The debate about soft skills versus hard skills is not new in people management. In the early 1990’s, Daniel Goleman introduced the term emotional intelligence, which emphasizes the importance of interpersonal skills, and has since received growing attention. These soft skills are usually differentiated from more technical skills, specialized knowledge and proficiency (also called hard skills), which traditionally have been the main focus of recruiters.
However, which types of skills are more important for international assignments?
Managing expatriation is usually very costly for organizations, so firms generally expect positive outcomes and in particular tangible results. This obviously means that the person going abroad should have the necessary knowledge and technical skills. Only a qualified specialist can set up a new production line or operation, only an experienced leader can establish a new project and only a proficient manager can implement a new procedure. However, what if this needs to be done abroad, in different cultural settings, with culturally diverse colleagues and unfamiliar practices? Without being able to adapt abroad, expats most likely won’t succeed. Strong personal and interpersonal attributes are necessary to manage the tasks at hand.
Decision: Obviously both skill types shouldn’t compete but rather complement each other. However, if you were given the choice between an employee with stronger hard skills and an employee with stronger soft skills, whom would you choose for an international assignment?
according to my experience, an important point on this matter is represented by the fact that the company’s expectation on the employee’s performance are typically changing once one is appointed to an overseas function.
Thus, for the expatriate is very important to deal with this changed scenario and secure appropiate agreements in term of time, supervising procedure, feed-back on professional and private progresses, etc.
I would categorize these ability as a “soft skills”.
Given the economic cost for the company and the \human\ cost for the ones (he/she and his/her family) moving abroad, I would say that commitment to the assignment (to the long run strategic goals of the company) is the key success factor of any expatriation process. I believe that hard skills needed abroad could be fulfill with short terms assignments…
Handling expatriation is mostly terribly expensive for associations, so firms typically expect positive outcomes and particularly real results. This manifestly implies that the individual going abroad should have the obligatory information and technical talents.
When it comes to which types of skills are more important for international assignments, I believe the real issue is more to do with how it is carried out. But if I couldn’t sit on the fence, then as James mentioned, handling expats is definitely a costly experience
It is really hard to say. In some cases hard skills are required , especially in some high tech environmnents, however from my experience soft skills are very important, especially when you are going to completely different culture. I spent some time in Middle East and getting used to local traditions was not easy at the begining.
One can always find technical hard skills laborers – the rare breed is the person with top interpersonal communication skills and those professional communicators always excel beyond the technical experts. Food for thought!
Having worked in Asia and Australia, and observing the different types of background and culture, I would lean more towards having the right soft skills. It certainly allows the employee to blend in easier and faster, and this has a positive impact on company prdocutivity
From the various surveys that we done through our online expatriates community platforms with various companies HR department around the world it seems that flexibility and cultural adaptation potential are key factors. Obviously the technical background is mandatory in most cases.
In my opinion it’s not soft or hard which is the question but finding the RIGHT people.
I would think that both hard and soft skills are necessary and I don’t see why they can’t be combined in the same person. It is obvious that hard skills are a prerequisite to employment and these will take many years to learn. Soft skills can be acquire more quickly and it should be mandatory for all expatriate personnel to learn the culture of the country they will be living in.
For me, soft and hard doesn’t matter. It is when the person is competent, he is qualified. That hard skill will later be developed as he go along…
I guess a company would never consider sending an employee to work abroad unless they are confident about his hard skills. If the company wants to implement some new business process in a foreign country, then I would go for a hard skilled expat, but if it is needed only to supervise or educate it might be a better solution to send soft skilled employee.
Depends on your hard skills. If the only skills you have learnt are from a degree, they are mostly too general.
Most people never use much, if any of what they learnt in hard skills outside uni.
It gets you a piece of paper, that gets you a job, but soft skills will make you good at your job.
Happiness is an integral part of emotional intelligence. As long as you are happy you have a better mindset of your personal goals in life.
Obviously both skill types shouldn’t compete but rather complement each other.