Soft skills of senior contracts managers in Northern Ireland

This paper describes an investigation of the soft management skills of senior personnel within construction companies in Northern Ireland. A literature review was undertaken to identify issues relating to soft management skills, and is summarised within the paper. Data were collected using eight semi-structured pilot interviews to identify the major issues required for inclusion in a subsequent on-line questionnaire. Each interview was analysed through cognitive mapping, using Banxia Decision Explorer software. The questionnaire asked respondents to indicate, on a five-point Likert scale, if they considered they had adequate soft management skills training and was circulated through the Construction Employers' Federation (N.I.). SPSS software used in the analysis of the 47 usable responses identified stress management, communication, people management, negotiation and presentation as the main soft management skills currently lacking. These soft management skills gaps are not widely recognised, the major emphasis of employers being on hard skills. Recent research at Queen's University, Belfast found that construction management education throughout the UK and Ireland also focuses primarily on developing hard management skills. Bridging of these soft management skills gaps will help improve day-to-day running of construction organisations.