IT roles are changing. While technical skills will remain part of the job, many IT leaders see them as table stakes. Human-centric skills -- or soft skills -- are now taking center stage.
Here's what IT leaders have to say about the most important skills to have in their toolboxes.
What is one non-tech-related skill that is essential for IT leaders to have in their toolbox?
"I'd say have the ability to understand the customer, to be able to relate to them and show value, where the end result needs to be trust. I'm firm that trust is the way that you execute, the way that relationships happen [and] the way that everybody works together. And AI is a necessary tool that is part of that."
--Robert Kramer, analyst and managing partner at KramerERP
"I think nothing can beat curiosity at this moment. Whether you're a junior person on any team or you're a senior leader, the most important thing for people right now is to be able to just make sense of everything that's happening around them. … [But for] mid-career and senior-level folks, I think skill set-wise? It's the ability to ask the right questions. I think that's what's become most important at the moment. That enables [leaders] to connect the dots. I believe this was always very, very critical, but it cannot be more important than the moment we are in right now."
--Meghna Punhani, chief people officer at Eightfold AI
"These days, technical skills are not on the top of the list. I have people who have very little technical skills that are thriving just because they have an open mindset, and they are willing to adapt. Despite what everybody says, those models do not adapt to different things. The new CIOs need to be willing to be adaptable."
--Fabio Caversan, CTO at Stefanini Group
"There are several, but I would say the most important is collaboration, because the odds of success on digital outcomes when initiatives are co-led is significantly higher. So, if you really want to get things done in technology right now, you need to be able to collaborate. It's because AI isn't just a technology shift -- it's an operating model shift. It's a business level shift. It's a societal level shift. So, you have to be able to collaborate out of the technology side."
--Shanna Grafeld, senior principal analyst at Gartner
"Communication and sharing. You don't have to be an IT person. You can be a product manager. You can be a designer. You can be everything, right? You can build a product and evangelize it. Being an extrovert and trying to build those skills to be communicative and brand your product. It's not like you're building in the back and somebody else is marketing. It could be the same person, top to bottom."
--Murali Swaminathan, CTO at Freshworks
Sarah Amsler is lead editor for editorial's Reader Engagement and Outreach team at TechTarget.
