Every thought why soft skills are considered to be desirable traits to be present in an individual? Just consider an example. Suppose, your customer’s temperament turns into extreme aggression. To calm the situation, a company’s employee says Mr. X listens to the customer’s grievances compassionately and finds a way to his problem. Therefore, this way he earns the trust of his customer and builds loyalty. Now, the organization’s reputation is not at stake. It can be inferred from the aforementioned instance that Mr. X was able to turn the tables only because of the presence of his soft skills compassion and empathy.
Such skills are not job-specific, but they hold high vitality to ensure the professional success of a business. It is the first and foremost duty of employers to extract time from their busy routine and plan out soft skills training both for their employees’ development as well as the organization’s growth. A survey by BizLibrary states that 75% of long-term job success relies on soft skills. Such skills are inclusive of time management, conflict resolution, negotiation, networking, and creative thinking, communication, problem-solving, etc.
Challenges faced by organizations in soft skill training
Now, you are very clear with the fact that numerous organizations and their workforce have started realizing the worth of soft skills. They need to be well-versed in such skills more than ever. Therefore, they emphasize soft skills training. But, sometimes this training is hard owing to a number of factors. The employees who are working for a prolonged time show abhorrence towards soft skill training as they think things should go on as they used to. Secondly, since employees dwell in different faraway locations this makes physical training quite expensive as well as time-consuming.
Therefore, soft skill online training vests in itself a huge potential to address these challenges and let employees develop these set of skills with constant practice.
Now, if you have to make up your mind for investing in your employees’ online soft skill training, you need to determine various factors to enhance its effectiveness for optimum results.
What Type of soft skills are required to get a specific job done?
Though it is essential to hone every soft skill to excel in one’s career. However, there are certain designations or job roles that benefit from a certain soft skill. For example, if you are in a customer service department, you need to be well-versed in certain soft skills such as communication, empathy, compassion, and conflict resolution.
Therefore, while designing an online soft skill training program, the developers need to keep 3 aspects in minds- review the individual’s job description, ask managers about the soft skills required to be developed in their team members, and finally, the last step is asking employees regarding soft skills they are struggling with.
Carry out the assessment of the soft skills the employees already possess
Before developing a soft skill online training module, carry out a soft skill assessment to know which soft skills the employees already possess and which they need to develop. For this, the designers need to design a unique and engaging assessment that is simple and easy to understand.
The assessment should include the following things- knowledge checks in the form of quizzes, and MCQs. If they answer correctly, it means they possess a certain skill. If not, it means they need to strengthen that skill. The second thing that should be there is to do’s and don’ts activities. What should be done and what should not be done simultaneously. The third aspect to incorporate in the assessment is to give learners real-life examples to know how well they can conquer the challenging situation.
Offering timely online soft skill training
Now after being well acquainted with the soft skills required for a specific job role, skills possessed by an employee naturally, and the skills they need to strengthen; it’s time to implement soft skills online training. It should be consistent, dynamic, mobile, and accessible by employees 24×7 anytime and anywhere. Such training programs should take the assistance of videos, animations, graphics, and real-world scenarios to keep the learner engaged throughout the training session. Make sure to keep the training program customizable, carefully researched, and professionally designed.
The need of continuous feedback
The task of the employer doesn’t end after offering soft skills online training. Once everything is communicated to the employees, provide them feedback so as to inject reliability, keep them motivated, boost their morale, and increase their efficiency. You should offer them reports that give a clear picture of their performance and rate of progression.
Wrapping-Up
Honing the soft skills of the organization’s workforce through soft skills online training is of paramount concern. Though the employers may confront some challenges while imparting the training, if they keep the above-discussed factors in mind; they will surely succeed in enhancing the effectiveness of soft skills online training programs.
To acquire soft skills online training course, trust none other than KnowxBox. We keep on adding essential behavioral soft skills courses which help in understanding and softs skills and make training more effective.