Bridging the Soft Skills Gap: How to Teach the Missing Basics to Todays Young Talent - Hardcover

PRAISE FOR BRIDGING THE SOFT SKILLS GAP

"Bridging the Soft Skills Gap offers a powerful tool to this new generation of employees and their managers to understand the skills needed to be successful in a multi-generational company with a straightforward and easy to implement 'how to' approach."
Larry Lawson, CEO, Spirit Aero Systems, Inc.

"Tulgan takes understanding and addressing challenges with 'generational diversity AND inclusion' to the next level. This book is chock-full of meaningful and effective strategies for getting the most out of this critical talent component."
Sue Unvarsky, Senior Vice President, Operations, Prudential Retirement

"Managers and leaders will find Bruce's work a valuable resource for how to engage and motivate a younger workforce."
Stephen Hampson, President and General Manager, MeritorWABCO

"As you read this book, as well as his others, you can't help but think of real people and real situations in your organization that you are dealing with every day.... We look forward to embracing and incorporating his lessons on how to teach the missing basics in our leadership development program."
Steve Bell, EVP & Director, Human Resources, National Penn Bancshares

"Bridging the Soft Skills Gap is an essential tool for developing today's talent. Tulgan's book offers an easy, no nonsense approach to building greater soft skills critical for success."
Tani Bialek, PhD, Director, Learning and Professional Development, McGladrey LLP

"Bruce Tulgan offers down-to-earth, practicable and actionable answers. Tulgan again identifies a critical issue plaguing many of today's companies, and provides clear step-by-step instruction for teaching professionalism, critical thinking, and followership."
Gregg Edwards, Chief People Officer, Asante Health System

"In the restaurant business, our brand is primarily delivered to every guest every time through our hourly teams, the Millennial workforce. We've incorporated Bruce's concepts and practices into our training materials and daily management practices."
Alan Palmieri, Co-Owner/Partner, Marlow's Tavern

"This book offers immediately transferable ideas and guidance for a leader to enable your employees to bridge the gap in basic skills."
Sylvia B. Vogt, President, Carnegie Bosch Institute for International Management at Carnegie Mellon University

"Bruce's methods for training young talent in soft skills are not only effective but help bridge the generation gap in the workplace and prepare future leaders for success."
Ray Kotcher, Senior Partner and Chairman, Ketchum, Inc.

"Professionalism, critical thinking and followership are critical skills for today's law enforcement professionals. Bruce provides common sense solutions for managers to develop these skills in themselves and their employees."
Colonel Craig Price Superintendent, South Dakota Highway Patrol

Today's new young workforce has so much to offer—new technical skills, new ideas, new perspective, new energy. Yet too many of them are held back, and driving the grown-ups crazy, because of their weak soft skills.

Here's what managers say:

• "They just don't know how to behave professionally."
• "They arrive late, leave early, dress inappropriately, and spend too much time on social media."
• "They know how to text but they don't know how to write a memo."
• "They don't know what to say and what not to say or how to behave in meetings."
• "They don't know how to think, learn, or communicate without checking a device."
• "They don't have enough respect for authority, and don't know the first thing about good citizenship, service or teamwork."

Soft skills may be harder to define and measure than hard skills, but they are just as critical. People get hired because of their hard skills but people get fired because of their soft skills.

Managers ask: "Why should it be my problem to teach these soft skills? They should have learned these things from their parents or in school. How can I teach these soft skills when I don't even remember how I learned them myself?"

Here's the bad news: Setting a good example or simply telling young workers they need to improve isn't enough. Nor is scolding them or pointing out their failings in an annual review.

Here's the good news: You can teach the missing basics to today's young talent.

Now, based on more than twenty years of research, renowned expert on the Millennial workforce Bruce Tulgan offers concrete solutions to help managers teach the missing basics of professionalism, critical thinking, and followership—complete with 92 step-by-step lesson plans designed to be highly flexible and easy to use.

Tulgan's research and proven approach has shown that the key to teaching young people the missing soft skills lies in breaking down the critical soft skills into their component parts; concentrating on one small component at a time; with the help of a teaching-style manager. Almost all of the exercises can be done in less than an hour within a team meeting or an extended one-on-one. The exercises are easily modified and customized and can be used in many different ways:

• As "take-home" exercises for any individual or group
• To guide one-on-one discussions with direct-reports
• In the classroom as written exercises or as group discussions

Managers—and their young employees—will find themselves returning to their favorite exercises over and over again. One exercise at a time, managers will build up the most important soft skills of their new young talent. These critical soft skills can make the difference between mediocre and good; between good and great; between great and 'one of a kind.'