2020 is the year of the rat.
This year is supposed to represent new beginnings.
It made sense in January since it was the start of a new decade but the rest of it just didnāt.
We have 2 choices with anyone, anything.
To be frustrated and angry or patient and positive.
2020 is the year of the rat.
Not the most ideal animal that first comes to mind to symbolize new beginnings, unless you embody that mindset shift.
Rats represent stability and longevity.
Today, businesses are learning to prepare for the worst in order to be stable during these volatile periods and as a society, we are being reminded of longevity.
We have more similarities than differences and to refuse to listen to someone with opposing views only means you are weak in your opinions.
Listen more, speak less, and add value rather than judgments.
Let’s stop getting wrapped up in our own heads and learn from the rat.
Your frame of mind is all that you have to keep you going.
Never lose sight of it.
Of course, a new year means new habits, diets, and competitions with your friends on how fast you can reverse your plans by sticking to your old diet!
Donāt we just love new years and yes, this way it should be lower case don’t worry.
Of course, besides these advertisement gimmicks and fads implemented into our brains, believe it or not, it is important to start working on something for yourself besides your external features.
Your health, mentality, and family are the most important things in life but so is the reason you are on this earth!
To add more value, education, and fulfillment in peopleās lives.
That comes through self-improvement and education.
Donāt worry, this is not a summary of all the 51.8, books since I couldnāt force myself to finish any more that Iāve read since my freshman year of high school.
By no means am I a fanatic or expert on the most vital soft or hard skills.
Every job, profession, career, hobby requires different ones.
All you will get here is a rundown on the most popular ones that can be applied to any job because frankly, that is all I care about and will help you the most.
You cannot fit into a category and life isnāt linear, so be prepared to fasten your seatbelt and be ready for a rocky road.
I love that flavor.
Anyway, here we go.
A year in advance and I already have to apply for summer internships for 2021.
Each year every registration, planning agenda, Superbowl kick-off announcement, pumpkin spice flavor reveal, and Prime Day gets pushed earlier.
Time seems to be running out and everything is rushed.
Why?
We should plan way ahead in advance since we can predict anything right?
It’s not like a pandemic will happen all of a sudden.
We have choices with everything as stated above.
To be upset and rush through everything or be patient and actually get things done.
I used to be overreactive and an obsessive fan of multitasking, following the mantra: quantity, not quality.
Part of an interview or job process is testing how you can handle the pressure.
I did tons of coding interviews with personal tests with an AI robot and actually real humans, which were nice as well!
What I learned through these assessments was not how I received my answer or the timing, but my thought process.
One question I was asked during a consulting interview, āHow many cups of coffee are consumed in Manhattan each day, pre-COVID?ā
Now, as a non-coffee drinker, this still wasnāt hard for me and it shouldn’t be for you.
I have the least amount of knoweldge on roasts, beans, and the fascination of this energy boost addictive drink.
Iāve never stepped into an overprized green starfish store a.k.a Starbucks or bougie sustainability mimic a.k.a Blue Bottle, La Colombie, Peets, you get the point, and never sat in a shop with one pinkie outside of my latte cup sipping like a queen!
So how could I possibly know what to do here?
Thankfully, I knew the moment I was asked this, the interviewers didn’t know either and truly donāt care!
I was relieved but knew since they were observing my thought process and how I was thinking out loud, I needed to come up with some sort of conclusion that made sense but was inaccurate!
That is a good way to put it!
This is the process that helped me pass:
-There are roughly 2 million residents in Manhattan and roughly another 2 million commuters
-214 streets numbered from 1st-228th and 12 avenues
-Now with how many Starbucks… I had to do a complete rough estimate here.
I would assume since I see a Starbucks on almost every block along with boutique and smaller franchise grab and gos, if you multiple every street (218) * another Iāll say 10-20 smaller shops would equate to roughly 4,000 coffee shops in NYC
Through my reasoning, I didnāt get to the correct answer of 3,389 that currently stand in NYC, but I was close through my logic that got me to an answer.
Get to an answer, not with the answer.
Along with this question, I was asked,
How many cups are thrown away?
Obviously, this is much harder because some people reuse the cups, and depending on how many garbage cans there are as opposed to people who litter them, would all need to be taken into consideration.
If you can find some fun in these problems and consider them games for practice, you will really enjoy this process, seem more like a human instead of a robot.
This will allow you to enjoy the environment, culture better, and not feel it is a job.
Make sure you are a good fit for the company, not just proving they will like you.
That brings me to my next point.
You can always be taught anything and there WILL be extensive training on the job.
What employers are looking for is you.
They can always find someone with those skills and replace you, but how can your personal brand stand out?
Be personable.
People don’tā remember what you did or gave them but rather how you made them feel.
Now of course you may be asking, well, I just know I wonāt get that job if I donāt know XYZ hard skills, having this GPA and certain major.
Frankly, if that is the case, I would recommend rechecking the companyās site to make sure they value learning.
It is a process, not a destination.
They cannot expect you to be close-minded and sit in a cubicle all day programming, something I did way back in middle school, not that fun!
In fact, companies, in particular, a lot of financial firms, banks, asset management firms, and consultant companies such as Goldman Sachs and Accenture are looking for you through a holistic lense.
This isn’t just a nice advertising slogan promoting LGBT or BLM.
It really means they value soft skills over hard skills, which Iām really thankful for as a generalist, not specialist.
I could talk to you for hours about every 1 to 2 facts I know about people, places, and things but it is hard for me to go into depth into 1 thing.
Believe it or not, strive for that!
I appreciate companies that look at us holistically.
EQ > IQ
No one cares if you can recite your times’ tables, can you apply them in real life and make it a fun experience?!
This means you are able to be comfortable with other people, share your thoughts and opinions, have patience, deal with tedious tasks such as getting through primary school and college and understand that failure is a part of learning.
Of course, we donāt want to fail at work but you will eventually, Iām sorry to say.
Itās better for me to tell you than dramatically find out yourself on your first day when you spill your coffee and burn your chest sitting up like cardboard is stuck to your chest or you got a bad sunburn all day long.
Make it fun and turn it into a conversation starter!
Tell people and they will like you more than hiding it.
We don’t like perfection, we want relatability.
There will be mistakes made, confessing up to them, and making sure you learn from them is 10x more vital than being a robot.
You will be spending more time with your co-workers more than your family, so make sure you are likable and comfortable.
Being likable is understanding and listening to others’ points of view.
We have 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason.
Be less selfish and care about others so they can care about you.
Donāt live in this fake reality and online.
Cut social media and live in the present.
Now this was a bunch of helpful tips that only the true 1% maximizers and high achievers apply.
We all hear it but never apply it.
I can’t force you to do anything and I know most of you are checking your Insta feed while reading.
All I can say is that you are damaging yourself and that is your choice.
Now before accepting and moving on to an interview, employers check your resume, CV, and supplemental material that youāve provided them.
They also enjoy snooping online for you, which is a good thing.
But if you have to change your picture or delete something becuase you know they will be looking at something suspicious, is a telltale sign to you, not them that you, yourself know you arenāt doing something good most of the time.
Something I always keep in mind is to be the same person everywhere and to everyone.
Treat people the same.
It’s so simple, we forget it.
First off, it is too much work to act differently in different situations and I truly have nothing to prove to anyone.
I went to lunch with my friends this past weekend.
Donāt worry, we were socially distant.
We went to a different town and they decided that they must portray themselves differently.
They ordered food they normally wouldnāt and wore the type of clothing you would never, I say truly never, see them wear.
I asked them, āwhy arenāt you yourselves?ā
They replied, ābecuase we are taking pics later and of course, I need to highlight the best.ā
That never even crossed my mind especially since Iām always the one who wears, speaks, takes the pictures and orders the same thing everywhere.
I try to downplay everything and I assume that is why I have close friends.
People like me for what I provide them not what I can impress them with.
Donāt try too hard.
Nobody is paying attention to you except yourself.
In an interview, it’s the same game.
They want to get to know you.
If you do a $400 makeover and learn the British accent, it will make it more stressful on your part to sustain that and make sure they donāt catch you.
Try less and you will achieve more.
Just like with breaks.
Donāt take excessive breaks, be strategically lazy to avoid burnout.
Now onto the hard skills.
Just to recap the soft skills that IĀ would prioritize:
-Loyalty
-Patience
-Empathy, Sympathy
-Communication, public speaking skills
-Vulnerability
-Leadership
-Strength
-Open to Failure and confessing mistakes
Now all you have to do is find some instances in your life when you displaced these skills and you are good to go!
Now the hard skills.
Of course, depending on the job, it would be nice to have a decent amount of skills because after all, isnāt that why we study, learn, and go through this education system?
Your skills arenāt here to impress others or make you money.
Remember: You are hired to better the company, exceed expectations, growth, and accelerate it.
They trust that you will apply your skills and lying about them on your resume will make you worse off in the long run and the employer as well.
Hiring is expensive, taxing, and a time constraint.
Don’t waste your or their time.
Now, with the invention of technology, of course, this isnāt any new phenomenon, just the multitude of skills you can derive from it are pretty expansive.
According to Zety.com, The truth is that the demand for soft skills has been growing since at least 1980.
Another study, by LinkedIn, actually suggests that 57% of employers value soft skills more than hard skills.
Out of college, we are expected to have a comprehensive list of hard skills that weāve obtained yet in actuality, weāve learned more soft than hard ones.
Weāve communicated, dealt with annoying assignments and papers, tedious tasks that have helped us embrace embarrassment, and lead with integrity.
Thus far, all of those skills Iāve learned in college, the rest Iāve done on my own including, running two businesses, marketing, programming in 5 different languages, portfolio management, trading, blah blah Iām not here to brag so those are some examples.
The truth is: you arenāt hard-working because everyone is!
If you were truly hard-working, no one else would be!
We all work hard in different ways but demonstrating where youāve done it matters most.
It isn’t a strength, it is a reason.
You want a nice mix of soft and hard skills, but weigh more on the soft side.
It is the cuddliest too:)
Hard skills are more niche-specific than soft skills since you will always need to work with others and use your mouth, our favorite overused possession.
Make sure to serve the role and tailor your skills towards it.
After all, you must be applying to that role for a reason.
What fascinates you about it?
And it better not be the paycheck because that will only set you back because it never keeps you in the field.
If the job description says:
The perfect candidate for this job will have experience with Objective-C and Swift, plus strong iOS mobile development knowledge with Cocoa Touch and similar frameworks.
Those are your hard skills right there!
Be strategic with no fluff.
Donāt oversell yourself because we can never know everything.
Make sure you are granular but at the moment regardless if you are in the middle of applying, interviewing, a student, or a partner at a firm for 40 years, it is crucial to remember that hard skills evolve but soft skills stay.
They will always be vital in any environment so make sure to focus your attention on those because they not only take more willpower to develop but patience since it is an example of one!