Blog - Page 62 of 77 - Soft Skills

What are Soft Skills?

by Lei Han

I must admit I had no idea what are soft skills when I graduated from college. I quickly realized on my first job at McKinsey how my lack of some soft skills were affecting my performance reviews. Here are some of the soft skills I lacked at that time.

Stress Management and People Management Skills – At 22 years old, I was assigned an assistant at McKinsey. I treated her horribly when I was stressed out and I was immature to think I have the right to since she worked for me. Needless to say, she was NOT jumping to help me all the time.
Confidence and Communication Skills – I was book smart and had great ideas on projects, but sometimes I was afraid to speak up when there were senior people in the room. I had no idea how to structure my comments and I didn’t have the confidence to think they would care what I think. McKinsey expects Analysts to voice their opinions.
Resilience / Office politics skills – I was blamed for something I didn’t do on a project. It took me a few years to move on from this one. My manager succeeded in blaming me because he knew how to play office politics better than me. I had no close support from any partners.

After working 15 years in consulting with 20+ Fortune 500 companies dealing with all kinds of people, personalities, and unexpected situations, I have a much greater appreciation for how important soft skills are to achieve business success. So I would like to offer my own definition of “what are soft skills” in practical terms (see below). ... read more

Forgive and Forget – Key to Career Success

by Lei Han

I had a real scare yesterday. My 3 year old daughter, Isabel, lost her balance and fell from an 8-feet-high rope ladder, head first. I screamed, and although I was a few steps away, I couldn’t reach her in time. She hit the dirt on the side of her head and right cheek. Luckily, her head does not seem to be injured. Besides a shiner on her cheek, she was just super scared. ... read more

Office Politics – Should I leverage it to further my career?

by Lei Han

Early in my career, I have been burnt by office politics but not in the way you think. I didn’t feel burnt because someone else sabotaged my job. On the contrary, I concluded, I burnt myself because I didn’t understand or appreciate office politics and the importance of using it fairly and skillfully to protect and build my career advantage. ... read more

Mentoring Model – Mutual Mentorship or Paying it Forward?

by Lei Han

Yesterday, one of my friend sent me this article written by Steve Blank about Mentors, Teachers, and Coaches. I wanted to shared it with you to get your perspective. Steve makes great distinctions about the difference between mentors vs. teachers vs. coaches. I completely agree with this. He says

Teachers, coaches and mentors are each something different.

If you want to learn a specific subject find a teacher.

If you want to hone specific skills or reach an exact goal hire a coach.

If you want to get smarter and better over your career find someone who cares about you enough to be a mentor.

Work for Free – Who Should do it and Why?

by Lei Han

I came across this question on Quora – Should anyone work for free for good exposure and at what stage do you stop doing free, but awesome work?

1. Should anyone work for free? Yes, everyone should at least consider to work for free as an option. I think it’s important to realize that wasting time also costs money in the long run. As you alluded to, you could be paid doing mediocre stuff and not learning. In this case, you are losing time building experience and therefore you may not get promoted fast or get a better job with higher pay easily. On the other hand, you can work for free and in exchange get great experience on your resume, new skills, or even a chance to turn it into a good paid job. I think the right free work could very well be a great investment of your time. It’s like getting free education without paying for tuition.

2. At what stage do you stop doing free but awesome work? It’s important to set up an agreement up front before you start to work for free as to when and under what condition you will stop working for free. This way you can set expectations up front. For example, I know job seekers who have offered to work for free for start-ups to gain experience and both parties know they will stop either when they find a job or when that start-up got enough funding to pay them. For more examples, see my other article Radical Ways to Find a Job

At the end of the day, whether to work for free is an individual decision. You have to consider three factors before doing it.

A) available time – if you are looking for work but it’s taking awhile, it’s a good time to consider working for free to get experience. Or if you work a 9 to 5 job and has energy to work some more on top of that

B) financial situation – if you have a job already, can you afford to work for free instead? If not, then do it on the side first.

C) type of free work opportunity – most importantly, only work for free for the right situation – one that can teach you new skills, great experience on your resume, good brand name company, provide more connections, or can lead to a job.

Who Do You Model Yourself After?

by Lei Han

I model myself after many people. This is because even the best role models will disappoint in one area or another and in fact I think it’s expecting too much when you model only after one person.

Instead, I think it’s important to have a board of advisors – chosing 5 to 8 people that can be your mentor or role model for different aspects of what your want to develop. For example ,

For work life balance, I always think of the HP client I had 8 years ago, who showed me how to work effectively without over perfecting. She manages to get out of work by 6:30 and be the SVP of marketing.

For entrepreneurship, I think of two entrepreneurs I know who have shared their trials and tribulations and teaches me something new every time I interact with them. One has similiar business experience as me but ahead of me in career. I am learning a great deal from him about how to apply corporate experience to entrepreneurship and how to overcome fear of failure. Another has totally different background than me. He is a serial entrepreneur and I really admire his vision, perseverance, and ability to think completely outside the box.

How to Answer – What is Your Salary Requirement?

by Lei Han

The “what is your salary requirement” question is always a tricky and awkward one to answer. The best way is to avoid answering it tactfully for as long as possible. I recommend the following strategies in address the salary requirement question.

Try your best to not provide any numbers – because you want to avoid either being too high or underselling yourself. Most recruiter friends always tell me “don’t be the first to draw blood”
Re-focus the discussion on how the company reward above average performers, whether this company is the best fit, etc…This signals to the company that you believe you will be a top performer and that you can more about this role than just compensation
Re-direct the question back to find out what the salary range is for this position? Therefore, making them show their cards first. This is always a great way to deflect this question as well as find out if what they had in mind fits within what you expected. If it does, you can respond vaguely and say “let’s focus on whether I am a good fit first and then hopefully we can talk about the right compensation based on my experience and skillsets”
Tell them you are excited about the company – this subtly negotiates on your behalf, and if the company likes you and they don’t know your salary requirement, they may make you a salary offer on the higher end to make sure they can secure a positive response from you.

Here are some examples of salary requirement answers that have worked for me or my clients.

“Salary is only part of the picture. My number priority is finding the best fit for my career. I am very excited about this opportunity. I think I can be a valuable addition to this company. What is the salary range that the company is looking at for this position?”

“San Francisco is an expensive city to live in so starting salary is important, but what is also important to me is how this company rewards high performers. What is the bonus structure? How will compensation progress in a year or two?”

If pressed to provide a number, then try this “I hate to overshoot and be disqualified for this position, but if you need to know then the minimum I would accept for an ideal position is … ”