Soft skills? Non-cognitive skills

I have posted about Zeil before (here), but a blog post last year suggests their "data reveals what in-demand personality traits are worth in the New Zealand job market", noting that "A good place to start when looking for a rewarding career is to look at your personality strengths, often referred to as ‘soft skills’" (Mowbray, 2024).

Now, "soft skills" is an interesting term. What are they, really? Well, they are also known as "non-cognitive skills", "socio-emotional skills, soft skills, transversal competences, social competences, ‘21st century skills’, [k]ey competences, generic competences, or even basic and life skills" (Cinque et al, 2021, p. 7); to which we could add "flexibility, team spirit, communication, motivation, critical thinking, adaptive, multi-tasking and innovative responses, well-being, social and collaborative problem-solving abilities" (Staboulis & Lazaridou, 2020, p. 3943); and "a variety of behaviours, personality characteristics, and attitudes with academic skills, aptitudes, and attainment" (Gutman & Schoon, 2013, p. 8). So quite a list, then.

From these definitions, it appears that non-cognitive skills aren't really 'soft' at all: these are personality characteristics which employers seek in employees. Characteristics such as punctuality. Lateral thinking. Initiative. Attention to detail. Dedication. Persistence. Trouble-shooting. These skills are the difference between 'a pudding that takes up space on a seat' compared to a 'go-getter who drives projects forward'. It seems obvious which person appears more employable.

The ten highest average salaries containing a corresponding non-cognitive skill identified by Zeil are listed as follows (Mowbray, 2024):

$103,676	Ability to work in a team
$100,960	Being able to take charge
$91,239	Flexibility
$87,506	Problem Solving
$83,328	Listening
$79,226	Communication
$72,047	Interpersonal skills
$69,063	Managing your time
$61,271	Customer Service
$56,230	Strong Work Ethic

It would be helpful to know how Zeil put this list together. Most of us are more likely to work on our team work skills as the return is twice as high as the bottom-most non-cognitive skill (work ethic). I also find it interesting that a strong worth ethic only aligns with roles where the average salary is only slightly more than minimum wage. Perhaps employers may say that while they want a strong work ethic, they are not willing to pay for it...? 

Anyway, an interesting list!

Sam

References:

Cinque, M., Carretero, S., & Napierala, J. (2021). Non-cognitive skills and other related concepts: towards a better understanding of similarities and differences (No. 2021/09). JRC Working Papers Series on Labour, Education and Technology. https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/236541/1/176491032X.pdf

Gutman, L. M., & Schoon, I. (2013). The impact of non-cognitive skills on outcomes for young people. A literature review. The Institute of Education [UK]. https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10125763/1/Gutman_Schoon_%202013%20Non-cognitive_skills_literature_review_.pdf

Mowbray, A. (2024, February 24). 10 highest paying soft skills. Zeil. https://zeil.com/blog/articles/10-high-paying-soft-skills

Staboulis, M., & Lazaridou, I. (2020). Non Cognitive Skills as the new metric in recent labor markets–Case Study: The impact of social media in promoting and developing skills. In INTED2020 Proceedings (pp. 3943-3950). IATED. https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/63049452/stab_laz_INTED2020_912020200422-93961-m2nhd4-libre.pdf?1587554861=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DNON_COGNITIVE_SKILLS_AS_THE_NEW_METRIC_I.pdf