. The survey asked participants to list the top 10 most important soft skills that contribute to a thriving work environment (i.e., a workplace that is productive and healthy). All of the pro- vided answers were then combined and sorted into groups based on similar terms. These 56 groups were further itemized into 14 soft skill categories that emerged as most important. Consistent with the Robles (2012) study, a new group of undergradu- ate business students were asked to participate in recruiting business professionals to take a follow-on survey during the subsequent semester in spring 2022. This time, the business professionals were asked to rate the importance of each of the 14 soft skills on the same Likert-type scale ranging from (1) not important to (5) extremely important.

Participants

Participants in both phases of the study had to meet three requirements: (1) over 18 years of age; (2) live in the United States; and (3) have a minimum of 5 years of

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professional experience. Participants in both studies represented eight industries (i.e., business and information, health care, retail and manufacturing, education, entertain- ment and hospitality, nonprofit and religious, government, and finance, legal services, and insurance).

Phase 1 Participants. The 105 business professionals who completed the Phase 1 survey had an average of 17.6 years of work experience and an average of 9.7 years of manage- ment experience. Participants were 56% male and 44% female, and their age range was almost evenly dispersed between 20-29 (19%), 30-39 (23%), 40-49 (29.5%), and 50-59 (19%) age brackets, with 9.5% of participants aged 60 or above. Participants were racially diverse, with 58% identifying as White/European American, 11.6% Black/ African American, 9.8% Ethnically of Hispanic/Latino origin, 9.8% Asian, 5.4% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 1.8% American Indian/Alaska Native, and 3.6% as other.

Phase 2 Participants. The 78 business professionals who completed the Phase 2 survey had an average of 17.5 years of work experience and an average of 7.1 years of man- agement experience. Participants were 38% male, 61% female, and 1% preferred not to say. Their age range was almost evenly dispersed between 20-29 (23%), 30-39 (14%), 40-49 (28%), and 50-59 (30%) age brackets, with 5% of participants aged 60 or above. Participants were racially diverse, with 56% identifying as White/European American, 6% Black/African American, 10% Ethnically of Hispanic/Latino origin, 25% Asian, 1% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 1% Aboriginal, and 1% American Indian/Alaska Native.

Data Findings and Analysis

Phase 1 Data Findings and Analysis

In Phase 1 of the study, 105 business professionals listed a total of 942 individual soft skills that were identified as important for a thriving work environment. The individ- ual responses were grouped into 56 soft skills representing 3 to 91 items respectively. The 56 soft skills were then coded to develop a taxonomy that could be compared to Robles’s (2012) taxonomy (see Table 2). While the resulting taxonomies were rela- tively comparable, there were notable differences between the frequency of soft skills and new, emergent soft skills listed by business professionals that led to a revised taxonomy in the current study.

Differences Between Identified Soft Skills. The first distinction between the two taxono- mies is evidenced in the lower frequency of soft skills listed in the current study as compared to Robles (2012). In the current study, for example, Integrity was only men- tioned a total of 41 times (4%), Courtesy was mentioned a total of 9 times (1%), and Professionalism was mentioned a total of 5 times (0.5%). All three of these soft skills were much more prominent in Robles’s (2012) study. One potential reason for the dif- ferences is based on how the workplace has rapidly evolved over the last few years

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such that while these three skills may still be viewed as an important, they are pres- ently not “top of mind” for business professionals.

The second difference between Robles (2012) and Phase 1 is that new subcatego- ries emerged that were not mentioned in the original research. These include auton- omy/independence, curiosity, creativity, conflict management, diversity, inclusive, being influential, intelligent, leadership, situational awareness, stress management, and vision. The new subcategories, while sometimes mentioned at a low frequency, elucidated the broader soft skill categories in new ways as compared to Robles (2012) and influenced the revised categories for the current study. For example, the inclusion of leadership, vision, autonomy/independence, and being influential suggest that it is important to make an active impact on processes or people rather than being passive. Intelligence, creativity, and curiosity emphasize the value of independent thought and discovery within the workplace. Situational awareness, inclusive, diversity, and stress management point to the significance of being aware of self and surroundings to pre- vent burnout or missteps. Conflict management highlights the importance of navigat- ing people and process differences to effectively make an impact at work. The result of the differences between the soft skill category frequencies and the new subcatego- ries was a revised taxonomy that reflects the contemporary workplace.

Comparison of the taxonomies. The final taxonomy in the current study includes 14 soft skill categories: Adaptable, Agency, Conscientious, Contextual Awareness, Create Clarity, Curiosity, Engage the Mess, Genuine Care, Integrity, Partnership, Play,

Table 2. Robles (2012) and Phase 1 Soft Skills Comparisons.

Ranking Robles Phase 1

1 Integrity Integrity 2 Communication Create Clarity 3 Courtesy Social Skills* 4 Responsibility Agency 5 Interpersonal Skills Social Skills* 6 Positive Attitude Positive Energy 7 Professionalism Conscientious^ 8 Flexibility Adaptable 9 Work Ethic Conscientious^ 10 Teamwork Skills Partnership 11 – Genuine Care 12 – Play 13 – Engage the Mess 14 – Suppress the Noise 15 – Curiosity 16 – Contextual Awareness

Note. Items with * and ^ were in separate categories for Robles (2012) but combined in the current study.

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Positive Energy, Social Skills, and Suppress the Noise. As seen in Table 1, there is still a significant resemblance with the Robles (2012) taxonomy.

The first noteworthy adaptation between the two taxonomies is that two sets of categories in Robles (2012) formed single categories in the current study. Robles’s (2012) Professionalism and Work Ethic categories emerged as the single category of Conscientious. This mirrors the data from the current study as “professionalism” and “work ethic” accounted for a mere 1% and 3% respectively of the total participant responses. The new category of Conscientious is also more robust as it incorporates additional concepts such as “time management” and “organized.” Similarly, Robles’s Courtesy and Interpersonal Skills merged into a new category called Social Skills. This is similar to the revision above as “courtesy” only accounted for 9 mentions or 1% of the participant responses in the current study and was aligned with “interper- sonal skills.”

The remaining six soft skill category names listed in Robles’s taxonomy have a resemblance to the current taxonomy, but five names were refreshed based on the new soft skill subcategories. Communication became Create Clarity; Responsibility became Agency; Positive Attitude became Positive Energy; Flexibility became Adaptable; and Teamwork Skills became Partnership. Integrity is the only category that retained the same title. At first glance, the new category names may appear as mere semantic updates; however, the new taxonomy titles capture nuances that emerged in the current study as mentioned above. For example, Create Clarity incorporates the written and oral attributes of Robles’s (2012) Communication and adds an element of “vision” found in the current study. Agency includes the reliability and self-discipline of Robles’s (2012) Responsible, yet adds the elements of “leadership” and “ownership” captured in the current study. Positive Energy has all the elements of Robles’s (2012) Positive Attitude and includes an “enthusiasm for work.” Adaptable is similar to Robles’s (2012) Flexibility with the addition of “resilience.” Finally, Partnership includes Teamwork Skills with an added focus on “inclusive” and “diversity.” It is apparent that these new categories are similar to what Robles described in 2012, but emphasize an added robust- ness around initiative and including others in the process.

The final divergence from the Robles (2012) taxonomy is the inclusion of six new categories: Genuine Care, Play, Engage the Mess, Suppress the Noise, Curiosity, and Contextual Awareness. Genuine Care incorporates “empathy” previously grouped in Robles’s (2012) Interpersonal Skills and is paired with “recognizing others” and “stress management.” This grouping takes into consideration a caring for both self and others, which was not seen previously in Robles’s study. The next new category, Play, refers to humor in the workplace, which was previously part of Robles’s Interpersonal Skills category. Genuine Care and Play were added to the current study’s taxonomy based on the new emphasis on how employees engage with one another in the workplace.

The two new categories, Engage the Mess and Suppress the Noise, are constructs about how individuals deal with conflict management by either effectively handling conflict or minimizing unnecessary defensiveness in an interpersonal disagreement. Conflict management was not mentioned at all in Robles’s (2012) list, but was men- tioned by 18 participants in the current study. The inclusion of conflict management

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identifies a noteworthy shift in the skills needed to navigate today’s workplace. Furthermore, the direct callout of the need to manage interpersonal difficulties show- cases that getting along with others is not just about the “cooperation” and “relationship skills,” which are subcategories of the soft skill Robles called Teamwork, or demon- strating “patience” and “being helpful,” which were subcategories of Robles’s (2012) Interpersonal Skills. Therefore, Engage the Mess and Suppress the Noise were added to the current study’s taxonomy to capture the new emphasis on conflict management.

Finally, Curiosity and Contextual Awareness are the last two new categories of soft skills not mentioned in Robles’s (2012) study. Yet they are mentioned by 35 and 21 participants, respectively, in the current study. These two new soft skills seem to nod at the importance of independent thought and discovery in the workplace. While the other 12 soft skills in this study describe how one actively engages with people or tasks, these two skills were unique in that they describe how a person would gain insight or learn about how to respond to their environment through asking questions, being perceptive, or taking time to reflect.

Table 3 showcases the soft skills taxonomy identified in Phase 1 of the current study. In the next phase of this study, the research question shifts to focus on their respective relevancy and importance in the workplace today.

Phase 2 Data Findings and Analysis

The next stage of the replication of Robles’s (2012) study, was conducted in spring 2022. Undergraduate business students again recruited business professionals (78 total) to complete a survey, this time rating the importance of the soft skills identified

Table 3. Top 14 Soft Skills Identified in Phase 1 of the Current Study.

Soft Skill Themes Specific Soft Skills Identified by Business Professionals

Adaptable learner, coachable, resilient Agency self-directed, leadership, problem solver, critical thinking,

ownership Conscientious time management, organized, professionalism, work ethic Contextual Awareness self-awareness, situational awareness Create Clarity written and verbal communication, vision Curiosity creative, curious Engage the Mess effective conflict management Genuine Care empathy, recognizing others, stress management Integrity humility, honesty, trust Partnership teamwork, collaboration, inclusive, diversity Play humor Positive Energy attitude, enthusiasm for work, confidence Social Skills interpersonal skills, emotional intelligence, patience,

respectfulness Suppress the Noise not being defensive or easily offended

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Table 4. Mean Rating of Importance of Each Soft Skill.

Robles (2012) Mean Rating Phase 2 Mean Rating

Integrity 4.93 Integrity 4.56 Communication 4.91 Adaptable 4.56 Courtesy 4.81 Conscientious 4.49 Responsibility 4.63 Partnership 4.35 Interpersonal Skills 4.46 Agency 4.32 Positive Attitude 4.35 Social Skills 4.23 Professionalism 4.35 Genuine Care 4.18 Flexibility 4.18 Create Clarity 4.16 Work Ethic 4.12 Positive Energy 4.09 Teamwork Skills 4.12 Contextual Awareness 4.09 Engage the Mess 3.94 Suppress the Noise 3.92 Curiosity 3.85 Play 3.41

in Phase 1 of the study. The mean ratings from Robles’s (2012) study and the current study are provided in Table 4 and the rating scale counts of each soft skill in the current study are listed in Table 5. There are several distinctions between the importance of soft skills in 2012 compared to 2022.

First, the mean importance of each soft skill range has dramatically changed. In 2012, the top three soft skills had almost near perfect scores with Integrity at 4.93, Communication at 4.91, and Courtesy at 4.81. In the current study, the soft skills that

Table 5. Current Study Rating Scale Counts of Each Soft Skill.

Soft Skill 1 2 3 4 5

Contextual Awareness 0 1 4 23 50 Adaptable 0 0 1 32 45 Conscientious 0 0 4 32 42 Positive Energy 0 1 8 32 37 Genuine Care 0 1 19 23 35 Integrity 0 0 8 37 33 Curiosity 0 0 12 36 30 Suppress the Noise 0 2 16 33 27 Agency 0 0 8 48 22 Play 0 2 24 30 22 Partnership 0 0 12 47 19 Create Clarity 0 0 24 35 19 Social Skills 0 4 22 34 18 Engage the Mess 2 9 33 23 11

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tied for first place, Integrity and Adaptable, were at 4.56, lagging 0.37 points behind the 2012’s top mean level. One conclusion, the data suggest that instead of there being a few essential soft skills that employees need to demonstrate, there may be a cluster of soft skills that are highly valued but not essential.

Second, while Integrity continues to be rated as the most important soft skill, there were considerable changes in the subsequent rankings. In 2012, executives overwhelmingly valued Integrity and Communication as the top two soft skills needed within the workplace, and 100% (57) of the business executives rated these two soft skills as either very or extremely important. In the current study, 90% (70) of business professionals rated Integrity and 69% (54) rated Creating Clarity (pre- viously known as Communication) as very or extremely important, indicating a significant decline in how these two soft skills are valued in the workplace today. Interestingly, Contextual Awareness, which is a completely new soft skill category that emerged in Phase 1 of this study, had the most important or extremely impor- tant ratings by business professionals (73 participants representing 93% of respon- dents). This suggests that awareness of self and others may be a prized contemporary skill set, and possibly even more of a nonstarter than an employee lacking Communication skills.

The other soft skill that was rated highly in the second phase of the study alongside Integrity at a 4.56 mean is Adaptable. This category rose 0.38 points in importance (previously known as Flexibility with a 4.18 mean) over the last 10 years. These results indicate that being adaptable to change, process, or priorities is another highly valued soft skill in today’s workplace. This seems a natural shift given the tumultuous changes that have occurred in the workplace because of the pandemic. The next highest ranked category is Conscientious with a 4.49 mean rating. This is much higher than the two Robles (2012) categories that comprise this new soft skill category, Work Ethic at 4.12 and Professionalism at 4.35. Of the soft skill categories that are variations of the soft skills mentioned in Robles’s (2012) taxonomy, the ones that seem to have increased in value the most in the last 10 years are Adaptability and Conscientious.

Third, it is important to note that of the six emergent soft skill categories in Phase 1 of the current study (i.e., Genuine Care, Contextual Awareness, Curiosity, Play, Engage the Mess, and Suppress the Noise) all of these soft skills had a lower mean average than the soft skills mentioned in Robles’s (2012) taxonomy. The one excep- tion was Genuine Care, which scored 4.18. Genuine Care rated higher than Create Clarity (4.16) and Positive Energy (4.09). As noted previously, the other emergent soft skill that evidenced greater importance at work is Contextual Awareness as most business professionals rated it as extremely important. The other four categories (i.e., Engage the Mess, Suppress the Noise, Curiosity, and Play) were still rated as important—just not as important as the others. Play had the lowest mean at 3.41, which is only 1.15 points behind the highest ranked soft skills of Integrity and Adaptable. Today’s work environment may be embracing novel soft skills as employ- ees adapt to the increasing demands of technology and the remote work environment, but are still determining the value they drive in the workplace.

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Discussion

One of the major differences between the workplace 10 years ago and today is that many employees transitioned to remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic. This has influenced the structural and relational aspects of how work tasks are completed. Many studies report on how remote work can feel more isolating (Toscano and Zappala, 2020; van Zoonen et al., 2021) and produced more stress as families learned how to navigate both family and work obligations while working from a home loca- tion (Thomas et al., 2022). The new work context inevitably led to adaptations in the soft skills necessary to complete work and build relationships. One impact of working on virtual meeting platforms is that we can no longer rely on body language to gain context. By extension, educators also need to consider these differences in order to adapt teaching practices and course curriculum to enhance student learning and adop- tion of these highly valued workplace soft skills.

Adaptability and Conscientious behaviors may be more important soft skills in the workplace today because of the flexibility and self-leadership required of employees to work independently from home. Many studies have shown that employees who have higher levels of autonomy (Galanti et al., 2021) and fortitude (George et al., 2022) also demonstrate better productivity and engagement in a work-from-home environment. This may be because employees had to face significant disruptions to their work routine when the pandemic started and those who were able to tap into their ability to adapt were more successful and productive with their work obligations. Employees who demonstrate effective Adaptability and Conscientious behaviors may also display more psychological empowerment, which includes taking a more active orientation to their work role (Spreitzer, 1995) instead of waiting for an external source to problem solve for them. In turn, many students have faced some of the same chal- lenges during the pandemic through remote learning practices, so they may have natu- rally been exposed to opportunities to learn about resiliency and adapt to changing environments. However, noting the level of importance Adaptability and Conscientious has in the workplace, it may be important for instructors to emphasize and provide further opportunities for students to practice how to take a more active approach to overcoming obstacles.

Genuine Care and Contextual Awareness may be higher valued soft skills in today’s work context as employees learn how to relationally interact in the remote work con- text. While communicating via e-mail may seem more efficient, having dynamic two- way conversations allows people to connect in a valuable way that can spur relationships and authentic dialogue that is meaningful (Dolamore et al., 2021). Many employees have indicated that they desire more collaboration and connectivity even in a work- from-home environment (Alexander et al., 2021). Because there is less face-to-face interaction that naturally occurs during the workday, these new soft skills need to be intentionally developed and displayed in the workplace to develop a thriving culture among employees and their stakeholders. Similarly, students may need to learn how to intentionally integrate best practices of demonstrating Genuine Care for other students in their classroom and Contextual Awareness of others and situations around them,

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which will help them translate these behaviors into the work environment as they enter the workforce.

Limitations

One limitation of this study is that the taxonomy used in Phase 2 was different from what was used previously in Robles (2012) study. After reviewing the results of Phase 1 of the study and observing that several of Robles (2012) soft skill categories were mentioned with low frequency, we decided that it would be more accurate to represent the data to use a new taxonomy that incorporated the Phase 1 results. However, there is no taxonomy or process that would allow us to account for these differences while also allowing for direct comparison of Robles (2012) categories and how they measure against what is valued in today’s workplace.

A second limitation to the study is the use of a convenience sample collected through undergraduate business courses. While both studies set participant require- ments that were slightly different, we cannot control for the potential biases the sample populations brought to the respective studies. The replication study attempted to mir- ror the Robles (2012) methodology and approach, but there are challenges to replica- tion when the studies are conducted by different researchers. The results do suggest a number of interesting areas for further examination.

Future Research

While the current study illuminates which soft skills are highly valued in today’s workforce, we recommend that future research be conducted on the top three rated soft skills: Integrity, Adaptability, and Conscientious. The focus of the research would be to better define and understand the categories so employees can effectively develop these skills and integrate them into their daily work practice. Identification of top skills is important but is insufficient without tactical methods to apply these skills to make an impact in the work environment. To better prepare students for the workforce, hands-on training and development resources could be provided to students within higher education using thoughtful curriculum design.

Second, we propose further research related to the emergent categories of soft skills within the current study’s taxonomy. It is intriguing that 25 participants (2.6%) men- tioned conflict management, yet it was not mentioned at all 10 years ago. Similarly, Curiosity was mentioned by 35 participants (4%) and Contextual Awareness by 21 participants (2%). We recommend that each of these newer constructs be further explored, including a deeper understanding of their impact on the workplace.

Conclusion

Hard skills have traditionally given a job candidate a foot-in-the door, but it is soft skills that have enabled them to succeed. As the work environment continues to rapidly change where and how we work, our understanding of what enables an employee to thrive needs

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to evolve as well. The current research builds on the foundation of prior work conducted by Robles (2012) and seeks to create clarity as to which soft skills can improve the employee experience as well as contribute to thriving workplaces. This work can begin in the classroom through the intentional design of curriculum to equip students with tools and practice to prepare them to contribute effectively in the workplace.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Shannon Fletcher https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0767-1969

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Author Biographies

Shannon Fletcher is an associate professor and faculty lead in the College of Business at Northwest University. She teaches organizational behavior and business communication. Her research interests include soft skills and how to create a thriving workplace.

Kristen R. V. Thornton is an adjunct professor in the School of Business, Government, and Economics and School of Psychology, Family, and Community at Seattle Pacific University. In addition to teaching, her active industry experience in consulting and People Analytics influ- ences her research related to employees in the workplace.

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