Why People With These 3 Timeless Skills Always Get Hired
Employers can't help but say yes to people who master these classic skills.
Rido | Canva The only thing we know for sure is that we don’t know. I’m not discussing philosophy or the meaning of life, but much more prosaically, the future of our job market.
Work has always been unpredictable, but now more than ever. AI comes to mind immediately, but it’s not the only factor whose impact on the world of work no one is currently able to predict (and if they say they can, I suspect they’re lying). Just think of political turmoil, the climate catastrophe, and the demographic crisis.
This sense of precariousness makes us reasonably anxious. On one hand, we’re told we should be lifelong learners and prepare a Plan B and Plan C; on the other hand, we have no idea what is going to be helpful in ten years. Or in ten months.
Yes, we should learn. But what? When I was in high school, everyone told us we should learn Arabic and Chinese because those would be the languages of business in the future. None of them anticipated that, in the “future,” software would translate everything we say.
Later, kids were encouraged to learn to code — another thing AI seems to have a good grasp on. In the meantime, I’d love to have learned how to sew as a kid, because now I’m stuck with low-quality clothes and shoes. I’m not talking fast fashion: even expensive clothes underwent a decrease in quality and durability. Therefore, I’m forced to buy them anew when I’d be happy to mend them. But now I don’t have time to learn how to do it.
It’s hard to know what specific skills are going to come in handy in a few years. General skills are easier to focus on, but how to do it concretely?
Oh, I know there are already so many newsletters, posts, articles, and podcasts telling you what skills to strengthen to become more effective, productive, and successful. Some of it is admittedly great advice, but most of that stuff has one or more of the following shortcomings:
- It’s too generic. “Be curious?" “Be confident?” Really? What exactly should I do tomorrow morning when I get up in order to become curious or confident?
- It’s elitist. “Travel the world.” Oh, I’d love to, and I’m sure visiting different countries would boost my resume and enrich my portfolio, but I don’t have money to spare, and I have a family to take care of. Adding “no excuses!” at the end of the post doesn’t make it any better.
- It doesn’t take into account the character and preferences of every individual. Most of this advice is targeted at extroverts, for instance. Not because they’re more likely to succeed, but because it’s easier to write a piece about the importance of teamwork, rather than to stop and reflect on how collaboration can look different for each one of us. Just think about how much we’ve all read and heard about networking…
I can’t read the future, but I’ve taught many groups of people, from children to retired professors, from teenagers in a classroom to corporate trainees on Zoom, with topics ranging from electromagnetism to how to order coffee in Italian, and I’ve noticed that some elements are predictors of success, no matter the age, the topic, the setting.
Why people with these 3 timeless skills always get hired:
1. Ability to find reliable information
This may sound like a joke. Never in history has it been easier to find information than it is today! We’re drowning in information! And that’s exactly why fewer and fewer people are good at finding what they need.
Ask ChatGPT what the capital of Mongolia is, and it’ll tell you. But if you’re looking for something a bit more complex, all you’ll get is a watered-down summary of the information you need.
Here’s an example from my line of work as a language teacher. If I ask AI to build a ten-sentence “fill-the-gaps” exercise on Italian modal verbs, I obtain an average result, which is often good enough.
But if I ask it to design an exercise aimed at helping learners notice the differences between the Italian modal verb potere and the English counterpart can, well…the result sucks. As a human being and an experienced teacher, I have in mind all the points and cases I want my students to be faced with; ChatGPT doesn’t.
More often than not, it’s exactly this “background knowledge” that makes the difference between momentarily fixing a problem at work and understanding where that problem came from and how to prevent it from occurring again.
Teaching in the classroom, I’ve repeatedly seen how hard it is to make students autonomous. They get stuck if they aren’t told exactly what to do and how to do it.
When they can’t solve a math exercise, their first instinct isn’t that of just googling until they find a way out: it is to give up and ask for help. Flash-forward to their office desk five years later, and what you get is an employee who can’t untangle the daily mess.
You might think this is just because they weren’t that interested in solving our math problems to begin with. But my husband and friends tell me the same happens at their workplaces, across completely different settings. I don’t think it is a coincidence.
Learn how to find what you need, learn how to solve problems on your own, and you’ll be ready to tackle new challenges we can’t specifically prepare for right now.
How can you master this skill?
The next time you ask ChatGPT for advice, include in your prompt the request to report its sources, and then make an effort to check those sources yourself. You’ll find out some important information has been left out of the AI’s answer, or other elements may spark your curiosity and lead you to discover and learn more on your own.
You’ll get the chance to see if the topic you’re looking up has been researched academically, or if all sources are just online blogs and Reddit forums, and this may lead you to regard the information you received differently. Most of all, you’ll avoid spreading disinformation and indulging AI’s hallucinations.
2. Ability to manage time well
Drazen Zigic / Shutterstock
We’re all about productivity and efficiency. But what if you keep preparing carefully studied to-do lists, only to find out that, at the end of the day, you never get to cross off half of the items?
If that’s you, maybe you’re not great at estimating how long it takes to complete a task. Nothing to be ashamed of: it doesn’t mean you’re dumb. It happens to the best of us.
My husband has repeatedly ordered home delivery while starting his Saturday gym workout and justified the timing by saying that he’d be done with the whole workout, treadmill session, and shower before they even had time to prepare our pizza and deliver it. The end result? Warm beer, cold fries, and an even colder glance on my part.
Take it from someone who lives with a ticking clock in her head. All my online lessons last exactly sixty minutes. I can’t afford to show up late, or have time catch me off guard. “Time management” is often passed off as a miracle solution that’ll allow you to do more and more, but in reality, sometimes it’s as simple as knowing what to expect.
How can you master this skill?
Try monitoring how long it takes for you to carry out some tasks, not only at work, but even in your daily life. It’s important not to do it with judgment: if you think you’re going to spend twenty minutes to shower and get ready to go out, but find out it consistently takes forty-five minutes, that doesn't necessarily mean you need to speed up. Start with awareness and observation, before deciding if and what to change.
You’ll feel less overwhelmed if you don't expect to be able to accomplish in 24h what reasonably takes twice as long. Once you get a feeling of how much you can handle, it’ll be easier for you to find ways to prioritize, eliminate unnecessary waste of time, or simply discover that yes, you have too much work to do (not everything can be optimized!). At the very least, your to-do lists will be more realistic.
3. Ability to communicate well in any format
How many emails or messages do you send each day at work? Do you ever stop to proofread them before you hit “send?”
Reading what you wrote not only allows you to get rid of the occasional typo or grammar mistake (which is generally a good thing). It’s especially helpful because it forces you to read your message with the eyes of your interlocutor.
Let’s start with the purpose of your email. Why are you writing this? Maybe to let your boss or colleague know something, or to ask them to do something. Is this stated clearly?
What about information? Is all the relevant information included, or do you expect them to have to write another message to ask you for details such as when, how much, with whom, or by when to perform the task? As a writer, I know how easy it is to take things for granted just because we know … but the reader doesn’t.
Finally, how is your tone? Are you communicating what you want to, subtleties and “between-the-lines” included? Are you being unnecessarily rude or aggressive?
I’m not advocating for overthinking every single bit of communication, but if everyone checked their emails before sending them, I’m sure we wouldn’t be constantly overwhelmed by notifications. Just think how much time we could spare if instructions and requests were communicated right from the start.
By training to strengthen this skill, not only will your written communication improve, but, as a side effect, your oral communication will, too. Next time you write an email, proofread it. And if you have AI write your emails, proofread them all the same: AI won’t commit grammar crimes, but it doesn't know what you want to obtain.
How can you master this skill?
Don’t let your message fall into the pit on top of hundreds of unread messages and annoying notifications. “PIT,” by the way, is the acronym you can use to check the quality of what you wrote: purpose, information, tone. Don’t hit “send” until all three are convincing. And add “grammar” or “spelling” for a classy touch.
I don’t claim to have discovered revolutionary keys to universal success. I’m just summarizing basic skills that are often overlooked, with consequences I’ve seen again and again among students, teachers, and professionals alike.
Strengthening these abilities is not complicated. It’s fast, and it’s free. Maybe it won’t help your resume shine, but it might make your daily life, at work and home, a bit less overwhelming. As for the future, I seriously doubt they’ll stop being helpful.
Federica Minozzi is a writer and language teacher based in Italy. She has posted articles on Tiny Buddha, the Glossika blog, and Medium, and she has a weekly newsletter on language learning on Substack.
