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are the glue that makes our professional lives work .
We get trained within many sorts of institutions and courses on how to do a task technically , but we don ’ t necessarily get trained on how to think about : what is the purpose of that tool ? Is it going to solve the problem that we ’ ve got ? And how can I creatively engage with this process to add something of value to the outcome for my organisational stakeholders ? And that layer of critical thinking is what turns tool use into innovation .
Many people may overlook that they possess these soft skills , such as critical thinking , communication and creativity . Do you think there has been a devaluing of soft skills ? I do think that there has been a devaluing of soft skills in the past . And I think that the reason that these skills are coming to the fore now is because of our fears that technology will take our jobs . And , so , we would look to combat that competition for our jobs by doing something that technology can ’ t . And that ’ s really where these soft skills , or unique human traits that we like to think of them as , really come to the fore for most students .
We understand that technology , that artificial intelligence , will come in and take away a lot of the rote practices and automated decision-making processes from our actual positions . So we see ourselves in competition with them . And I think that that ’ s the wrong point of view . And really it comes back to : why are soft skills devalued ?
And , so , when we look at these soft skills , the ones that students and graduates chose were really ones that you could think of as almost individual traits that make them excel against their colleagues , rather than the people management skills , the cognitive flexibility , coordinating with others , emotional intelligence and that service orientation and negotiation skills .
And just putting my hat on as a sociologist , I would look at that and say that that skill bank they didn ’ t prioritise as much as the other skill bank are the more feminised skills . And we have a tradition in our workforce to devalue invisible , tacit or feminised labour . I believe that these soft skills that students have chosen are the ones that firstly will help them to compete for their jobs against technology . And secondly , they ’ ve chosen the ones that are more about individual brilliance .
And of course all of that is true , but it ’ s not , in my mind , the best way to look at the future and our relationship with technology in our jobs . It ’ s those enduring skills that will actually help us to keep jobs and get new clients . And that ’ s that service orientation , that negotiation , that emotional intelligence . And we ’ re also going to have to apply these skills when we work with technology in our roles .
So , it ’ s actually not about competition for jobs against technology . It ’ s about how we work with these technologies . I just feel that there ’ s a teetering there about what these students indicated versus what perhaps one version of our future could look like .
If soft skills are critical for our future , do you think the Commonwealth government ’ s recent attitude towards certain disciplines , for example the humanities , and hiking course fees , is appropriate ? My discipline is the social sciences and humanities . And I do feel like I ’ m under attack from these changes in priority from the government . But the question here is actually about how students learn the skills
Soft skills are really what we need and are the glue that makes our professional lives work .
that they desire , which is complex problemsolving , critical thinking and creativity .
And obviously , it ’ s within the disciplines of the humanities and the social sciences that we teach these skills . We don ’ t have a monopoly over teaching these skills ; there ’ s lots of different ways that you can learn them outside of the university environment . So there ’ s this tension there about what is a university and what is it for the government ? And , really , it ’ s about connecting people to jobs , and to the jobs of the future , or the short-term future , that they see as having the most demand for our graduates .
And of course , the stats don ’ t really back that up in the present state , as we understand that students from the social sciences and the humanities actually get employed at the same rate as those from STEM disciplines or the sciences .
So , the question that we always have is : what is the evidence behind this decision ? But for our purposes here , they ’ re going to do it . So , how are universities going to deliver to these demands for having graduates who can solve complex problems ? In the university setting , we actually teach graduates how to do this by scaffolding in role-play , for example , where we present them with complex scenarios and then ask them how they would go about solving it from different points of view .
That ’ s one of the ways that we start to get graduates to open their viewpoint and to have that greyer social sensitivity about different values and stakeholders who are engaging with a particular problem set .
We also teach them critical thinking by getting them to actually engage with an evidence base to inform their argument . And that ’ s a process of digital literacy skills , modelling , and also setting tasks where they can follow a gentle formula that helps them to break that process down step-bystep until it becomes intuitive for them . So , we have lots of different ways that we actually train , or support , or facilitate the development of these skills . But generally , you will see them most prominently taught in the humanities and social sciences . ■
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