5 top job skills and how to build them

In a competitive environment that insists on continuous improvement, where do you start? How do you meet the challenges of a market that seems loaded with demands?

Your performance evaluation is an excellent starting point. Those skills you scored less than exemplary on provide a point of embarkation for your venture through the world of seminars, classes and continuing education.

Mike Norman, whose Michael D. Norman and Associates is the licensed sponsor of Dale Carnegie training in the Twin Cities and southern Minnesota, finds this approach a common reason many sign up for professional seminars.

He cites the example of a vice president who had been with a company 15 years and was an outstanding person with excellent technical skills. A recurring issue in his performance evaluation was his difficulty dealing with other department heads. His lack of people skills was creating a barrier. He enrolled in Dale Carnegie courses to work on those skills, and, at last report, co-workers noticed he was making real efforts.

"In such a computer-oriented society, there are lots of people who are technically brilliant but lack the ability to communicate or work with people, or lack the confidence to express their ideas," Norman says.

Five of the most common skills people in the workplace need to improve, based on an informal survey, are stress management and the balancing act, communication, attitude, teamwork, and personal planning and growth.

Finding seminars, classes and workshops to meet your needs doesn't require much research. If your company offers training, take advantage of it. The price is usually right (free).

Firms such as Dale Carnegie and Bruce Christopher Seminars regularly design and present custom training programs for businesses. Educational institutions such as the Management Center at the University of St. Thomas and the Center for Training and Development at North Hennepin Community College do, too. With the exception of Bruce Christopher, all of the above offer public seminars and classes. So do other colleges and universities, community and technical colleges, adult education programs and metro area organizations.

Let's explore the five top job skills and how to build them. Stress management and the balancing act

The No. 1 skill in the workplace that needs improving is balancing work and family, according to Bruce Christopher, a licensed psychologist and popular seminar presenter. He cites research that shows the average person spends 38 percent of his or her day dealing with unwanted conflict, tension or miscommunication in the office.

"People are experiencing a higher level of stress in the workplace," Norman adds. "They bring a lot of problems to work and don't have patience or don't have the skills to work with people and resolve problems."

Solutions lie in learning methods for achieving balance. In fact, The Balancing Act is the name of a seminar at the Management Center at the University of St. Thomas, where students glean skills in stress management, assertiveness, conflict management and time management.

"Time management seminars can affect all levels of people, anyone who wants to increase their planning efficiency and productivity," says Pat Cina, marketing manager at the Management Center.

North Hennepin Community College's Center for Training and Development addresses the issue with sessions on coping and calming skills, how to manage conflicts, and how to deal with complaints, anger and stress. Communication

"Communication in today's world is so critical," Cina emphasizes. And experts agree, in a time when technology increases efficiency and workers' technical skills are soaring, people are becoming more isolated and less adept at expressing ideas, interacting with peers and generally communicating with each other.

"Communications makes an organization and relationships work," Christopher says. "After all, an organization is an organism run by people; it's not a machine." Yet, he notes, 70 percent of communication is mistaken, misinterpreted or misunderstood.

Things can change, one individual at a time. Communications seminars range from writing skills to creating high impact presentation materials, from the art of listening to competence in speaking.

"One of the speech programs that fills up all the time is Effective Speaking Skills for Professionals," says Cina. "It sells out for a reason. It gives people a process for preparing, presenting and evaluating their speeches," she says from personal experience. "You are able to put those skills to work immediately. It helps build credibility, helps you speak competently and teaches you ways to adapt speech to specific audiences, which is so critical."

"A customer market focus is at the core of every organization," she continues. "Several courses relate to customer service, like how to listen to your customer to meet their needs. If you're not listening, you wonder, are you really giving them the products and services they want? Are you meeting their needs? It's really important." Attitude

"Studies show that attitude is one of the greatest predictors of success," Christopher says. "People who are motivated and have high morale will be successful."

Attitude is the starting point of Christopher's approach to customer service.

"It all flows from there," he says. "I stress that attitude can be contagious. Customers pick up the attitude of an employee in the first seven seconds and form impressions based on that attitude. If a complaint is resolved quickly by a person with a good attitude, that customer is 82 percent more likely to do business with the company again."

On the other hand, when a customer has a less than pleasant experience with an employee with a bad attitude, they tell an average of 11 people about the experience. Those 11 in turn tell others, and the negative message snowballs.

Meet the need for attitude adjustment with seminars in interpersonal skills, specifically sessions on building self-esteem, conflict resolution and stress management. Teamwork

"Today, the biggest thing holding people back or creating problems is the inability to work effectively in a team environment," Norman says. "So many organizations are moving to a culture of being more team-oriented, pushing the responsibility down in the organization. This requires the ability to solve problems. Many people are not good at that. They work well individually but don't participate or don't have good skills at negotiating, conflict resolution, listening and communicating."

In today's rapidly evolving workplace, the ability to adapt to change is not only necessary, it is a survival skill.

"Resiliency means the ability to deal with change, to be flexible, a skill that is vital," Christopher adds.

"Being an effective team member requires more than understanding the basics of group dynamics," says a course description in the Management Center's catalog. "Your ability to interact effectively with other team members can dramatically affect both your personal performance and the performance of the team."

The seminar is Interpersonal Effectiveness for Team Members.

Sessions in team building, participation and leadership are among the most popular both in the corporate scene and in continuing education. Personal planning and growth

There was a time not long ago when people held their positions just by doing a good job, says Wendy Kuzma, operations manager of continuing education at North Hennepin Community College. "After they got a degree, that was all they needed to do. Now to get anywhere, people need more skills than they originally developed. They need continuing education because there are a lot of others out there as marketable as they are."

Norman agrees: "If we're going to be effective, we have to take personal responsibility. ... The only one person I can control is me. If I don't start improving all the time, I'll have problems."

He advises that you develop a plan of ongoing self improvement.

"We have to make a commitment to continuous learning, because that's the only real competitive advantage we have," he says.

In a lot of companies, there's a sense of entitlement, Christopher says.

"A person has worked there 20 years and says, The company owes me a job.' That is old thinking, because there is no such thing," he says. "People change jobs every five years. The average person changes careers seven times in their life. So career development and planning is a skill. The keys are continuing education and developing your own skills so you can be more effective.

"Get as much training as you can," he suggests. "Identify areas you want to improve, and target your training to meet those needs."

Norman emphasizes the importance of viewing continuing education and improvement as an ongoing process.

"You don't change the ability to communicate in a one-half day seminar," he says. "Be clear about your goals, and commit to a process. It's like working out to get in shape. You don't accomplish it in one day but have to do it over a period of time."

To achieve performance objectives, seminars, classes and workshops become the building blocks to self improvement, career enhancement and your ultimate value in the workplace.

Roger Meyer, director of the Management Center, sums it up in his introduction to the center's 40th anniversary catalog: "In today's competitive world, knowledge is the foundation for tomorrow's success."