Soft Skills and Effective

Communication in University
Settings
Hind Moustadraf
Université Mohammed V- Rabat

Abstract: In order to transform Morocco into a developed

nation, institutions of higher education need to play an
essential role in generating a skilled workforce with a first-
class mentality.
The Ministry of Higher Education has taken some steps to
ensure that soft skills be addressed in the curriculum because
they are among the essential skills needed by graduates in
order to be employable in this global era. Soft skills refer to
nontechnical skills such as listening, communication,
teamwork, time management, self-management, empathy,
integrity, flexibility, emotional intelligence, and related social
skills (Andrews & Higson, 2008; Goleman, 1998; Klaus,
2007; Robles, 2012).
In recent years, many reforms were implemented by the
Moroccan Ministry of Higher Education to encourage the
development of soft skills among graduates in order to
enhance their employability.
For technically based occupations like engineering, soft skills
are very important for the application of technical
Revue SSDL, Faculté des Langues, des Arts et des Sciences Humaines de Settat
ISSN : 2737-8519, N°1, 2021
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2 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

knowledge at work effectively (Hairuzila, 2009). Thus, this

study focuses on developing soft skills in undergraduate
engineering students of four Moroccan Universities. This
paper discusses the importance of soft skills for students, the
type of pedagogical methods initiated by varied educational
institutions; their relevance and their impact in developing
soft skills and benefits to students.
Keywords: Soft skills, Higher education, Pedagogical methods,
Employability, Labor Market

Introduction
“Education is the lifeblood of the country’s new
development model” which means that, in order to
transform Morocco into a developed nation, it is necessary
to improve education performance and teaching quality
(Amzazi, 2019).
For that purpose, the Ministry of Higher Education
developed many reforms to improve the quality of university
education in the kingdom by integrating soft skills in the
curriculum to enhance graduate employability.
Essentially, soft skills refer to personalities, attributes,
qualities and personal behaviour of individuals. Soft skills
include certain abilities such as communication, problem-
solving, self-motivation, decision-making, and time
management skills (Gupta, 2009, p.62-63). Additionally, it
is said that hard skills are the academic skills, experience and
level of expertise that is generally described in a resume, and
the principles, methods, procedures and techniques needed
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues |3
for performing jobs.Contrarily, soft skills are sought out
behaviours and characteristics that employees demonstrate
unconsciously and routinely on the job.
Researchers have reported that recruiters may prioritize a job
candidate with soft skills over someone with technical skills
(Robles, 2012; Russell, Russell, & Tastle, 2005). Most
employers are likely to hire, retain and promote persons who
are dependable, resourceful, ethical, have effective
communication, self-directed, willing to work and learn, and
have a positive attitude (Wats M.& Wats R.K.,2009, p.1).
Consequently, there is now more pressure on academic
institutions to enhance the soft skills of their students. The
present study tries to bring awareness to the importance of
soft skills by examining the type of pedagogical methods of
implementing soft skills within Public and Private Moroccan
engineering universities. This research will further examine
the relevance, impact and benefit that soft skills can have on
students as well as the teaching methods to reinforce
students acquisition.
We are therefore interested in analysing soft skills
development within Moroccan higher education by
answering the following questions:
• To what extent do the pedagogical methods
implemented in Moroccan engineering universities allow
soft skills acquisition?
• What are the most important soft skills for
engineering students?
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4 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

• What are the benefits of soft skills development to

engineering students?
• What is the most suitable environment to acquire
soft skills?
• Who is the most resourceful person to successfully
implement soft skills within a higher education
environment?
• What measures should be undertaken by the
university to enable the acquisition of soft skills?
This article proposes to answer these problems by carrying
out a methodological analysis which will lead us to address
the following three parts in turn:
The first part will be the subject of a brief overview on the
literature review which focuses on the definition of soft
skills.
The second part will be devoted to the exposure of the
methodology and the population interviewed for the field
phase. Let us simply point out that we opted for a qualitative
approach to research, in particular by examining students'
perceptions regarding the importance of soft skills and
analysing the teaching practices adopted by Moroccan
universities through semi-structured interviews.
The third part will be dedicated to discuss the results of the
current study.
1. Soft Skills and Their Importance to
Engineering Students
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues |5
Competent and qualified candidates are recognized as good
employees when they have two types of skills: technical and
non-technical skills.
Technical skills or “Hard skills” are job-specific which means
that they vary from one type of job to another. According to
Medina “« Technical skills are a skill, expertise or technical
competence related to the field of the workers, whether
engineering or technical (Medina, 2010). Technical skills or
‘hard skills’ is often associated with the use of tools,
equipment related to work properly and efficiently, as well as
all technical matters. (Nasir, Ali, Noordin, & Nordin, 2011,
p.10) It can be known and understood more easily as can be
seen clearly with the naked eye (Yahya and Muhammad
Rashid, 2001). Whereas non-technical skills represent,
according to Straub (1990), aspects common to all jobs and
tasks, such as following instructions, communicating
effectively and cooperating with others in teamwork. In the
workplace, Noor Azizi et al. (2001) stated that non-technical
skills include the ability to perform specific tasks. In
addition, non-technical skills play an important role in
supporting technical skills (Roger, 1996).
There are different ways of defining and classifying ‘soft
skills,’ notably as life skills (WHO 1993), twenty-first
century skills (Moore and Morton 2017), “transversal skills”,
“soft skills” (Davis and Woodward, 2006), employability
skills (The Conference Board of Canada, 1992; Cotton,
1995), generic competences as well as key competencies for a
successful life, a well-functioning society (|OECD 2003,
2012) and lifelong learning (EU 2006), “generic skills”
 |
6 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

(Wiggill, 1991; Kamaliah 2009; Kamaruddin, Ruhizan and

Ramlee 2009). These skills such as communication skills,
analytical, critical and problem solving skills, lifelong
learning ability, entrepreneurship and management skills are
the ones that employers value as important skills for
potential employees to possess (Hairuzila, 2009, p.69). For
this reason, all graduates should master and acquire these
skills regardless of their field of study. Engineering programs
are often criticized for overemphasizing technical skills and
giving insufficient attention to nontechnical skills (Itani and
Srour, p.1). However, engineering graduates like any other
graduate, should have both transversal skills and technical
skills in order to have opportune access to the labour market.
By examining the required engineering skills and attributes
for engineering graduates at various accrediting institutions
and countries (USA, UK, EU, AUS, and Japan), Zaharim et
al. (2010) were able to show that many of the common
employability skills for engineers consist of nontechnical
skills, such as communication skills, leadership, teamwork,
lifelong learning, professionalism, and decision-making
skills.
For example communication skills include oral
communication with managers and peers, presentation skills,
business writing skills, and cross-cultural communication
abilities. All of these areas can be tackled at the
undergraduate level if they are well integrated into
engineering program curriculum (Itani and Srour, p.2).
Concerning management and leadership skills, they are
essential even for technical personnel who perform
administrative duties in carrying out their daily functions.
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues |7
They are even more essential for engineers who assume
managerial positions later in their careers. Srour et al. (2013)
highlight that engineers’ transition from the technical to the
management path can encounter many difficulties, one of
which is derailment. Derailment can be described as not
meeting management expectations mainly as a result of a
lack of management skills (Shipper and Dillard 2000).
The empirical study presented in this paper adopted the list
of soft skills defined and extensively described by the ModEs
European Project (Table 1; Haselberger et al. 2012) (see
table 1).

Table 1. List of the 20 Soft Skills Utilized in the Study (Haselberger and
al. 2012; Succi, 2018)
Category Skill
Personal 1. Being Committed to Work – make a commitment to the organisation and understand its specific
characteristics
2. Being Professionally Ethical – take actions while bearing in mind the principles and ethics of the
profession in daily activities
3. Being Tolerant to Stress – show endurance in complicated or stressful situations
4. Creativity/Innovation Skills – contribute new ideas to develop improvements in the products or
services of the organisation as well as in the activities performed in the job
5. Learning Skills – provide a self-assessment of necessary knowledge (theoretical or practical) and take
measures to acquire and implement this knowledge
6. Life Balance Skills – manage successfully the frequent conflicts between life and work
7. Self-Awareness Skills – grasp our real weaknesses and strengths
Social
8. Communication Skills – transmit ideas, information and opinions clearly and convincingly, both
verbally and in writing, while listening
9. Conflict Management & Negotiation Skills –conciliate different opinions to reach an agreement that
satisfies everyone
10. Contact Network Skills – develop, maintain, and foster contacts
11. Culture Adaptability Skills – carry out managerial and entrepreneurial processes in multicultural
environments
12. Leadership Skills – motivate and guide others to get them to contribute effectively
13. Team-Work Skills – to build relationships based on participation and cooperation with other people
14. Adaptability to Change Skills – redirect the course of action to meet goals in a new situation
Method-
15. Analysis Skills – draw conclusions and forecasts for the future by acquiring relevant information from
 |
8 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

ological different sources

16. Continuous Improvement Skills – perform the activities, duties and responsibilities inherent to the
job under quality standards and strive for excellence
17. Customer/User Orientation Skills – identify, understand and satisfy efficiently the needs of
customers
18. Decision Making Skills – make the decisions necessary to achieve objectives quickly and proactively
19. Management Skills – set goals and priorities through the selection and distribution of tasks and
resources
20. Results Orientation Skills – make organizational efforts profitable while having always in mind the
goals pursued

2. Methodology
The main purpose of this paper is to investigate students’
perceptions of the importance of soft skills. A questionnaire
was used for data collection and 255 undergraduate
engineering students from four universities in Morocco
participated in this study.
The students were invited to participate in our study
through the lecturers and answered our questions via
different distance learning tools: Moodle, Microsoft teams,
zoom, and skype.
It should be noted that the study was conducted in French-
speaking Moroccan universities, which is why we translated
the verbatim from French to English for the purposes of this
study.
The questionnaire consisted of multiple-answer multiple
choice questions and open-ended questions to solicit their
opinions and responses especially towards the courses,
projects and activities that have encouraged their acquisition
of soft skills. Rather than using software based methods, we
opted to analyze the open-ended questions manually using
an inductive thematic analysis known as the classic tool for
the study of opinions and perceptions.
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues |9
It serves to identify the themes and categories present in a
corpus and then analyze them. It is a subjective approach
that aims to reformulate, interpret and theorize phenomena.
Thus, through a horizontal approach, we have identified in
the various interviews of the corpus recurring themes and
categories and we have grouped them together by
relationships and typologies.
3. Findings
The main results of this study are presented in the following
sections.
3.1 Awareness of soft skills
The participating students were asked what soft skills, in
their opinion, are essential for engineering graduates. Based
on a literature review, a list of 20 skills was developed.
The top five soft skills, as identified by the students, were
team-work skills, communication skills, self-awareness skills,
tolerance to stress and creativity/innovation (see Table 2).
On the contrary, Life Balance Skills, Customer/User
Orientation Skills, Culture Adaptability Skills and Conflict
Management & Negotiation Skills are ranked of lowest
importance. These skills may not be as important as the
previously ranked skills because they are not obviously linked
to soft skills.
Table 2: The most important soft skills for engineering graduates
(multiple responses)
Ranking Soft skills Frequency
(n=255)
1 Team work skills 248
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10 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

2 Communication skills 246

3 Self-Awareness Skills 221
4 Being Tolerant to Stress 218
5 Creativity/Innovation Skills 205
6 Results Orientation Skills 189
7 Leadership Skills 175
8 Contact Network Skills 151
9 Management Skills 149
10 Adaptability to Change Skills 95
11 Analysis Skills 87
12 Continuous Improvement Skills 85
13 Being Committed to Work 42
14 Being Professionally Ethical 39
15 Learning Skills 18
16 Decision Making Skills 9
17 Conflict Management & Negotiation 2
Skills
17 Culture Adaptability Skills 2
18 Customer/User Orientation Skills 1
18 Life Balance Skills 1

3.2 Benefits of Soft Skills Development

According to a student, “the development of soft skills is
useful for my engineering career, and these kinds of skills are
in high demand” (Student subject). “From a young age we
were led to take mainly theoretical courses, which is certainly
beneficial for us in order to develop our intelligence and
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues | 11
resonance. However this does not teach us the art of
communication and teamwork, as well as many other
qualities required to improve our professional and personal
situation” (Student Subject). Students participating in this
study were asked about the benefits of soft skills
development to engineering students. The majority of
students mentioned that an increase of compatibility with
people is the most important benefit of soft skills acquisition
which leads to a” better integration and understanding of the
work environment” (Student subject). According to another
student: “Softs skills are useful for managing conflicts and
problems with our colleagues in the workplace”. Table 3
shows the benefits of soft skills development in students.
 |
12 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

Figure 1 : Graphic representation of the 7 most frequently used

words

Table 3: Benefits of Soft Skills Development (n=255)

Benefits Frequency

1 Increase compatibility with people 148

2 Build your self-esteem 146

3 Enhance your employability 119

4 Increase your ability to influence others 86

5 Strengthen your ability to adapt to adversity 51

3.3 The most suitable environment to acquire

soft skills
In response to a question on what is the best environment
and resourceful person who is able to help students in
developing soft skills, the student’s opinions were divergent.
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues | 13
Most engineering students were of the view that the
university professors and lecturers are the best resource
persons for achieving the above objective. “I think that the
best resource persons who can help me develop my soft-skills
are my university professors and I also think that the most
suitable environment is the classroom” (student subject).
Regarding the subjects enabling the acquisition of these
competences, the students insisted on the following courses:
“the main persons who can help us develop softs skills are:
professor of communication and the professor of business
organization.” (Student subject). While others argue that
these skills can rather be developed within the company with
tutors and internship mentors. Being helped by personal
coaches can help students deal with new situations that push
them out of their comfort zone and deal with stage fright
and their lack of confidence. Few students think that we can
develop soft skills by ourselves; a student says that “a few
simulations in front of the mirror are enough and the trick is
done, we just need motivation” (Student Subject). Another
student report “I think you don’t necessarily need others to
 |
14 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

develop soft-skills, just believe in yourself and self-study is

the best technique to adopt” (Student Subject)

Table 4: the most resourceful person to successfully implement soft skills

within a higher education environment (multiple responses)

Ranking Soft skills Frequency

(n=255)

1 Professors/Lecturers 186

2 Internship Tutor/Mentor 171

3 Personal development coach 129

4 Ourselves 85

5 Experts and Experienced Engineers 47

6 Parents and family 24

3.4 The Most Effective Pedagogical Methods for

Soft Skills Development
With regard to the contribution of teaching methods to the
acquisition of soft skills, the results of the study show that
graduates reported having acquired more soft skills in more
active teaching models, based in particular on group work,
internship and problem solving method and far from the
conventional academic model.
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues | 15
Table 5. The Most Effective Teaching Methods for Developing Soft
Skills (Multiple Responses)

Ranking Soft skills Frequency

(n=255)

1 Group Work 181

2 Internship 164

3 Problem Solving Method 139

4 Role Playing 120

5 Case Study 90

6 Flipped Classroom 70

7 Lectures 54

8 Project Based Learning 32

3.5 The Effectiveness of the Pedagogical

Methods Implemented in Moroccan Engineering
Universities

To find out what they think of the teaching methods

adopted in the context of their academic career and to know
further about these interactive and effective teaching
 |
16 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

methods, we asked them the following question: “Do you

think your training promotes the acquisition of soft skills?
Cite examples of activities that helped you develop one or
more soft skills mentioned in the first question.” The
majority of engineering students believe that their academic
training promotes the acquisition of soft skills. “All our
professors insist on teamwork, whether for projects,
internships or even during oral presentations” (student
subject). A student subject stated that his machine
maintenance work placement with the DANONE plant in
Salé was not only beneficial for his technical skills but also to
improve his analytical thinking skills, organizing, planning
skills and communication skills with co-workers (Student
Subject). Another student insisted on workshops as a means
of developing soft skills: “The robotics projects organized by
the university allow me to develop several transversal skills,
such as strengthening my team spirit, and developing my
creativity especially during the sessions of computer-assisted
mechanical design” (student subject).
According to several students, oral presentations in class
also help to develop soft skills and more precisely
communicative skills; “oral presentations in pairs allowed us
to improve our team spirit, our ability to analyze, solve
problems and acquire the ability to work under pressure and
manage time” (student subject).
Whereas for others “our training unfortunately does not
promote the acquisition of soft-skills since we focus only on
lectures neglecting the importance of parallel activities”
(student subject). These students underline the importance
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues | 17
of extracurricular activities to develop this type of skills. “It’s
rather outside of class that we could develop them. I had the
opportunity and the chance more than a year ago now to
participate as a benevolent guide to the event "the night of
the philosophers" where my role was to direct participants to
the conferences they wished to attend and answer their
different questions. It was an enriching experience that
helped me a lot to develop my communication with others
which is not my first quality.” (student subject).
From my personal perspective, my participation in the forums
has had a huge impact on my way of being. Of a calm and
reserved nature, it helped me to dare to speak, to go towards the
people. Indirectly, my self-confidence has improved and I begin
to give my opinion without being afraid of judgment or
underestimating my ability to solve problems. I even learned to
listen to others which allowed me to improve the efficiency of
group work and to perfect my results (student subject).
3.6 Measures to Improve Soft Skills
Development
The students suggested several measures to be undertaken by
universities in order to improve the acquisition of soft skills.
Almost 50% of the students recommended that more
internships should be incorporated into the pedagogical
curriculum of the university to help students discover the
reality of the labor market (see table 6). Two other measures
suggested by around 40% of students were to organize visits
to companies and incorporate soft skills into the curriculum.
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18 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

Table 6. Measures to be Undertaken by Universities for Effective Soft

Skills Development

Benefits Frequency

1 Increase internship opportunities 126

2 Organize visits to companies 97

3 Incorporate soft skills into the 89

curriculum

4 Organize more workshops 41

5 Organize round tables 34

Conclusion
The aim of the present research was to examine the evolving
importance of soft skills in a competitive environment, as
well as to investigate the perceptions of students concerning
the importance of acquiring soft skills. Specifically, this
study focused on engineering students in Moroccan
Universities. In this investigation, the aim was to assess
student subject perspectives of the importance of soft skills,
implementation of soft skills in University settings, and the
measures that should be taken by universities to better
enable the acquisition of soft skills.
Previous research has established that ‘success as an engineer
requires more than simply strong technical capabilities” and
“therefore, they need soft skills to complement technical
skills” (Hairuzila,2009, p.71).This study has confirmed that
engineering students are acutely aware of the importance of
 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues | 19
soft skills to accompany their already acquired technical
skills, this further complements the findings of earlier
studies. Specifically, engineering students ranked team work
skills and communication skills as equally comparable to that
of technical skills. This evidence from this study suggests
that because students are frequently asked to work in group
settings, they therefore have the unconscious perception that
these two transversal skills are indispensable for them.
Contrarily, results of this study indicated that Customer/
User Orientation Skills and Life Balance Skills are the least
important soft skills for engineering students (see Table 2).
This can be explained by the assumption that students are
not yet aware of the relevance of life balance skills, and
especially engineering students are not aware of customer/
user orientation skills because they see these skills as more
applicable in a business environment. However, the pressure
that can accumulate from future employers and work
conditions can prove that these skills are necessary soft skills
for their personal and professional development. Overall, all
soft skills should be taken into consideration within a
student’s academic career, even for technically based
occupations.
One of the more significant findings to emerge from this
study is that within the benefits of soft skills development,
students listed personal benefits before professional benefits.
Specifically, within the findings students ranked an increase
of compatibility with people and build your self-esteem over
enhance your employability (see Table 3). This suggests that
students believe that getting along with others can lead to a
higher chance of employment. This can be linked to
 |
20 Soft Skills et Didactique des Langues

previous results from the Most Important Soft Skills for

Engineering Graduates (see Table 2) where students ranked
Team Work skills and Communication Skills as the most
important. In this increasingly global
The research has also shown that interactive teaching
methods based on group work, internship or problem-
solving projects encourage students to play an active role in
teaching by arousing their curiosity and creativity. These
learning methods develop critical thinking, analytical skills,
social intelligence and communicative skills of students
especially for Modern engineers who need to reinvent
themselves to meet the challenges confronting them in the
21st century; thus, they have to be willing to learn, unlearn
and then relearn in order to keep abreast of the latest
developments in this ever changing society (Hairuzila, 2009,
p.71)
There are, therefore, a number of important changes which
need to be taken by the two major players in student life,
namely companies and universities. These two entities need
to work together not only to increase students’ awareness of
the importance of soft skills but also to steer them toward
professional success by providing them with the opportunity
to hone their essential skills in order to continuously adapt
to the changing labor market and improve their
employability.
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