Soft Skills - Ask a Wharton MBA
Develop Soft Skills – Work Smart & Live More
I’ve cried three times a week this past month — and not because I was sad. The tears came from something deeper: the painful realization of how brutal my inner critic has been for years. Not a gentle voice encouraging growth, but a harsh one constantly telling me I am behind, lacking, or still not enough. ...
What should a manager do when they believe an employee’s performance rating was unfair? This leadership dilemma happens more often than people admit, and how a manager responds can either build trust or quietly weaken their leadership.
“Honestly, I think it was unfair to him.”
That’s how a manager I’ll call Roger started a coaching conversation with me recently. ...
As I step into 2026, I find myself in a season of transition — one that feels unfamiliar, a little disorienting, and surprisingly freeing.
I’m leaving full-time work and entering what I like to call my rewirement phase. It’s not quite retirement, not exactly a second act with a clearly defined script. I don’t yet know what my goals will be for the next five years. And for the first time in a long time, I’m learning to be okay with that. ...
Happy New Year.
I’m sorry I haven’t written for a while.
The last month caught me off guard when a relationship I value deeply became unexpectedly tense—not from anything dramatic, but from a handful of misunderstandings that slowly added up. It wasn’t the kind of conflict with a clear beginning or obvious fault. It was murkier than that, and harder to name. ...
If you asked me a decade ago what “mental wealth” meant, I probably would have stared blankly. For most of my life, I thought happiness was tied to achievement: get into the right college, land the prestigious job, earn the next promotion. Each milestone was supposed to unlock peace of mind. Instead, every success gave me maybe a week of relief before I moved on to the next goal. ...
When we talk about wealth, social wealth, depth of our connections to others, is often the most overlooked type. We take for granted that when we’re young, we’re surrounded by classmates, teammates, and family. But as life gets busier, friendships become harder to maintain. We forget how essential social wealth really is. You can have money, health, time, even inner peace—but if you’re alone, life will still feel empty. In fact, research shows that social isolation shortens life spans and makes us less happy. ...
We all want to find our purpose—yet nobody ever teaches us how. We grow up comparing ourselves to others, assuming they’ve got it all figured out, while we’re the ones stuck in limbo. Truth is, most of us feel just as lost. In fact, up to 90% of people struggle with “purpose anxiety,” the unsettling feeling of not having a clear life direction. ...