In a previous post, we talked about the differences between soft and hard skills. Considering that it requires strong interpersonal abilities, is project management a soft skill? Keep reading to learn more.
What Are Soft Skills?
As we saw in our previous blog about this topic, soft skills are skills that determine an individual’s work style and how they relate to others.
Some common examples of soft skills include communication, active listening, time management, leadership, dependability, and creativity.
The opposite of soft skills is hard skills. While soft skills are personality traits, hard skills are technical knowledge such as foreign languages or mastery of engineering mathematics.
Is Project Management a Soft Skill?
Project management involves its fair share of soft skills.
For example, using active listening to understand a client’s requirement is a soft skill. So is the ability to remain calm under pressure and mediate the conflicts that arise between the different stakeholders of a project.
With that in mind, it’s easy to think that project management is a soft skill.
The reality is that, depending on who you ask, project management is classified both as a soft skill and as a hard skill.
This is determined by how you decide to look at project management. People who emphasize the interpersonal side of project management, list project management as a soft skill. Other people argue that project management is not a personality trait but a set of methodologies and processes, and as such should fall into the hard skill category.
Regardless of how any particular author decides to classify project management, any project manager needs a solid combination of hard and soft skills to succeed.
About Darnell Technical
Darnell Technical Services is an engineering design firm with extensive experience in a vast array of projects. Our headquarters are located in Santa Ana, California, and we have an office in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Contact us today by telephone (714-285-0082 (CA), 702-945-2899 (NV)) or through our social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn to learn more about all the technical instruments and materials we put at your disposal.
