HESTER - scientific note – JobTeaser Help Center

Development of the exercise on the identification and justification of soft skills

Justine Massu holds a doctorate in Psychology. She is affiliated with the IRG at the University Paris Est Créteil, a researcher in Managerial Innovation at Skapa, a design agency, and a freelancer on various projects, including for Jobteaser. She develops psychometric tools and conducts applied research in organisations on topics such as creativity, innovation, soft skills, management, and intrapreneurship.

Jérémy Lamri is an entrepreneur, co-founder of Monkey tie, the Lab RH, and the Hub France IA. He directed the Research & Innovation Pole at JobTeaser, the European leader in youth employment and guidance. He studied at Oxford and HEC Paris and holds a doctorate in psychology from Paris Descartes. He is the author of several books published by Dunod: HR Innovations, 21st Century Skills, the Digitalization of Guidance, and Soft Skills.

Theoretical Framework

While the term soft skills is widespread in research and practice, a consensus on their number, definitions, and interdependencies has not yet been reached. The aim of this tool is to propose an organised taxonomy of soft skills, along with their definitions and examples of operationalisation at different levels of skill mastery, allowing individuals to self-assess.

Definition

We can rely on the work of Haselberger and other authors within the ModEs project (2012) to define soft skills as "a dynamic combination of cognitive and meta-cognitive skills, interpersonal, intellectual, and practical skills. Soft skills help individuals to adapt and behave positively so they can effectively meet the challenges of their professional and everyday lives."

Models

We have based our study on two soft skills models to explore their number and interdependence. These models were selected for the rigour of their scientific approach and their practical application.

The first model is developed and updated by O*NET. The Occupational Information Network (O*NET) is a free, public online database containing hundreds of job descriptions. Developed under the sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Labor, it features job listings, activities, and associated skills updated annually through data from job holders and occupational psychologists. Currently, 969 jobs are listed.

For each job, O*NET provides an assessment of the skill and knowledge levels required to perform the work. It is in this context that the soft skills model was developed. The O*NET database is the only cross-functional skills database that starts from an empirical premise and is updated recurrently (Burrus, Jackson, Xi, & Steinberg, 2013; National Research Council, 2010).

O*NET identifies seven categories of skills.

Basic skills: facilitate learning or faster acquisition of knowledge.
Content skills: needed to work with and acquire more specific skills in a variety of different domains (e.g., Reading Comprehension, Active Listening).
Process skills: contribute to the more rapid acquisition of knowledge and skill across a variety of domains. (e.g., Critical Thinking, Active Learning).
Cross-functional skills: facilitate the performance of activities that occur across jobs.
Social skills: used to work with people to achieve goals (e.g., Service Orientation, Coordination).
Complex problem-solving skills: used to solve novel, ill-defined problems in complex, real-world settings (e.g., Problem Identification, Idea Generation). Note: These skills also constitute the steps of the creative process applied in organisations.
Systems skills: used to understand, monitor, and improve socio-technical systems (e.g., Judgment and Decision Making, Systems Analysis).
Resource management skills: used to allocate resources effectively (e.g., Time Management, Management of Material Resources).
Technical skills: used to design, set up, operate, and correct malfunctions involving application of machines or technological systems. (e.g., Quality Control Analysis, Technology Design).
Note: These skills require a more detailed specification of the knowledge and tools used in the job – They are not included in our model as they are specific to certain professions and not widely applicable to most jobs.

The second model is the eLene4work model. This is a framework created by the EU under the Erasmus+ program. The result of collaboration among numerous European universities, it is well-documented, maintained, and filled with material to develop each soft skill. Although statistical analyses are mentioned (Cinque, 2016), they are not made available.

The result is a list of 22 skills divided into three main groups:

Personal skills, such as learning capacity, stress tolerance, professional ethics, self-awareness, commitment, life balance, creativity/innovation.
Social skills, such as communication, teamwork, networking, negotiation, conflict management, leadership, cultural adaptability.
Content-link/methodology skills, such as client/user orientation, continuous improvement, adaptability to change, results orientation, analytical abilities, decision making, management skills, research and information management.

We have thus cross-referenced the two models to ensure the inclusion of the greatest number of distinct skills and compared the definitions of common skills.

Selected Skills

Source	Name	Definition
O*NET	Written Comprehension	Comprendre des phrases et des paragraphes écrits dans des documents liés au travail.
O*NET	Active Listening	Give full attention to what other people are saying, take the time to understand the information being expressed, ask appropriate questions, and not interrupt at inappropriate times.
O*NET	Written Expression	Communicate effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.
O*NET	Oral Expression	Speak to others to convey information effectively.
O*NET	Mathematics	Use mathematics to solve problems.
O*NET	Science	Use scientific rules and methods to solve problems.
O*NET	Active Learning	Understand the implications of new information for both current and future problem-solving and decision-making.
O*NET	Learning Strategies	Select and use training/instructional methods and procedures appropriate for the situation when learning or teaching new things.
O*NET	Monitoring	Monitor/Assess performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
O*NET	Critical Thinking	Use logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.
O*NET	Problem Identification	Identify the nature of problems.
O*NET	Information Gathering	Know how to find information and identify essential information.
O*NET	Information Organization	Find ways to structure or classify multiple pieces of information.
O*NET	Synthesis/Reorganization	Reorganize information to better address problems or tasks.
O*NET	Idea Generation	Generate a variety of approaches to solve problems.
O*NET	Implementation Planning	Develop approaches for implementing an idea.
O*NET	Solution Evaluation	Observe and evaluate the outcomes of a problem solution to identify lessons learned or redirect efforts.
O*NET	Social Perception	Be aware of others' reactions and understand why they react as they do.
O*NET	Coordination	Adjust actions in relation to others' actions.
O*NET	Persuasion	Persuade others to change their minds or behavior.
O*NET	Negociation	Bring others together and try to reconcile differences.
O*NET	Teaching	Teach others how to do something.
O*NET	Service Orientation	Actively look for ways to help people.
O*NET	Systems Analysis	Determine how a system should work and how changes in conditions, operations, and the environment will affect outcomes.
O*NET	Vision	Envision how a system should work under ideal conditions.
O*NET	System Perception	Determine when significant changes have occurred or are likely to occur in a system.
O*NET	Downstream Consequences Identification	Determine the long-term outcomes of a change in operations.
O*NET	Root Cause Identification	Identify the elements that need to be changed to achieve a goal.
O*NET	Judgment and Decision Making	Consider the relative costs and benefits of potential actions to choose the most appropriate one.
O*NET	Systems Evaluation	Identify the measures or indicators of system performance and the actions needed to improve or correct performance, relative to the goals of the system.
O*NET	Time Management	Manage one's own time and the time of others.
O*NET	Financial Resource Management	Determine how money will be spent to get the work done, and account for these expenditures.
O*NET	Material Resource Management	Obtain and see to the appropriate use of equipment, facilities, and materials needed to do certain work.
O*NET	Human Resource Management	Motivate, develop, and direct people as they work, identifying the best people for the job.
eLene4 work	Communication	The ability to clearly and convincingly convey ideas, information, and opinions, both orally and in writing, while listening and being receptive to others' proposals.
eLene4 work	Teamwork	The ability to build cooperative and participative relationships with others. This involves sharing resources and knowledge, aligning interests, and actively contributing to achieve the organization's goals.
eLene4 work	Conflict Management	The ability to manage conflicts, which involves stimulating, regulating, or resolving a conflict between two or more parties.
eLene4 work	Leadership	The ability to motivate and guide others to contribute effectively and relevantly to the achievement of the stated goals.
eLene4 work	Self-Assessment	The ability to look at one's own progress, development, and learning to determine strengths and areas for improvement.
eLene4 work	Adaptability	The ability to change a course of action to achieve goals in a new situation.
eLene4 work	Learning to Learn	The ability to assess one's knowledge needs (theoretical or practical) and take measures to acquire and implement this knowledge while maintaining a flexible and open attitude towards lifelong learning.
eLene4 work	Analytical Skills	The ability to draw conclusions and develop forecasts by obtaining information from various sources and establishing cause-and-effect relationships.
eLene4 work	Creativity and Innovation	The ability to bring new ideas to develop products or services, as well as new methods of work to meet the evolving needs of an organisation.

Soft Skills Identification Exercise

Pre-Test

Participants

A pre-test was conducted in 2020 to explore the structure of the soft skills model and to study the variability in the levels of skills required. Nine hundred and seven voluntary participants (538 males, 362 females, and 7 NA) completed an online questionnaire developed on Typeform© (Average age: 24.9 years; SD: 4.6; professional experience: Mean: 2.9 years; SD: 3.3). Participants were recruited through a paid panel via CrownPanel© and MTurk©.

Materials and Procedure

After responding to demographic questions, participants were instructed to assess the importance of each of the forty-three presented skills in their work. Before the first item was displayed, the following caution was presented: "Attention: This questionnaire concerns the skills implemented in a specific position. It does not measure your general skill level. When filling out this questionnaire, try to think of a typical workday in your position."

For each of the forty-three skills, two questions were asked. The first concerned the importance of the skill in the participant's current job role. Participants could respond on a 5-point scale from 1 - "Not at all important" to 5 - "Extremely important". The definition of the skill was presented with the first question. The second question concerned the required level of this skill. Examples of operationalisation of the skills were given (source: O*Net and eLene4work), and participants were to respond on a 7-point scale from 1 - "low" to 7 - "high".

Results Analysis

Correlation Table

Principal Component Analysis

A principal component analysis, with promax rotation, was conducted on the forty-three questions regarding the importance of skills (Bartlett’s test: χ2 (946) = 3573.17, p <.001). A parallel analysis (Horn, 1965) identified three factors to retain for each scale, explaining 41% of the total variance.

Factor 1 - Task development and execution skills

Main skills include Analytical Skills, Problem Identification, Learning to Learn, Science, Idea Generation, Active Learning, Consequence Identification, Synthesis and Reorganization, System Evaluation, Planning, Critical Thinking, Cause Identification, Solution Evaluation, Vision, Information Gathering, Creativity, Idea Evaluation, Self-assessment, Information Organization, Learning Strategy, Judgment and Decision Making, Written Comprehension.

Factor 2 - Speech and communication skills

Main skills include Speech, Communication, Persuasion, Active Listening, Adaptability, Writing. Main skills with negative saturation include Science, Mathematics.

Factor 3 - Management skills

Main skills include Service Orientation, Human Resources Management, Financial Resource Management, Conflict Management, Coordination.

Skills saturating on two factors include Mathematics (MR1: .56, MR2: -.47), System Perception (MR1: .54, MR3: .41), Evaluation (MR1: .34, MR2: .36), Teamwork (MR1: .29, MR2: .12), Social Perception (MR2: .52, MR3: .53), Negotiation (MR2: .42, MR3: .44), Leadership (MR2: .39, MR3: .44), Material Resource Management (MR1: .36, MR3: .39).

Hierarchical Clustering on Principal Components (HCPC)

We performed a Hierarchical Clustering on Principal Components (HCPC, Husson, Lê, & Pagès, 2011) to study the interdependence of soft skills. Skills are organised according to their degree of similarity and dissimilarity.

Skills grouped under the same cluster are significantly more similar, and the closest dimensions on the dendrogram are composed of more similar skills than when dimensions are distant. Analyses were conducted using the FactoMineR 1.33 package (Husson, Josse, Le, Mazet, & Husson, 2016) on R 3.3.1 (R Development Core Team, 2016).

The HCPC adopts the principle of hierarchical ascending classification (Ward, 1963). It is based on the coordinates of individuals in the principal component analysis. A principal component analysis is first performed on the forty-three questions concerning the importance of skills, whose results are presented above.

The primary goal of this analysis is to define and calculate the distances between participants' rating profiles. To do this, we must retain as many components as possible, removing only the last, which is considered noise as it hardly increases the explained variance.

From the remaining components, we calculated distances between participants from their coordinates in each component. These distances are then used to construct the hierarchical tree. On this hierarchical tree, the FactoMineR package function proposes a cut-off level corresponding to the application of the elbow criterion on the inertia gain. By selecting this cut-off level, the partition of skills is organised into twelve classes organising the forty-three soft skills.

Test Administration Procedures

In its online version, Hester offers three exercises. The first exercise includes sixty-six items from the pre-test. Users must select what they would have liked to achieve in their lives, thus broadening their perspectives. The second part of this exercise leads the user to identify their top three priorities. Independently of this, to propose a hierarchy of soft skills, exercise number two involves presenting scenarios to the individual who must state whether they have experienced each situation ('Yes' button) or not ('No' button). Based on the results from exercise two, during exercise three, the user must justify a situation for each soft skill in their top three using the STAR method.

Scoring Principles

The Hester tool aims to enable individuals to identify their soft skills. The proposed model is therefore composed of 10 dimensions that organise 39 competencies. Furthermore, as seen in the dendrogram, some competencies within a cluster are interconnected. For example, Communication and Oral Expression form a sub-branch within a cluster where Active Listening is also present. We have chosen to acknowledge this additional similarity among various competencies by introducing a level of analysis between dimensions and competencies: the meta-competencies, numbering 22.

Additionally, observing the dendrogram at a higher level (height = 10), we note that the dimensions derive from four main categories. Thus, the five clusters on the far right share similarities that set them apart from other clusters. To account for these findings, we have created an overarching level of four categories.

The final model is thus organised into 4 categories which include 10 dimensions comprising 22 meta-competencies that organise the 39 retained soft skills.

Conclusion

The analyses show that certain soft skills are often considered important in positions where others are also valued. This is the case when two soft skills are in the same cluster, such as time management and adaptability. Indeed, these results are easy to interpret since a job that requires organising and managing one's schedule often systematically requires the ability to adapt to unforeseen events. These results allow us to consider that soft skills are not independent of one another but can be grouped into clusters that are more or less necessary depending on the positions and jobs.

Following discussions among researchers, we decided to retain only 10 dimensions and not to keep the clusters composed of the Math and Science soft skills, and Material and Financial Resource Management. Indeed, our goal is to propose a model of soft skills suitable for most professions and life experiences and also to build a tool that is not overly lengthy. These clusters seem less consensual, although certain professions such as scientific positions for the first cluster or commercial roles for the second view these soft skills as necessary, most professions regard these skills as technical and rarely used.

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HESTER - scientific note