Most employers nowadays put increasing emphasis on social skills. Some people believe that social skills are important in addition to good qualifications for job success. To what extent, do you agree or disagree?

I definitely agree that today social skills are considered as important as good qualifications while
recruiting new employees. Hiring the right candidate based on technical knowledge without looking
at social skills is like designing a racecar with a powerful engine but with substandard steering and
braking systems. No business can thrive if its employees, however highly qualified they may be, lack the soft skills.

It is easy to see why employers are putting emphasis on social skills in addition to qualifications.
Social skılls reflect a person’s ability to work with others in a way that strengthens long-term working relationships. There are many personality traits such as creativity, adaptability, honesty, integrity, and effort, which are also important besides technical skills. A university degree does not signal whether a person has those traits. A degree does not indicate in any way, how a person will function in the real world.

Moreover, it has been seen that when recruitments are focused only on candidates’ technical skills
and expertise, then it resulted in hiring employees who had the intellect to succeed but lacked the
social skills required to work effectively. This is because they lacked emotional intelligence which is
the ability to understand their own emotions and those of others and use this emotional
understanding to adjust and cooperate with others. This resulted in interpersonal conflict and
frustration and sometimes such employees had to be fired. What is more, such employees were
unable to handle the social demands of leadership and so had to remain at lower-level jobs.
Undoubtedly, academic qualifications are also important because just as clothing is to first
impressions, so is a university degree to a first job or a job with good pay. The first thing that
companies look for is that piece of paper before looking at an individualľ experience. A degree
simply proves that an individual has acquired the necessary academic knowledge of how to carry out a job. Having a degree most definitely helps the recruiters in hiring suitable candidates.

In summary, it is clear to understand why social skills are given a lot of importance in addition to
qualifications. Such skills are the key to success at work.