Why professional skills are more important than «soft» skills?

18:06, November 17, 2017

What should a business employee be like? This was discussed at the conference «Russian Regions in the Focus of Changes»

The main business risk is the lack of qualified personnel. The company worries about it more than about cyber threats and the rapid development of IT-sphere. Today, at the round table «Value and Talents Co-Creation in Education and Business» it was discussed whether they are ready to invest in their employees, whether a diploma of a business school affects the salary and whether it is necessary to teach popular soft skills.

«Who is a business looking for? Now there is a struggle for people with soft skills who are interested and have creative approach and leadership qualities,» — commented the Head of Staff Selection in Regional Offices of PwC Elena Kabanova. — «However, universities should not train such specialists — university as an institution should give primarily professional qualification, and only then pay attention to the development of soft skills».

Speaking about these skills, independent expert Elena Chernyshkova noted that their importance is exaggerated: employers are sure that they are needed and important, but still they are looking for those who have traditional qualifications. In addition, even if professional abilities develop and are supplemented by soft skills, a person may not be useful in a business where management has become accustomed to a rigid hierarchical system. Therefore, one of the tasks of successful cooperation between business and education is to develop the ability of companies to use graduates with such a set of skills.

Regarding the topic of education, experts discussed its impact on the employment and career success of graduates.

«There is experience of assessing the effectiveness of business schools and universities: the career and wages are evaluated. If we talk about what affects the starting salary of a graduate, it is, for example, combination of studies and work. Formation of real skills at work gives a premium of 20%», — says the Vice-Rector of NRU Higher School of Economics Sergey Roshchin.

He also noted that today a large number of enterprises are retraining, but the number of graduates of such retraining is 15%. Most of the businesses does not want to invest in its employees, but at the same time wishes a trained worker.

Reference

XII International Conference «Russian Regions in the Focus of Changes».
November 16-18, 2017, Ekaterinburg.
Organisers: Ural Federal University, Graduate School of Economics and Management, Analytical Center «Expert», Expert Ural Business Magazine.
For many years, the conference has been one of the biggest discussion platforms in the Urals covering issues of regional development and involving representatives of executive authorities, academia, medium and large industrial business leaders from different regions. Every year leading Russian economists take part in the conference.