HR & Development: Soft-Skills and Hard-Skills - Research Proposal Example

Hard skills are precise teachable skills that are based on a fact. Hard skills relate to professional and technical knowledge that allows people to work within their professions. An example of hard skill is writing. In modern society, employees are required to be skillful in writing. Badly written documents or letters may lead to misunderstanding, loss of custom or even legal consequences. This skill can be specifically taught and evaluated. Soft skills are often referred to as people skills or interpersonal skills.

In the era of high technology, interpersonal skills are no less necessary in the use of modern technology. (Durbin, 2009) makes the following examplesPsychologist Louis L Thurstone (1887-1955) developed a theory of intelligence that instead of viewing intelligence as a singular general capability focused on seven different abilities called primary mental abilities ( Thurtone, 1938). Most of the factors identified by Thurstone have subsequently been replicated in the works of other scholars. Thurston argued that intelligence is composed of factors common to all meaningful activities and specific factors unique to the factors used to measure intelligence.

The primary abilities factors identified are3. Number or arithmetic ability (N) this is the ability to engage rapidly and correctly in a variety of computational operations. The simplest measure of this ability is a test checking sums for addition problems.6. Inductive reasoning (R or I) the ability to determine a rule or principle from individual instances, probably involved in most human problem-solving. The ability is measured by a number series that has several embedded rules; the subject is asked to complete the series correctly.