I wrote a blog on that - Soft Skills

On Monday's Soft skills workshop we touched on many subjects I've written a blog on.

As promised here's an index of those posts: 

• Unconscious incompetence through to unconscious competence (how we learn)
• Why do we ignore experts
• Standing in the shoes of your stakeholders 
• What motivates your stakeholders

• We see others through our own lenses
• The subtleties of influencing
• The top 10 things to remember when communicating
• Having a chocolate moment 
• The roles we play - bad cop
• How our values impact our relationship with others
• Self confidence 
• The horror stories of procurement gone wrong because we need to remind our stakeholders of the pain we're helping them avoid not just the pleasure we're moving them towards.
• Building bridges with others cropped up when the forth road bridge was closed to traffic back in 2015, and the metaphorical exploration might add to the Lego bridge building session!

We used a number of unconventional tools for problem solving and providing a different perspective on a number of challenges with stakeholders. (Many of the following posts have a festive theme as they were part of the advent series of 25 posts sharing unconventional tools for coaching and facilitation).

• Redacted Reflection 
• Pipe cleaners /Lego
• Drawing
• Collage - there's one post on collage entitled momentum provides motivation  
• Role models 
• Books/Magazines
• Intuitive Solutions - more on use of the tool here - and you can buy your own pack here.
• Language - Maverick spend - Answers or Solutions - Problems? 

We had an "interesting" discussion on Time Management, and here's a few posts on the subject:

• Time management - this Pinterest board with links to over 100 articles on the subject
• Juggling Balls and Spinning plates - a metaphorical exploration 
• Walking the talk on handling emails  
• Metaphors for email management 
• Goal Setting
• Deadlines - are they killing you?

Well-being also cropped up, and here's a couple of posts that might resonate.

• Adrenaline junkie
• Priorities

As ever, there's so much we could have covered in such a short space of time. The post I wrote on the 7 barriers to optimal performance may shed some light on what soft skills you may want to focus on for further development.

Anyone interested in finding out more about soft skills, problem solving or creativity workshops or coaching do get in touch alison@alisonsmith.eu +44 (0) 7770 538159