Desired soft skills in IT

Structured
team players sought

Professionalism is one thing. But if IT specialists can also work constructively on a team, think and work in a structured manner, and explain issues and communicate well, then they are an ideal hire. These personal qualities top employers’ soft skills wish lists.

Source: DEKRA Akademie 2024
Base: 300 job vacancies (multiple responses)

Good communication skills and a focus on service and customer needs, in particular, count when working with internal and external customers. IT specialists need to be able to explain projects or procedures so that a person outside the field would understand them. These characteristics are particularly helpful in the system integration area. In application development, in contrast, soft skills like independence or structured work methods have greater weight.

IT specialists often work under time pressure, and handle multiple tasks at the same time. To do so, it is important to maintain an overview even when there is a lot going on. A structured, responsible approach to such work is essential. 

Creativity is commonly considered essential for software development and problem solving. However, this characteristic ranks at only eleventh place (11.7 %). A willingness to learn ranks even lower; employers are looking for employees who are eager to learn in almost one out of ten job advertisements (9.3 %).