What are Interpersonal Skills? - Check 8 Examples
What are Interpersonal Skills - Whenever you’re communicating with other people, you’re employing your interpersonal skills. Often called “people skills”, interpersonal skills allow us to communicate and build relationships with others. They’re part of the soft skills group that are learnt throughout one’s life. These constitute both one’s innate personality traits and how one has learnt to handle social situations.
Knowing what are interpersonal skills is extremely useful for professional and personal life alike. It helps you identify key areas that you need to work on to crack job interviews, advance your career and build strong personal relationships.
In this article, we answer what does “interpersonal skills” mean exactly and what are examples of interpersonal skills that you should look to cultivate and why.
See also: Soft skills for students
Why do interpersonal skills matter
We’re always interacting with other people, regardless of what we’re doing in life or what stage we’re at. From developing meaningful relationships to giving presentations at work, the way we go about communicating with others is important.
Interpersonal skills are all the traits and learned behaviours that you exhibit when you’re interacting with other people. It is not just a matter of the words that you use, though they are indeed important, but also how you convey them. This includes the hand gestures that you make, your body language on the whole, your willingness to listen and understand, working in teams, treating others with respect and dignity, etc.
Employers and recruiters highly value interpersonal skills and look for applicants who can work well with others. Knowing what are interpersonal skills will also help you understand other people better so you can adjust your approach in order to work with them effectively.
Interpersonal skills come in especially handy when you want to gain favours from others. But even if you don’t have anything to gain from others, treating them with respect and dignity will get you in their good books, for it is the right thing to do.
What are examples of good interpersonal skills?
Now that you have an idea of what are interpersonal skills, let’s see what are examples of good interpersonal skills. These are the skills that you should be looking to develop to not just progress in your career but also to find meaning in the work that you do.
1. Empathy - Emotional intelligence is often considered a more reliable indicator of success than plain intelligence. Understanding how others feel and what they need goes a long way in knowing how to keep them motivated. This comes from being in tune with one’s own feelings and emotions - an intrapersonal skill that extends to good interpersonal skills. Being empathetic will keep you in good stead with your colleagues and coworkers and keep the communication in the workplace smooth and effective.
See also:
2. Active listening - Active listening is the act of listening to other people with the intention of engaging with them and gathering information. Failing to do this can have disastrous consequences, such as not understanding the instructions of a task or, worse, misunderstanding it. Listening with intent is also closely tied in with empathy. When you pay attention to what the other person is saying, you also get enough information to discern how they’re feeling and what they are really saying.
See also: Body language in communication
3. Teamwork - Teamwork is a good example to understand exactly what are interpersonal skills and how they are used. When you’re a part of a team, as is the case in most modern workplaces, you share a common goal with other members. Others depend on you just as much as you depend on them to achieve the shared goals and objectives. In the process, you communicate, negotiate, support, and help each other out to advance your team.
See also:
4. Leadership - Being a leader doesn’t come easy to everyone, but it is a great trait to have. Effective decision making and proactively managing others in a team to achieve a common goal are important markers of a leader and involve a variety of interpersonal skills. You don’t always have to have a leadership role in order to employ the skills of a leader. Taking ownership of the tasks that involve other people is enough, as it still involves everything that a leader would have to do as well.
See also: What are the good qualities of a leader
5. Conflict management - Conflicts are bound to arise when working with others; they are part and parcel of the social game. But if left unresolved, they can cause problems and cramp productivity. Knowing how to manage conflicts is, thus, an important piece of the puzzle to understand what are interpersonal skills. To better manage conflicts, display empathy, negotiate, assert your point but look for compromises as well; in short, be diplomatic. This is a key skill when interacting with others as it teaches you to communicate better and defend your views civilly and with respect.
See also: 17+ courses on Conflict Management
6. Positive attitude - One of the things common amongst successful people is their attitude towards positivity. Having a positive frame of mind opens one up to look for opportunities, even in difficult situations, and motivates others to reach higher and farther. This is true for everyone, not just for those who’re in positions of leadership for whom this trait is especially indispensable. Having a positive attitude propels us forward, and is what helps us forge lasting relationships.
See also: Power of Positive Thinking
7. Open to feedback - Being receptive to feedback is the number one way to accelerate your growth. This is a highly acknowledged interpersonal skill and will help you become better in all areas of your life, be it in your studies, work-life, or personal relationships. We’re not always sure whether what we’re doing is right or wrong. In such cases, it helps to be open to feedback from others to get confirmation and support.
See also: Soft skills vs Hard skills
8. Negotiation - Interactions with other people are invariably going to include situations where you have to come to a shared agreement. Listening closely, being attentive to what is being put forward and assertive enough to counter it with your own offer will help you get better at negotiating, Knowing how to communicate your case, manage the terms of agreements, etc. is a great skill to have, and one that comes naturally to those who know what does “interpersonal skills” mean.
See also: How to build confidence and self-esteem
Even though knowing what are examples of good interpersonal skills is a good start to identifying what you need to work on, the best way to learn what are interpersonal skills is through experience and participation. Everyone is different when it comes to the interpersonal skills they’re good at, and much of it is linked to how one’s personality deals with social situations. But much of it can be learned and integrated as well. We hope you now know the full extent of what are interpersonal skills, how they manifest, and their importance.
Read more:
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
A few examples of interpersonal skills include empathy, active listening, teamwork, leadership, and conflict management.
Interpersonal skills are those skills that are used when interacting with other people. Inter + Personal = Between personalities or ‘people skills’.
The 3 interpersonal skills that you can emphasize in an interview or resume include conflict management, leadership, and teamwork.
To demonstrate good interpersonal skills, pay attention to what other people are saying, have a positive attitude, be respectful, and look to resolve conflicts.