There are two different types of leadership skills—hard skills and soft skills.
An example of a hard leadership skill could be something such as creating a strategic plan or planning an agenda for a staff meeting. These are skills that can be taught and improved with experience.
A soft leadership skill could be something such as the ability to handle the stress of confrontation with non-performing employees or the ability to enthusiastically present an idea to a group of employees.
There are assessments that measure both hard skills and soft skills:
- A hard skills assessment—will measure “what” someone knows about a particular task, such as knowing how to create an effective strategic plan. Hard skills assessments can be used for pre and post training to determine if an individual is learning a particular skill as a result of the training.
- A soft skills assessment—will measure “core” traits of the individual, such as their level of extroversion or tough-mindedness. Soft skills assessments measure traits that are stable over time and are not typically affected by experience or training.
As you can imagine, there are very high quality training programs in the market to address the “hard skills” for effective leadership, but if an individual does not have the “core” traits necessary to naturally be effective as a leader, then the training is much less effective and may not improve the performance of the individual in any meaningful way.
My company, therefore, focuses on soft skills assessments and determining what level of natural ability an individual may have as a leader.
Measuring Soft Skills
Soft skills are measured using validated behavioral assessments. In the psychometric world there’s a concept called the “Big Five,” which are the five core traits that all psychologists agree can reliably measure someone’s soft skills. The “Big Five” are:
- Conscientiousness
- Likeability
- Unconventionality
- Extroversion
- Stability
There are also other measurements that are important beyond the Big 5. They are team orientation as well as social desirability to make sure the individual is being straight forward in their responses.
Let’s take the extroversion scale for example.
Studies have shown that effective leaders usually have a higher level of extroversion and they use this to make energizing presentations and “sell” their ideas to their team. If someone is lower in extroversion, it doesn’t mean that they can’t lead other people, but they may have a more difficult time getting others exciting and motivated to do their jobs.
This is not a “training” issue but a more of a “style” issue that can hold the person back from being an effective leader. On the other hand…if you have a higher level of extroversion and you couple that with training on how to make effective presentations, the individual is likely to be more effective.
In my next Insight, I explain why you should use leadership skills assessments.
Julie Moreland is a founding partner and President of PeopleClues. During the past 20 years, Julie has become a nationally respected authority on practical business applications of assessment technologies.