You say soft skills, I say Nice career you got there

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You say: “soft skills”, I say: “Nice career you got there” Press enter or click to view image in full size Cool, Misty, Deep Monterey Bay, California © Daven Morrison 8 min read Aug 8, 2025 An organizational psychiatrist’s five responses to: “ That’s just soft stuff ” More often than not, my role as an advisor to senior executives is to carry critical messages when people get stuck and no one else knows how. They know what they think, they have the data, but they fear the conversation. What lies underneath the avoidance to speak is a fear around a sense of incompetence. In certain conversations, leaders get lost, confused, and can look incompetent. They fear those moments. For this reason, either explicitly or implicitly, the organization has found itself with critical information for someone they cannot competently deliver. So, they tell me: “I was hoping you would tell them, I don’t have your soft skills.” As an organizational psychiatrist, the work focuses on the system and not the individual. Like the pediatrician who must attend to the parents, and the politician who must speak to the community, thinking about the system of people is essential to being effective. So, as the attention and the plan for interventions begin I turn to understand the history of the company, the mood of the department, and the frustrations of the leaders. In a sense, my work is on the ecosystem of the workplace. Press enter or click to view image in full size Jellies — Monterey Bay Aquarium © Daven Morrison What lurks in the deep? Others see the system as well. They focus on the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), the policies, the standard operating procedures, and of course, the numbers. To make rough equivalences to caring for a patient — I am interested in how they tell their story thus far, their mood and thoughts, and what is bothering them now (the symptoms they feel). And together we begin to explore possibilities: we think about the story yet to be told. The other group of doctors monitor the patient’s blood sugar, heart rate, immune responses, integrity of the musculo-skeletal system, and much more. Generally, all solid objective data. They have information that can be measured with standardized processes. Creating for them a story in the results that outlines a path to symptom management. For the psychiatrist, it is a path with much more subjective and unique data. And in the c-suite, it is subjective and unique for each organization. Given leaders see emotions and stories as subjective and difficult to measure, it makes sense why leaders say my work is “soft” and the areas I explore are “soft-stuff” requiring “soft skills” to manage. I see these points as legitimate. And I also see the ridicule. “Touchy-feely”; are not words spoken with the respect or deference that “basis points”, “run rate”, “stock divestiture” or “shareholder value” are. “Getting emotional” is referred to with derision more often than not. So, what do I do with those who are motivated to ridicule the work I do? Well, ironically, I use soft skills. They are very useful to know what to do, of course. “Nice career you got there, wouldn’t want anything to happen to it.” Five considerations — three I will tell you, and two I will be thinking As numbers are seen as hard, not soft, here are five responses to the ridicule of “soft stuff”. Some responses are to get people to think, some are better kept to myself as I consider what is happening outside the person who is giving this vulnearbility away. It is a vulnerability. In this list of five, the first three are things I share with clients, the second are ones I consider privately. Openly shared with you all: 1. Budgets are Values Statements : although budgets are a set of numbers, at their core they tell us what the values of the organization are. 2. Nothing of importance is shared with the door open : topics shared when the door is closed are what is most important, unclear, overwhelming. They are most “soft”. 3. Numbers are abstractions, feelings are real : at their core, numbers represent something concrete. In truth, they are abstract. While feelings are not abstract: feelings are easily measured, interpreted, and their impacts straight forward to document. This one may be the most difficult to understand. Read on. What I think but don’t share 4. Ridicule draws my attention to you: I wonder Why are you so insecure about something so important? Soft skills are the key to influencing and getting people to follow leaders, so why do they scare you (yes, I used that word). 5. A threat lurks somewhere deep. What is it about me and this work that threatens this group, and why this guy? And yes, it usually is a guy who makes the “kum bye-yah” joke. Budgets are Statements of Values Take a look at your recent credit card or bank statement for the month. As you do, think about the goals you have for your life. Now, imagine you are as judgmental as your most critical relative. What would they say about who you are and how you spend your money? If that bothers, you, good! Welcome to the world of feelings and emotions. You can do a similar exercise for your organization. Some of you work for organizations with open financial reports. Most people may not see all of where the spending goes, but you likely know what is considered worth spending on, and what isn’t. The organization is telling all who bother to see what is valued, how much they are valued, and what is not. And each organization is a story unto itself. As with people, no other organization is making the same budget decisions around spending and cost cutting. So, if you look with enough curiosity you will see the soft stuff of the subjective narrative and mood of the organization. Nothing of importance is shared with the door open The challenge of addressing the undiscussable is very real and very hard. It is enmeshed in emotions, opinions, old wounds and pain. All of these elements are subjective and challenging, but not impossible, to measure. Yet their consequences, as they relate to organizational paralysis or sabotage, are very real and easily seen. And the times when they are discussed are private and ideally done with skill and focus. Like the difficult tumor, all the soft stuff must be understood and identified before they are removed or minimized. Thus, “nothing of importance is shared with the door open”. Because if the door is open, attention is divided in the conversation, in fact it may be performative, and others may hear too much. Put simply, powerful emotionally laden data and topics cannot be managed with the required skill with open doors. Feelings are real, while numbers are abstract existing in the ether. Three dozen reams of paper, 500K gallons of jet fuel, $57,232.00 worth of feed corn may represent something that may exist in the real world. But when they only exist on paper, or on the screen as they do here , they are abstractions. These abstractions become real when they are reconciled; i.e. when they can be seen, touched, and documented. That’s why the accounting profession “trusts but verifies”. These abstractions are in conflict with the reality of feelings. How do we know feelings are real? We know they are real when we see their power in auto-immune diseases, physiological responses, and brain activity on scans. The hair that falls out with stress, or the weight gain and insulin resistance that fades with progressing dementia; a progression signaling the insecurities and unhealthy patterns are fading or gone. There are further ways to show emotions are real: the rapid escalation of perforated ulcers with the bombing of London or the synchronized heart beats of a shared movie: feelings are not soft and can be real and measured. They etch their story on our bodies like the seasons on the rings of a tree. First private thought: I heard you. Now, go on and tell me more about this need to ridicule. The person who calls this work “soft” is often the person who is relatively scared of feelings. Theyfear their own or others’ feelings. The reasons can be as varied as anything people do. But a common natural fear is that of being seen as incompetent. Like a project running off course, a presentation that is unclear, or a lack of technical competence exposed, the person who ridicules feelings often doesn’t know what to do when things get emotional. Yet, wherever there are people there are emotions. In fact, ridicule is an emotion. The person or group that ridicule are frequently quite skilled at eliciting a cheap laugh, enjoying a boondoggle, taking an excessive interest in who gets the sales credit, or enforcing the correct policy. All of these are informed by the emotion experienced. An insecurity with being vulnerable unveils a group When an individual begins to speak about soft skills or makes ham handed jokes about therapy or being “crazy”, it is a sign that the group is not comfortable being vulnerable. This also means the threat of the undiscussable is close at hand. Like a bird that fakes a broken wing to distract the predator from the nest this dynamic provides insight to use. The defenses of the mother bird, are similar to that of the crab on the beach with its claws snapping: both letting us know they feel at risk. But I am not a predator. This is important to clarify directly and indirectly. Their personal reasons to ridicule have roots in the past which tell them conversations that turn to the personal are dangerous. This may be tied to the person, and likely is. Yet, when the ridicule persists this insecurity also likely ties very closely with the unmet needs of the group and their organization. So, when this happens, my attention and concentration are high. Humor does help. I can laugh and make fun of therapy with the best of them. However I respect the work of therapy. And, wise cracks as a tactic only goes so far. Then, it makes sense to wonder “why does this scare them so much?” This is where we get curious. It’s important to note the timing, the person, and of course the words themselves. All these details enrich the understanding. The skilled students of human behavior and leaders who are paying attention, listen and respond to help put the scared individual, as well as the group at ease. There is always more to consider. Relative interpersonal power of each group member, the collective power of the group, the current organizational performance, and the broader state of the economy provide context. This context clarifies whether to push the group. At times, pushing is not the best option. Rather it is to let them recover and feel safe expressing their fears without confrontation. And as you read this far, and hopefully used your analytic and soft skills, you likely now know why mentioning soft skills heralds a threat to a career.