Soft Skills as an intervention has been initiated at Trust level at Shri Vile Parle Kelavani Mandal (SVKM) and the emphasis is placed on the all-round development of the students, thereby equipping them to face life after college. The soft skills training provided to the students assist them in identifying and achieving their own personal potential (https://svkm.ac.in/Placement%20and%20Soft-Skill/M__225). We at department of Soft Skills at NMIMS Deemed-to-be University borrow from the vision of SVKM and provide teaching and training intervention on Soft Skills which include Bahavioural Trainings, Career Initiation Skills and Corporate Readiness Skills to our students at various school under the Mumbai campus.

Aim:

For students, to be a primary resource for any intervention on Soft Skills, which includes interpersonal and intrapersonal relationship skills building, personality development and enrichment, and up-to-date business/corporate readiness training.

Objective:

1. To provide platform to students so that they develop essential Soft Skills required in personal and professional life
2. To enhance holistic growth potential in a learning environment that encourages participation and learning without any inhibition
3. To build behavioural skill-sets through experiential learning that allows addressing current interpersonal and intrapersonal challenges in both personal and professional setting

Who are we?

We are a unique and one-of-a-kind project initiated, established and guided by the top management leadership team of SVKM’s NMIMS Deemed-to-be University, Mumbai Campus, across 14 plus schools to impart an essential and crucial segment of life skills called Soft Skills.

Soft Skills as a term encapsulates all that is not considered Hard Skills such as ones’ qualification and certificates of achievements. It’s a skill that is an integral part of any life-long learning for any individual at any stage of their life. At NMIMS, we focus on getting our students prepared for the Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous (VUCA) world through teaching them essential life skills and getting them ready for the contemporary business world through tailor-made and customised Soft Skills modules.

The Life Skills and Citizenship Education (LSCE) Framework of United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) sets out 12 core life skills: creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, cooperation, negotiation, decision making, self-management, resilience, communication, respect for diversity, empathy and participation (UNICEF and partners, 2017). These skills have been selected as those most needed for the life outcomes of learning, employability, personal empowerment, and active citizenship (UNICEF and partners, 2017). The world of academia imparts much-needed skill-sets in various domains that equip our students to play effective roles in the corporate world or in the sphere of entrepreneurship. What prepares them thoroughly for the rigors of life as a responsible citizen both of the nation and corporate is the intervention in Soft Skills which attempts to address the 12 life skills outlined above.

The formal curricula, in commensurate with contemporary research, need analysis and topics identification, designed by every school under the NMIMS family address some elements of Soft Skills. However, there is an ever-increasing need to reach out to every student on a deeper level to ingrain in them the tools to develop essential life skills, the resilience in times of hardships and the confidence to cope with daily stressors of life on the one hand and to ready them as a responsible corporate citizen of the 21^st century.

We are a team of teachers cum trainers who have at least a decade long professional work experience in the area of Soft Skills. Besides, conducting full-time student learning engagement with various school, we frequently stay in touch with the current needs of the industry and bring those best practices in the class.

What we do:

Department of Soft Skills consists of three key points of intervention: Behavioural Skills, Career Initiation Skills and Corporate Readiness Skills: -

Behavioural Skills Include:

1. Developing students’ intrapersonal and interpersonal relationships
2. Enhancing their current competency so that they are able to address, handle and manage communication situations of varied kinds
3. Honing listening skills and developmental feedback delivery skills
4. Psychometric Profiling – tests and activities that allow the students to know who they are and how they can go about adjusting and adapting to the current VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous) world
5. Reinforcing positive behaviours through various activities and initiatives geared towards developing strong self-esteem and self-worth.
6. Developing and enhancing business communication skills like presentation skills, group discussion, business writing, etc.

Career Initiation Skills and Corporate Readiness Skills:

1. Conducting oneself as a corporate citizen of the 21^st century
2. Hand-holding students on getting a first-hand approach on interviewing skills like Personal Interview, Group Discussions and Case-Study Analysis.
3. Preparing our students for the future of work – instilling in the values of ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance)
4. Being a constant support and coach for students who require help transitioning from campus to corporate

What we offer:

1. Classroom sessions – conducted school-wise basis the requirements and need identification
2. Open-workshops – Sessions conducted in an open-invitation e.g., Topics on The Leadership Skill – Sharing Feedback, Expectations Management, The Art of Persuasion (especially for Digital Marketing, Social Media, Global-MBA courses), Listening & Empathy, Creating Positive First Impression, The Art of Story-Telling, etc.
3. Individual attention to students on case-to-case basis
4. Leading and managing student Initiatives such as Debates, Public Speaking Club, etc.

How we are unique:

1. The faculties in the department are industry experts who bring to class the contemporary definition of soft skills and its real-time use in the corporate setting of today.
2. The programmes are designed keeping in mind the following:
   1. The student feedback and requirement
   2. The school’s area of focus
   3. The skill-sets required in today’s business environment
   4. Latest research on soft skills across the corporate domain and management institutes
3. The courses we offer are at its core a ‘threshold free’ structure thereby giving the students added opportunity to dive deeper into their experiences and explore new levels of knowledge application.

Train the Trainer

The Life-skills department of NMIMS deemed-to-be University in collaboration with our in-house counsellors conducted a "Train the Trainer” program on 7th November (second half) and 8th November as a part of its content development and sharing of best practices objectives.

The sessions were conducted by the core team of the department as indicated below:

1. Emotional Intelligence by Professor Krishna Chande
2. Motivation and Resilience by Meeta Shah (Senior Counsellor) and Assistant Counsellors Joel Gibbs and Nazneen Raimawalla.
3. Neuro-linguistic Programming by Professor Ritesh Haldankar
4. Creative Group Discussions by Dr Madhavi Gokhale
5. Team-building by Professor Ocean Gonsalves.

The program also included a theatre workshop by Shreyas Desai of Myriad Arts with the objective of linking elements of the theatre with soft skills.

There were 15 participants in all including the core team. The sessions were well-received and all the participants were deeply satisfied with the learnings and takeaways.

Ms Hemangi Kambli rendered excellent support as the coordinator of the program.

Standing from L to R: Dr Ambrish Bhatt, Professor Mahendra Tayde, Dr Madhavi Gokhale, Professor Krishna Chande, Professor Karishma Ahuja, Meeta Shah, Professor Ocean Gonsalves.

Seated from L to R: Professor Ritesh Haldankar, Joel Gibbs, Umangi Mehta, Professor Poojaa Jadhav, Professor Neville Mehta

Dr Sharad Mhaiskar (Pro Vice-Chancellor, NMIMS University) with the participants and Hemangi Kambli (standing next to Professor Neville Mehta)