The Most Common Skills You Need to Succeed in Tech

When you started your training for a tech gig, you probably thought most about the countless tech jobs with great pay that you could land. Those jobs are out there, but to land them, you need to have top-notch skills above and beyond coding or other technical abilities. The folks who succeed in tech have a variety of skills that have nothing to do with programming, math, or designing fiddly little dongles or devices. Picking up those skills are vital for your long-term success in techland.

Our guide is here to help you through this dark time; never fear. We’ve gathered tips on the best and most valuable skills you can bring to bear on your tech career. When you master the skills we examine in this article, you’ll be able to tackle any technical challenge and work with any team to solve the most complex and detailed issues. Before long, you’ll be a technical superhero, and your career will take off into the stratosphere.

Make an Effort to Become and Remain Self-Aware

Many of us have a rather skewed impression of ourselves. The best web designers and coders might have some amazing talents in creative, programming, or design areas, but that doesn’t mean that they’re perfect in every way. Even I have faults, I think. I’ll have to get back to you on what those faults might be, but I’m sure I have some. Not having a realistic self-image is fine when you’re working on a hobby, but the most successful business-folk know their strengths and weaknesses.

Knowing yourself allows you to recognize when you’re venturing into shaky territory. This puts you on your guard and prepares you for possible negative outcomes. Your inner critic can hinder you if you don’t recognize it for what it is, so take the time to identify self-defeating and counterproductive behavior. You should work on improving any weak areas, but you’ll need to know what those areas might be before you can address them. Self-examination activities such as journaling are invaluable tools to help achieve self-actualization. 

Understand How to Listen and Offer Feedback

The best techies can opt for a variety of great careers, but most of them will require you to be part of a team. As a team member, you’ll spend much of your time interacting with other techfolk, working toward some larger goal. To get the most out of your team and make sure that you contribute to the company, you need to know how to listen and provide feedback. When you have a team that listens to each other, you’ve got a powerful tool that can accomplish great things.

Make sure you engage in active listening. When you listen actively, you get more than a description of an application or database. You also obtain emotional intelligence and feel a personal engagement with the project. Be present at every meeting; turn off any screens, and give each speaker your complete attention. Offer measured and considered feedback, but don’t dominate the conversation. Being a productive team member means giving everyone a say.

So, that’s the deal, kiddos. As a techie, you’ll find yourself in all sorts of jobs that won’t seem to have much in common with each other. However, you’ll need the same soft skills to do well in any of them. Our guide gives you a rundown of the sorts of abilities that will help you succeed in tech and make your career a long and productive one.