Behavioral training - luxury or central success factor of the company?
- 13. July 2016
- Posted by: Ralf Juhre
- Category: Expert articles
Social competence is often regarded as secondary by technical professionals. Expertise, quality awareness, methodical project skills, perseverance and as much attention to detail as possible are high on the course and that’s a good thing. However, technical competence alone is no longer enough to compete in the fast-moving world of development. More than ever the ability to deal with oneself (time, goal and self-management) and others (communication and conflict, customer orientation, cooperation, leadership, etc.) is part of the requirement profile of the modern development engineer. This is precisely where typical fields of learning for technical professionals lie.
Nearly all markets in the automotive, mechanical and plant engineering and IT sectors present the following picture:
- Developments have to be made overnight
- in interdisciplinary teams
- in international composition
- in close communication and
- close cooperation with the customer
Due to the dynamics of international economic and social developments, the pace and the associated pressure to perform on the project staff involved will continue to increase in the future.
“We have always done it this way,” is the safest way to lose customers. The demands on innovation and flexibility of the people involved are immense. If the development engineers lack self-management and communication and negotiation skills, some projects are mercilessly put on the short side. The central success factors are the cooperation in the project team as well as the communication quality with the customers.
Failures in projects, for example, are usually caused by a lack of or insufficient communication and cooperation within the team and a lack of culture and competence in communicating with the customer.
Not a lack of specialist knowledge but a lack of social competence are the most frequent causes of bottlenecks in development processes – and the trend is rising. The demands on the social competence of employees will continue to grow in the future as economic and social dynamics increase. The social competence deficits of your technical professionals have these consequences, among others:
- Projects get into difficulties due to a lack of customer-oriented communication: deadline delays, cost overruns, quality defects
- Lack of cooperation in the team and with the customer reduces efficiency and effectiveness and causes high correction costs
- Leadership errors lead to acceptance difficulties and competence wrangling, which in turn limits effectiveness and efficiency
So if the social competence of technical professionals is also of such great relevance to success, then concepts for the development of social competence are urgently needed. The importance of the topic is often underestimated and soft training is classified under the category “luxury events with holiday character”. Systematic social competence development among technical professionals is anything but luxury. Successful companies have understood and attach more importance to the development of social competence.