In the background is the City of Light with its typical boulevards and triangular blocks, while Lily Collins embodies the character of Emily in Paris. A Parisian luxury series that shows how a young American woman manages to fulfill her dream of working for a successful marketing agency. In it, soft skills play a defining role in many of the situations that occur in the story. Intelligent dialogues, teamwork, empathy between peers and clients, are just some cases of the success that good mastery of soft skills within your sales team can generate.

What are soft skills?

In themselves, soft skills are nothing more than that internal toolbox that each person carries with them when connecting with the outside world. It is the way in which the individual manages to weigh his own difficulties to cultivate pleasant relationships, knowing how to make effective use of verbal and non-verbal communication. 

The ability to innovate and learn, active listening, communication, critical thinking and interpersonal communication skills are characteristics that allow a person to interact effectively in any social ecosystem.

Currently, diplomacy within work environments would be something like gold dust, not only due to the lack of training in general, but also because knowing how to bond through mediated word and active listening implies a bonus for nurturing trust between brands and their prospects. In other words, the management of soft skills in the corporate sphere is a symbol of being one step beyond what people look for and need.

Why train my sales team in soft skills? The 7 reasons

A survey carried out in the United States of more than 650 companies reveals that the skills most in demand by employers are soft skills. Unfortunately, emotional intelligence has been relegated to the background for many years, being biased from university curricula since its inception. This explains that 73% of the entrepreneurs who participated in the sample affirm that it is difficult to find candidates with qualities and competencies related to soft skills.

We well know that speaking in commercial terms involves a whole question of supply and demand, conquered prospects and closed accounts. But precisely for these things to happen successfully, being able to build lasting relationships with customers goes beyond the technique with the account of the person trying to sell a product or service. 

Knowing how to detect the client's non-verbal messages from their body language - look, posture, tone of voice, silences and more - implies exceptional management of communication skills, clearly added to the intelligence to know how to speak at the right time and in the right way. All this great little combo leads to your company's commercial strategies making a significant difference in the company-customer relationship. Ultimately, the commercial impact based on soft skills is guaranteed success.

Here are the 7 reasons why you should think about enhancing the soft skills of your human resources in the commercial area: 

1. They improve decision making

CEOs have the responsibility of making crucial decisions that impact any organization. In this, the decisions they make are invariably linked to listening skills. However, these competencies are not only required at the senior level, but must act as a cascade effect towards intermediate levels, where feedback between manager and team strengthens relationships and encourages innovative ideas.

2.  They drive positive change

Lack of communication can generate confusion and inefficiency, which translates into great losses for the organization. To avoid this, the existence of an excellent communication channel is required, which must not only exist within the sales team but also in the rest of the organization chart in pursuit of the alignment of objectives.

Thanks to this, employees are informed of the challenges facing the business and can each provide brilliant solutions from their role, undoubtedly bringing positive changes.

3. They create a healthy work environment

Empathy fosters a positive and supportive work environment, eliminating any unnecessary competition. Within this environment, employees are more prepared to take risks and advance. There, employees feel safer expressing their thoughts, providing honest comments to the organization in general. These are the kind of valuable contributions to optimize processes and discover new talent.

As a matter of color, within the internal Lab9 team they work based on agile methodologies, which is why video calls and messages via Slack have a high level of frequency. This allows communication between the different areas of the company to be fluid and transparent, so that collaborators can respectfully express their contributions to the organization itself and commercial projects.

4. They help solve problems more efficiently

Developing soft skills such as communication and active listening will make employees more proactive in recognizing problems, finding intelligent solutions more quickly and on time.

5. Soft skills improve customer service

With collaborators trained in soft skills, they will learn to identify problems effectively and establish solutions adapted to the needs of their clients. Empathy will result in a greater degree of compassion and patience in dealing with customers, which will clearly have a positive impact on your pre-sales and after-sales service.

6. Increase the number of sales

During the negotiation process, the exercise of soft skills plays a fundamental role in harmonizing the interests of the company along with the needs of the prospects. In this type of commercial conversations, the sales team will be able to persuade their clients in a much more subtle and respectful way, increasing their sales.

7. Improve employee retention

A company's retention rate increases when it begins to care about boosting its employees' interpersonal skills. Training in the field of soft skills implies personal and professional growth at the same time.