A Harvard Business School professor discussed the reasons why one trait can help anyone reach their full potential sooner than expected.
Professor Joseph Fuller, co-founder of the Managing the Future of Work initiative, spoke to CNBC Make It this week about what separates high achievers from their less successful counterparts.
“They’re not wedded to some predetermined career path that they set when they were students or when they started their first job,” Fuller said.
“They are open to unexpected opportunities and embrace change instead of fearing it.”
This ‘soft skill’, which the LinkedIn blog post said is adaptability, is a key trait that is ‘still in demand’.
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Professor Fuller is a Harvard Business School graduate who teaches the Becoming a General Manager course in the second year of the school’s MBA program.
The professor explained to CNBC Make It that setting career goals and timelines for completion is great — until it’s not.
According to Fuller, setting career goals and timelines for achieving them can be dangerous if one closes off to an unexpected path or path.
This would be the case where adaptability is needed to help successful individuals fulfill opportunities that could benefit their careers.
Adaptability is the ability or willingness to adapt to new conditions in any location.
Fuller told CNBC Make It that adaptability in the workforce is “a rare skill to find.”
“People are afraid to try new things and fail. But you can’t grow without going beyond your comfort zone,” Fuller said.
The researchers studied the impact of adaptability on careers after choosing to focus on various micro-trends in the workforce.
They took the six-month period of 2022 and compared it to the same period in 2023 to see which skills were growing the fastest.
“Adaptability is the best way to have an agency right now,” said LinkedIn VP Aneesh Raman.
“The basis of change management is building the muscles of adaptability.”
This skill is considered critical for employees and organizations and could help workers remain competent and calm during potential changes in the work environment.
Although adaptability is the number one trait in the eyes of highly successful employees, it is not the most sought-after skill.
LinkedIn’s February 2024 post on this year’s most in-demand skills argued that increasing specialization in communication, collaboration and leadership is of greater value.
Other top skills include customer service, leadership, project management, analytics, teamwork, sales, problem solving and research.
“I believe we are at the beginning of a world of work that is more human than before,” said LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky.
Roslansky added that it gives individuals “a chance to do more fulfilling work and to do that work more easily and effectively with others.”