I’ve always disliked the term “soft skills.” It implies these capabilities are somehow less important than “hard skills”—softer, easier, less substantive. Just be nice to people. How hard can it be? The Association for Talent Development has been advocating for a terminology shift, recognising that these capabilities are often harder to develop and more valuable than technical skills.

As AI advances, this framing becomes even more problematic. The capabilities we’ve called “soft” are precisely the ones that become more valuable as technical tasks are automated. Calling them “soft” undersells their importance and undermines investment in developing them.

It’s time for a rebrand.

Why “Soft Skills” Is the Wrong Frame

The Term Implies Less Value

“Hard” suggests substantive, measurable, important. “Soft” suggests the opposite—nice to have, but not essential.

This framing has practical consequences:

• Organisations invest more in “hard skills” training
• Hiring prioritises technical capabilities over interpersonal ones
• Performance evaluation emphasises measurable outputs over relationship quality
• Career progression rewards technical expertise over leadership capability

The Term Suggests These Skills Are Easy

They’re not. Critical thinking is hard. Building trust is hard. Navigating organisational politics is hard. Creative problem-solving is hard.

In fact, these capabilities are often harder to develop than technical skills. You can learn a software tool in weeks. Developing genuine emotional intelligence takes years.

The Term Creates False Dichotomy

“Hard” versus “soft” suggests these are separate categories. In practice, the most effective professionals integrate both. A software developer who can’t communicate with stakeholders is limited. A leader who doesn’t understand the technical work their team does is handicapped.

The Term Is Unhelpfully Vague

“Soft skills” becomes a grab-bag for everything that isn’t technical. Communication, leadership, emotional intelligence, critical thinking, collaboration, creativity—these are very different capabilities lumped under one dismissive label.

Alternative Framings

Several alternative terms capture these capabilities better:

Human Skills

These are the capabilities that remain distinctly human as AI advances. The term acknowledges that AI is changing what’s valuable and positions these skills as the human complement to machine capability.

Durable Skills

These capabilities remain valuable across technological changes. Technical skills become obsolete; these don’t. The term emphasises lasting value.

Power Skills

A reframe from weakness (soft) to strength. These capabilities enable everything else—leadership, influence, innovation, collaboration.

Professional Skills

All professionals need these. Technical specialists can’t succeed without them. The term normalises these capabilities as core professional requirements, not optional extras.

Human Intelligence Skills

Distinct from artificial intelligence. These are the capabilities where human intelligence still outperforms machine intelligence—creativity, judgment, emotional connection, ethical reasoning.

I don’t have a strong preference among these alternatives. Any of them is better than “soft skills.”

Why This Matters More in the AI Age

As AI automates routine cognitive work, the human contribution shifts:

Routine Tasks Become Automated

AI handles data processing, content generation, pattern recognition, and many analytical tasks. The human value isn’t in doing these tasks—it’s in directing, evaluating, and integrating them.

Human Judgment Becomes More Important

AI generates options. Humans must decide which options to pursue. This requires judgment—weighing trade-offs, considering context, applying values—that AI can inform but can’t replace.

Relationship Work Remains Human

Trust, rapport, influence, collaboration—these happen between humans. Even as AI mediates more communication, the underlying relationship work is human.

Complex Problem-Solving Requires Both

The most valuable work combines technical capability with human insight. Neither alone is sufficient. The professionals who integrate both are most valuable.

Leadership Matters More, Not Less

As work becomes more complex and change accelerates, leadership capability becomes more differentiating. Setting direction, building commitment, navigating uncertainty—these are human leadership challenges.

Implications for Development

If we take these capabilities seriously as core professional skills:

Investment Should Increase

These capabilities deserve significant development investment—not as nice-to-have extras but as essential requirements.

Development Methods Must Improve

You can’t develop leadership through e-learning modules. These capabilities require practice, feedback, reflection, and often interpersonal interaction. Development methods must match.

Assessment Must Evolve

If we can’t measure these capabilities, we can’t develop them effectively. Better assessment methods—behavioural observation, 360-degree feedback, practical demonstrations—are needed.

Hiring Should Weigh Them Equally

If these capabilities are as important as technical skills, they should be equally weighted in hiring. This requires developing better interview methods and assessment approaches.

Career Paths Should Recognise Them

Progression should reward both technical depth and human capability. Technical specialists shouldn’t advance at the expense of leadership development.

What Organisations Should Do

Rebrand in Your Organisation

Stop calling them “soft skills” in your communications, job descriptions, and training catalogues. Choose better language that conveys importance.

Invest Accordingly

Review your development budget. Is investment in human capabilities proportional to their importance? For most organisations, it isn’t.

Develop Seriously

These capabilities require serious development approaches:

• Practice opportunities in real work contexts
• Feedback from multiple perspectives
• Coaching and mentoring support
• Reflection time and space
• Progressive challenges that build capability

Quick workshops and e-learning modules are insufficient.

Measure What Matters

Build better measures of human capabilities into your performance management, hiring processes, and development assessments.

Model from the Top

If leaders don’t visibly value and develop these capabilities, no one else will either. Leadership behaviour sets the tone.

What Individuals Should Do

Take These Capabilities Seriously

Don’t dismiss them as less important than technical skills. In an AI-transformed world, they may be more important.

Invest in Development

Seek feedback on your human capabilities. Find development opportunities. Work with coaches or mentors. Read, reflect, and practice.

Integrate into Your Work

Look for opportunities to apply human capabilities in your daily work—building relationships, navigating difficult conversations, solving complex problems, leading initiatives.

Showcase in Your Career

Don’t hide these capabilities as assumed background. Articulate them in interviews, highlight them in performance discussions, demonstrate them in your work.

The Capabilities That Matter

For clarity, here are the human capabilities that matter most in an AI-transformed world:

Critical Thinking: Evaluating information, questioning assumptions, reasoning through complexity.

Communication: Conveying ideas clearly across contexts and audiences, written and verbal.

Collaboration: Working effectively with others, building shared understanding, contributing to team outcomes.

Creativity: Generating novel ideas, approaching problems from new angles, envisioning possibilities.

Emotional Intelligence: Understanding and managing your own emotions, reading and responding to others’ emotions.

Leadership: Setting direction, building commitment, navigating change, developing others.

Adaptability: Responding effectively to change, learning continuously, adjusting approaches.

Judgment: Making sound decisions with incomplete information, weighing trade-offs, applying values.

Relationship Building: Establishing trust, building networks, maintaining connections over time.

Ethical Reasoning: Recognising ethical dimensions, navigating value conflicts, making principled decisions.

These aren’t “soft.” They’re essential.

The Bottom Line

The capabilities we’ve called “soft skills” are becoming more valuable, not less, as AI advances. The term undersells their importance and undermines investment in developing them.

Stop calling them “soft.” Call them human skills, or power skills, or professional skills—whatever language conveys their true importance.

Then invest in them accordingly. The organisations and individuals who take these capabilities seriously will have significant advantages in an AI-transformed world.

It’s time to retire “soft skills.” These capabilities deserve better.