When I received an advance copy of Peggy Klaus’ new book, The Hard Truth about Soft Skills: Workplace Lessons Smart People Wish They’d Learned Sooner, I figured it was worth a gander. I’ve met Klaus, and she is an energizer who is not afraid to scream and yell and push people’s limits. I know this because I once ran a workshop at a conference right next door to Klaus. Apparently, I had drawn the short end of the stick because the other speakers knew that her crew would be bragging out loud… very loud.
Now I just wish that energy had transferred over to the book. While it is chock full of info, it was a bit scattered for me and some of the real “punchy” points were diluted and buried. I also had to keep checking back to the title/subtitle to see why these bits of advice were all interconnected. I’m not sure the title’s use of “Soft Skills” was the best description. Maybe it could have been titled “People Skills: How to Present Your Best Self So That Others Want to Play With You.” As that’s pretty much what this was about: skills that will help you deal with other people.
However, the whole scattershot approach abruptly disappears in chapter six, where she launches into a chapter on “Branding and Bragging.” All of a sudden, it’s the Peggy Klaus aka “Brag Lady” with whom I was familiar. The writing was better, the flow much smoother, and the energy was back and carried over into the final chapters on gender, generations and leadership.
As for the “soft skills,” there were some good points in the first two-thirds of the book, such as:
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“I swear if I hear one more person say [follow your passion], I’m going off a Swiss Alp.” This is the Klaus I like who tells it like it is. Following your passion is no guarantee of success. Sure, it makes it easier if your business involves some bit of your passion, but it involves a whole lot more than that. (Note: A good book about how you can work passion into your worklife is Career Bliss: Secrets from 100 Women Who Love Their Work by Joanne Gordon.)
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“If you want to stay competitive and ahead of the game, keep your hard skills sharp. Making this happen is not your employer’s responsibility, it’s yours.” Now this is one statement that I would jump up and down and shout about because every day I run into people, including entrepreneurs, who refuse to learn technology. There was an interesting article in The New York Times recently about how technology laggards still add value to the innovation process. But if you’re an entrepreneur, you should have a leading mindset rather than “nooooo, don’t make me learn something new.”
- “If you find yourself having to defend yourself and make an argument for why your behavior is really OK, then you’ve probably crossed what I’ve called the IC Divide–the IC here stands for integrity and character.”
- She has some good takes on risks, listening, grammar, apologizing and saying thank you.
Top Shelf Bottom Line: There were some good refreshers in here re: what she calls “soft skills.” These seem to be skills that help you be your best self and convey that and/or converse with others. But as stated above, you need to pull out relevant tidbits from the first two-thirds of the book and hang on until the last third of the book. The last third is the best part and includes info on creating your personal brand, bragging, generations and leadership. So if you didn’t read her first book, Brag!: The Art of Tooting Your Own Horn without Blowing It, and you need a book to motivate you to get more proactive in promoting yourself, it’s worth picking up.
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