Soft Skills-The Need of the Hour for Professional Competence: A Review on Interpersonal Skills and Intrapersonal Skills Theories

Professional competence in the job needs a serious attention as the last decade has seen an increase in the number of industries like the IT Sectors, Retail, Travel, Transport, Financial Services, Hospitality, Beauty and Health care. Even though job opportunities have increased to considerable extent in recent years, it is difficult to find a suitable candidate and this merely indicates that we have a shortage of individuals who are employable. The growth in the number of students waiting to be employed versus those who could be employed requires urgent attention. Educational institutions have realized the need for inculcating soft skills to their students along with the academic qualification (the hard skills) to ensure their professional competence. Soft skills are distinct from the hard skills and are recognized as the key to bridge the talent gap we face in India today. It is essential to interact with the clients and to work in a collaborative manner within the team. This reflects on the work quality and productivity. Soft skills are more to do with who we are than what we know. The hard skills may be the foundation to a successful career. However, they need to be cemented with soft skills. Soft skills can be categorised as interpersonal and intrapersonal skills. Interpersonal skills are very much noticeable to others and they are the competence of an individual to interpret and manage his/her own feelings, actions, motivations and that of others in the social contexts. Intrapersonal skills deal with feelings, thoughts and emotions that are stirred up within an individual. This skill is not apparent because it is within a person and the individual next to them may not be aware of it. This paper aims at explaining the need for soft skills for the professional competence and reviews the theories of interpersonal and intrapersonal skills where in need for acquiring those skills are considered as the need of the hour by many experts.