The Pre-requisite for Soft Skills

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Over the past few months I’ve been doing a lot of thinking (perhaps too much thinking) about what my work really is. Not just because of the whole ‘end of year’ reflection stuff, but also because I needed to think more deeply about the kind of impact I want to have on the world.

In this light I want to share with you a story that I think brings to life the direction I’m taking things. I hope it also sparks some reflection for how you engage with others as we all have this ‘fresh start’ with the calendar turning to 2026.

As you would expect when networking, I often get asked how I got into doing the work I do. It comes with the territory in my line of work and now that I think about it, when I was in the marketing field no one ever asked why I got into it. But I digress…

Sometimes when I’m meeting new people I start my story from the very beginning, and I most often do this when meeting folks on zoom. And when I say beginning, I mean… I was born in 1979 kind of beginning…

I go on to say that I was born with a cleft-lip and palate, which means I looked different from everyone else, which means I was treated differently. I came to know my worth differently, and this shaped my thought patterns, beliefs about myself, and made me very tuned-in to who people were being when they interacted with me (think: friend or foe).

Before I go much further with how this beginning leads to the work I do now, I’m often stopped right about there. The person on the other side of the screen says something like 'oh but wow, you could never tell, you look GREAT!’ They have a big smile on their face, and I know they meant well, but without knowing it, they just minimized everything I just said.

Rather than point out how their comment really landed, one of my go to responses is; ‘oh, well, Zoom is veeeeery forgiving’.

When I recently stopped to reflect on this, I could see that I was being super self-depreciating for no good reason, and I was not even close to being my own best friend. I would never encourage a friend to respond with that comment!! Would you?

When I zoomed in yet again, I realized that my response was a reaction to not feeling seen for my life experience. You see, when the person said ‘you look great’, what they were doing is bypassing what it was like for me to grow up being mocked and made fun of for my appearance. Instead they skipped directly to a place where ‘things are better now’, which subconsciously means they can tell themselves that none of those early experiences matter anymore, because I can ‘look in the mirror and feel great about myself’.

DON’T I WISH that I could skip ahead and have no sticky residue from the first quarter of my life. It's no wonder I always felt a certain way when people reacted in this way.

All of this makes me think about the types of conversations where someone is sharing their pain, and the friend is trying to help them see the silver lining before they have processed their grief. (and I know I’m guilty of this too!) But the point is that it’s SOOO EASY to dismiss people, even when they are being vulnerable, because of our own discomfort.

Our discomfort in being with unpleasant emotions, or with stories that feel close to our own, or perhaps so very different from our own. Eyes can glaze over and an attempt to deflect, divert or even ignore the gift of truth and sharing becomes the self-protecting tactic. The result? The other person feels dismissed, and the very thing that was trying to be built – trust – is erased before the bridge even had a blueprint.

Next time this happens again, I think I might say something like; “Well, sure my appearance has changed since then thanks to braces and surgeries, AND those early experience led to who I am today, but it also led to a whole heap of destructive thoughts and behaviors that I’ve had to heal from and change. And some of that work will never be done.”

Interpersonal communication, just like teamwork and adaptability are all considered ‘soft skills’. But these soft skills cannot be truly mastered without the prerequisite of developing your HUMAN SKILLS.

Human skills are the ability to see yourself with more clarity and honesty. To not only see your thought patterns, unhealed wounds, and unprocessed emotions, but to understand how those things are impacting your inner world, and therefore how you show up for yourself and for others.

For many years I’ve talked about all kinds of themes both here and on The Unlock Lab podcast and have provided actionable tips that will help you get unstuck in your career and life. The things I talk to you about can really be summed up as human skills. Human skills is the ability to deeply understand yourself through excavating your patterns and buried dreams, and then accepting, and removing judgement of your true self underneath all of your conditioning.

The result of this work is that you:

🦉 Have the ability to know and see yourself with more clarity and honesty

🦉 Understand what's impacting your inner world

🦉 Shift how you show up for yourself and for others leading to new growth trajectories

In 2026 I’ll be talking more about how human skills is the antidote for disengaged workplaces, and that begins of course with being an engaged leader yourself. As my story illustrates, lack of trust is a big reason why people stop engaging, and most of the time it’s not intentional. People are lacking the human skills because of the over-emphasis on technical skills for decades. This focus has hijacked the truth which is: what makes all the difference in engagement and the results we are pursuing, is our shared humanity. The lack of focus on the ability to understand and shift one's own internal world, has led to a severe deficiency of human skills in the workplace. UNTIL NOW.

If you want to learn more about how human skills can transform your leadership, your team dynamics, and your business results, schedule an exploratory call with me here.

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Photo cred: John A. DeMato

And for the record, yea I DO LOOK GOOD. 🤪 Stay Feisty, Fabulous and HUMAN.

Tosca DiMatteo