Soft skills requirements in software development jobs: a cross‐cultural empirical study
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/13287261211221137 |
| Date | 17 March 2012 |
| Pages | 58-81 |
| Published date | 17 March 2012 |
| Author | Faheem Ahmed,Luiz Fernando Capretz,Salah Bouktif,Piers Campbell |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
Soft skills requirements
in software development jobs:
a cross-cultural empirical study
Faheem Ahmed
Faculty of Information Technology, UAE University,
Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
Luiz Fernando Capretz
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering,
University of Western Ontario, London, Canada, and
Salah Bouktif and Piers Campbell
Faculty of Information Technology, UAE University,
Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
Abstract
Purpose – Most of the studies carried out on human factor in software development concentrate
primarily on personality traits. However, soft skills which largely help in determining personality
traits have been given comparatively little attention by researchers. The purpose of this paper is to
find out whether employers’ soft skills requirements, as advertised in job postings, within different
roles of software development, are similar across different cultures.
Design/methodology/approach – The authors review the literature relating to soft skills before
describing a study based on 500 job advertisements posted on well-known recruitment sites from a
range of geographical locations, including North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The study
makes use of nine defined soft skills to assess the level of demand for each of these skills related to
individual job roles within the software industry.
Findings – It was found that in the cases of designer, programmer and tester, substantial similarity
exists for the requirements of soft skills, whereas only in the case of system analyst is dissimilarity
present across different cultures. It was concluded that cultural difference does not have a major
impact on the choice of soft skills requirements in hiring new employee in the case of the software
development profession.
Originality/value – Specific studies concerning soft skills and software development have been
sporadic and often incidental, which highlights the originality of this work. Moreover, no concrete
work has been reported in the area of soft skills and their demand as a part of job requirement sets in
diverse cultures, which increases the value of this paper.
Keywords Jobs, Recruitmentadvertising, Skills, Computersoftware, Interpersonal skills,Soft skills,
Non-technicalskills, Diversity in software development,Human factors, National cultures
Paper type Research paper
I. Introduction
Software is a by-product of human activities, which often include problem solving
capabilities, cognitive aspects, and social interaction. The simple overall software
development process can be characterized as a set of activities comprising system
analysis, design, coding, testing, and maintenance. Logically these are separate
tasks which when coupled together enable software construction and operation.
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JSIT
14,1
58
Journal of Systems and Information
Technology
Vol. 14 No. 1, 2012
pp. 58-81
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
1328-7265
DOI 10.1108/13287261211221137
Each of these tasks also requires that the individuals involved have a particular set of
skills which may not necessarily be common across all activities. The psychological
hypothesis that not everyone can perform all tasks effectively implies that personality
traits play a critical role in the performance of people executing the same task.
Although the field of software psychology was fashioned many decades ago
(Shneiderman, 1980), it has been neglected due to the complexity of human nature and
difficulty in effectively assessing its impact on software development. In our society
today, the software industry has become a major employer and the specialties within
software development are as diverse as those in any other profession.
Software development job descriptions (either on- or off-line) normally divide
required skills into two broad categories; “technical requirements” and “non-technical
requirements”. Figure 1 shows a sample job advertisement which clearly highlights the
two categories of skill requirements. The text inside the “Solid line” rectangle highlights
the technical requirements of the job whereas the text inside “dotted line” rectangle
shows non-technical requirements also commonly known as soft skills. Whilst technical
skills also known as “hard skills” refer to the technical knowledge and abilities that an
individual should have to carry out the tasks associated with the position. Soft skills
grew from the domain of psychology and pertain to a broad range of characteristics
involving personality traits, social interaction abilities, communication, and personal
habits. It is also important to highlight here that the term soft skills often interchangeable
with “people skills”, “non-technical skills”, “emotional intelligence”, or “social skills”
Figure 1.
A sample job
advertisement from
a job portal
Soft skills
requirements
59
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