CS/CIS Blog University of Houston-Clear Lake , DCM blog in an all new theme

Have you polished your communications skill lately?

The Roger Reece’s workshop at UHCL on "Creating value through Communication and Teamwork" has come and gone last Saturday. The two session six hour workshop has been very well received by the participants. It hit on a theme that we have emphasized again and again: communications are keys for a successful career. The workshop has provided many gems on effective communications. I may blog more about it later.

Here is one commentary that caught my attention. Roger showed a slide of a balance with ‘technical skill’ on one side and ‘personal skill’ on the other. He then asked the audiences how much percentage they would assign the importance of these two skills to their future career. The first student said 70% technical skills and 30% personal skills, and then the second said 50% and 50%. The last student had it just the other way around with 70% for the personal skill.

I have read some surveys in the past stressing the importance of non-technical skills before and so was expecting him to throw out some data. Instead, Roger said that whatever the actual percentage is not important. It may be 30% or 70%, but have the courses you have taken devoted the same amount of time on personal skill?

The answer is apparently no. That means if students want to develop skills to levels according to their relative importance, they will need to do much of it in their own time outside the classes. Have you polished your communications skill lately?