Ask HN: How do you practice social soft skills in real life? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How do you practice social soft skills in real life?

41 pointsantonpuz25 comments

I currently read "how to make friends and influence people", this and many other soft-skills books/trainings offer concepts and ideas of how one should act in a business/social conversations.

I always struggle with applying those concepts in real life, I cannot stop and think about what is the most appropriate reaction for a situation and I quickly forget and get overwhelmed with concepts and ideas from the book.

How did you apply similar concepts in real-life scenarios, and what ideas worked best for you?

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I've found the first step to any self-development project is observation.

Give yourself a free pass for a few weeks or a few months. Your only job: observe yourself.

Observe yourself getting nervous. Overwhelmed. Awkward. Behaving in a way that seems unnatural.

Journal what you find. Journal how you feel when you find yourself in these different situations.

You will feel like an idiot when you do this. That it's a waste of time. This process isn't intuitive, but it is life-changing if you're willing to be honest with yourself.

If you take this seriously, you'll find that most of your fears and awkwardness and inhibitions are the result of past experiences, more specifically, your perceptions of past experiences.

If you can develop the stomach to live in reality, you will be on the cusp of real life change.

Once you've taken an inventory of where you're at, you can begin to implement the things you're learning.

Very well written!

I got a weekend job at Lowes. It was good because it's basically the opposite of software dev. You stand, walk, move things, help people get the right stuff for their project, and talk to people.

I wish I could push this post higher - I have worked a few customer service positions (tutor while in university, cashier at a little natural foods store) and I found both of those positions really flexed my social skills and have made my life much easier in myriad ways (job interviews, to pick a big one.)

I actually got the job at Lowes because I went to it as a sort of practice interview. I was looking for a job as a security guard (armed guards make double what I made at Lowes), but the positions I was offered were all about the same pay (unarmed guards don't get paid much). I think part of the reason I did well in the interview is because I was relaxed from thinking of it as a practice interview. This definitely helped me in interviews that I've had since.

Even though the pay was only $10 an hour and I was working 40+ hours at my main job plus 16-20 hours at Lowes, I really enjoyed my job at Lowes. It was much nicer than my software dev job - lower stress, less politics, no pressure to move up or meet some unobtainable metric, and the managers actually understood the work. It's almost like managers who have MBAs focus more on the metrics (output) and less on outcomes and the people.

My preferred job for social interaction would be a bartender or server. But, I think it'd require some training before starting especially the former one.

Since almost everyone mentioned some form of listening, I will add this: dare to laugh. A lot. It's so relaxing and nice to spend time with people that realize that when you're socializing it's one of the rare and almost sacred times when we can just goof around and have fun. Having a laugh ready to fire off will spread like wildfire in a circle of people you're interacting with. You might feel that it's contrived at first, but then after 30 minutes you'll laugh genuinely along with everyone else and people in that circle will loosen up immensely. I don't know why we're so conditioned to have small talk at hand whenever, but a laugh at hand at whenever is almost unheard of. I dunno, I might live in a boring country.

I don’t know what country you are from, in my country laughing is never a thing people are supposed to not do.

On the other hand, since it was always very not natural for me, i’ve used this strategy (basically laughing on command- that is, actually, fake laughing) for many of my teenage years, and it has taken several years and much thought for me to realize that it was making me really miserable.

Now i tend more towards not forcing myself to do anything that wouldn’t be natural from me, and this has made me much more satisfied with myself (even if, sure, simply growing up would have that effect anyway..)

If what you are actually saying is you are naturally wired to laugh a lot and you were actually restraining yourself, well then sure, but then also i’m sure you never had much soft skills problems...

I hear you, but I will persist in the point I was trying to make. Laughing takes warmup. You might hear an excellent joke and not even snicker at it, but given the proper mindset where you're attentive to the setup, the expectation, and you're just caught off guard, it's so nice to be able to enjoy that moment. It's easily missed.

Former interpersonal skills trainer here.

The comments have a lot of good suggestions. I would like to reinforce the emphasis on listening, and the idea of practicing one skill until you have it down, and then moving on to another. Also it is good to take a training course where you actually practoce the skills under the guidance of a teacher.

Also it is good to think afterwards about an interaction that went good or bad, reviewing as close to word-for-word if you can, and see what you can learn that you can use in the future. Also think of situations you have a hard time handling and see if you can think of how the skills you are learning can help, and again plan out what you might say word-for-word, and run though it a number of times, maybe even out loud, to make it more automatic.

1. Talk less, listen more.

2. In the listening, include listening to yourself. Do you repeat yourself (verbatim, or patterns) in ways that will quickly or eventually bore those you talk with?

3. Engage in low-stakes interactions. Join a softball team or running group or work at a dinner program, so that you are around other people but the focus is not about being around other people.

Anyway, that's how it looks to me.

Volunteer somewhere that involves interaction with people.

Host or participate in meetups for something you're really into.

Don't worry about what others think of you or making someome happy. Just listen to people and help without expecting anything in return.

1. Adopt a mind script that every conversation you have will be brilliant experience for you. You can say this to yourself before you even begin talking to anyone.

2. Once you've done the hardest part (said anything, even 'hi') take a moment to think about what you did well and how you can celebrate yourself.

3. The emotions you inject into the conversation (tip: smile as you speak) sets the expectation for others to follow. If you're enjoying yourself, others will do...but it sometimes takes them a little while to warm up.

4. It's easy to mistake a lukewarm/ muted response for rejection. Most of the time it is NOT. The other person is just trying to work out who you are and what you want. During this time, smile, stay upbeat. They'll come round.

5. Avoid asking questions, which is everyone's polite 'go to'. Instead, make statements. It takes more effort but it helps express yourself. "You look fun!" "That looks interesting!" will inject more emotion than asking a question. (Hint: when statements become easy you can ask questions again).

6. What on earth do you talk about? Yourself. You need to maintain a conversation to get it going (and the other person on board). Rather than say "that drink looks yum" say "i'm thirsty...and choosing is difficult for me because I'm a software engineer...but that drink looks yum". This helps you share a little more about you and explains why you're making a statement in the first place.

7. Have a genuine reason to actually talk to people. What's the best reason? Curiosity. Even if you're bored and lonely, say that. "Hi! I'm bored eating my lunch by myself so I thought i'd come say hi for a moment"

Source: I run this site/ youtube www.yourcharismacoach.com

The biggest thing for me is to gently check if I’m drifting in a conversation and to make sure that I’m actually listening to what the other person is saying.

Firstly it seems to me that I need to be true to myself. Your post has reminded me that there are others who try to evoke some particular responses in others by manipulating their own behaviour, which for me amounts to flying a false flag. Perhaps some people are better fit to carry out deception than others. I personally have not wanted to bring myself to such methods. Yet I know that many people achieve what seems to be success in life through such tactics. Obviously I'll never be rich. Yet I have wonderful friends because the soft, gentle ways of kindness are not the leading edge of a greedy riposte, but genuinely lead on to... simply more of the same. I never have to wonder what is the most appropriate reaction for a situation because I just do as I feel. I have real riches!

> I always struggle with applying those concepts

Soft skills are best practiced in forced situations, such as management and conflict resolution. Learning these concepts isn’t going to happen so long as you remain in situations where there is low friction from avoiding people or decisions.

Now that you’ve read the book just stop thinking about it. Maybe pick it back up once in a while. You’ll apply the ideas to some extent without knowing it and this way it will be natural and not forced, which is better.

Be genuine and kind instead of engineering situations.

This works for people who naturally have good social skills, but as a way of obtaining practice it seems rather unactionable - rather like "Step 1: be attractive; step 2: don't be unattractive".

It works for anyone who is honest and considerate of others.

No: it may work if you are honest (but know when the truth is harmful) and considerate of others (but are capable of telling when your attention is harmful). Mere good intention is nowhere near enough.

Succinctly: you can have sensible default reactions so your brain isn't spinning and the reaction is smooth (think cache). You can take advantage of low stakes contexts to train, as opposed to trying things in a professional context where the price may be hefty(think sandbox). Empathy: seeing a situation from the perspectives of all people involved is extremely useful, effective, and profitable.

Details and rationale:

There are a lot of common situations. These are situations that either have a high probability of happening in a context, or happen frequently. Note I didn't say XOR.

For example, someone complimenting you. A default reaction would be to smile, and say "thank you". Making eye contact with someone: smile and say Hi/Good morning.

This will take the load off of your head. Most people I've seen who describe situations they reacted inappropriately in simply don't have a repertoire or haven't been around the block. Many people get "weird", in their own words, during some of the most banal reactions.

Sandbox: practice on the streets. Buying coffee or groceries. Being tactful and smooth takes practice, and witnessing instances of handling situations. Leveraging everyday situations to learn more about people and expanding your comfort zone. For some people, holding a five minute conversation is daunting. They can practice as they go about their business. The pressure to do that in the workplace can be unbearable, and inappropriate behavior may be a consequence of that. Low pressure situ, low stakes.

The empathy part: the ability to predict how a situation or event will be lived/interpreted/felt by different people is, again, extremely useful. In a professional context for example, running a decision to be made against different world corresponding to people will often lead to a pause and figuring out it ought to be changed because X or Y. In meetings with clients, it allows to have a loop running where you interpret what something means for one member or department of the client organization, and how it'll play with other departments.

Again, this is extremely useful.

Also, as an aside for professional contexts and useful things to do/learn: the moments before, but mostly after a meeting is over where you chat up the people who were there are the most valuable. You rally learn things and information that couldn't/wouldn't be shared because of inhibition or other factors. People will share fears, apprehend, resentment sometimes, enthusiasm with you.

Read more similar books until lessons naturally internalize.

Pick one thing/idea/concept and try to apply intentionally all day in real life. See when it worked or not.

Become genuinely interested in other people’s lives and journeys. Go into every interaction thinking “I wonder what I will learn about this person?”

While listening, ask follow up questions. That is really the easiest way to make social interactions smooth, get to know people better and make them appreciate you.

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