Soft skills are hard. “They take work to build and work to apply.”
@ruthmalan
The word “hard” describes sciences like physics and chemistry. It is confusing that “hard” can mean difficult, because these sciences aren’t more difficult than the “soft” ones like sociology and anthropology. They’re differently difficult.
The “hard” sciences are hard because they’re solid. We can stand on them. Physical laws are universal laws. They demand rigor, and rigor means proving that assertions apply in all cases, both through deduction and by checking against evidence.
The “soft” sciences are differently hard. They study humans systems, far too complex to make universal causal predictions. Conclusions about one culture or group are valid in some other groups and invalid in others. Rigor in complexity means studying which cases your assertions apply to. It means observing, discerning, and wallowing in context.
I describe my career progression from solving puzzles to growing products like this:
Correctness, puzzles, and the “hard” sciences are hard like rocks. Rock climbing is very technical. It takes a lot of skill and strength and hard work to climb. At the top of the cliff, you know you’ve achieved something specific.
Change, people, and the “soft” sciences are hard like mud. Like wading through goopy mud. Techniques can help, but each depends on the kind of mud. Strength helps, but pushing too hard can get you more stuck. It always helps to be okay with getting messy. When you finally reach that piece of relatively solid ground, the view is still a swamp.
Why would you want to wade through mud?
why does a fish want to swim through water?
People, interrelationships, change — this is our world. Sometimes we can carve out puzzles we can solve for real. The few universal laws we can find are priceless. But the rest of it — life is in the mud, in the deep context. The skills to navigate it are not easy. They are not satisfying in the same way, either. But they are how we find meaning, how we participate in a system bigger than our own self.
I am okay with getting messy.