Ep. 94 - Building Soft Skills Like Persistence, Humility and EQ to Create Proper Career Progress

Podcast

May 18

Written By Strategic Momentum

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We all know the importance of building the necessary skills to grow in our career, whether it is advancing in the role we are currently in or it’s pivoting into a different role or industry. And oftentimes, often times we emphasize building and optimizing those hard skills - like coding, writing, or design. Yet in today’s new world of work, soft skills matter. And they matter even more to create the strategic momentum we are looking for. Because at the end of the day, we are dealing with people, not machines.

Kyle Hunter, otherwise known as K. Sparks, is an accomplished hip-hop musician, lyricist, performer, griot, futurist marketer and entrepreneurial businessman - that’s his career mashup. He’s written over 500 songs, and his music has 6M streams on Spotify. Kyle’s music career includes performances with artists such as Kendrick Lamar, Kanye West and Q Tip and he was nominated for the Best New Artist and Best Hip Hop Record.

Now as the CEO of Rhythm Couture he works globally with an eclectic mix of exceptionally talented musicians and producers and has favorably impacted and shifted the music product placement paradigm. His music has been placed in Lebron James’ Powerade Campaign, Monster Energy, Calvin Klein, Marie Claire, and VANS.

And he’s also a podcaster helping others get to the next level in their personal life through inspirational stories, motivating insights and advice. For him it’s always been about paying it forward.

Kyle’s career mashup has always entailed building new skills to grow his capabilities along the way. And while developing his hard skills has been valuable for his career advancement, it’s really been the soft skills, like emotional intelligence, that have been instrumental in helping him be the effective leader he is today.

Expressing Oneself and Staying True to One’s Beliefs

Kyle’s career journey started out in Queens, NY where he was born and raised. He was exposed to a lot of cultural influences growing up and music was an instrumental part of this. Queens is very rich musically with acts like Run DMC, LL Cool J, NAS, The Lost Boys and 50 Cent all coming from the borough.

Kyle was also very artistic and talented in poetry but it wasn’t until he attended a summer architectural internship at Cooper Union University that he realized his true calling for music, which had been more of a side hobby at that point.

That internship experience was a pivotal moment in his life. After being told by a professor that he should stay away from certain statements integrated with this art, he realized the importance and need to always express himself so he could ultimately be his whole, true self. In the end, that transcended everything he did in music as well as business.

“It's staying true to who you are. Because if you don't, ultimately you're cheating yourself and other people because there's plenty of people out there that could relate to you, they could relate to your story and you're robbing them of that experience. So, yeah, being true, being transparent, that's always been one of my mantras.”

Developing Skills - It’s Being Consistent and Persistent When Your Testing and Learning

To get to where Kyle is now, it wasn’t a straight line journey. There was trial and error that subsequently led to the positive exposure and notoriety for his music. He knew that to propel himself forward inevitably meant testing, learning and refining along the way to see what fit and what worked.

A great example of that is a series Kyle, or I should say K. Sparks, did, entitled Manic Mondays. Every Monday for an entire year he released an original song online, during the heightened digital era of blogs in the late 2000’s. In total, Manic Mondays amassed over 525,000 digital downloads.

That consistent and persistent effort to assess and measure what resonated with whom, and where, was incredibly valuable as it helped Kyle understand where to focus and optimize going forward. All this hard work resulted in getting record deals, venturing into music licensing and then eventually starting his own company.

“Many people don’t succeed because they give up and they give up because they feel like it's just not working. But a lot of times it's not that something's not working. It's just, the approach might be the wrong approach.”

The breadth of roles, experiences, interests, and passions have enabled Kyle to grow into a multifaceted individual, and now leader, with a clear mission to pay it forward. And as that leader, he’s aware of the need to lean into his people skills in order to manage what people expect of him and manage the reality of what it is that he can deliver.

To Move People, It’s Not the Hard Skills but the Soft Skills that Help You Navigate, Maneuver and Grow

Building the hard skills is one thing, this process is tangible and definable. But to really grow and accelerate in your career, soft skills are even more important in this new world of work. Those skills of persistence, humility and emotional intelligence, which Kyle identified, are critical but not top of mind for many.

“[Emotional Intelligence] is something that everyone needs. Without it, you’re going to be at a deficit.”

And companies, no matter how big or small, are made up of people, so the better you’re able to understand that human dynamic, the better position you’ll be in to navigate and propel yourself forward. Plus with the jobs of the future becoming more machine-powered and data-driven than in the past, it’s social skills such as communication, collaboration, and emotional intelligence that will be in higher demand.

We all need to talent stack both hard and soft skills continuously. But remember it takes practice and it won’t happen overnight. As Kyle likes to say, persistence beats resistance. And we all have a tendency to resist moving forward as fear creeps in when we look to do something new and break free of the norms we’ve been living with.

And yes, it will feel uncomfortable when you start. But the more you do it, the more confidence you will develop over time, to the point where it might end up being a considerable strength.

Best Work advice

Collaboration is greater than competition
Your network is your net worth - surround yourself with like-minded people who have a similar work ethic and similar goals.

Key Takeaways:

No matter what you do, you have to be passionate about it and you have to believe in it.
It’s important to stay true to who you are because if you don't, ultimately you're cheating yourself and other people.
Don’t see your failures as losses but rather as experiences. In the end, they make you a better person and leader.
- Don't let the internet discourage you because not everyone is posting their failures.
- Through the imperfections, you learn how to perfect the craft and the process.
Stay consistent, stay persistent and everything will come in its proper timing. You can't rush proper progress.
- Understand the situation from the right frame of reference and don't compare your story to someone else because everybody's on a different chapter.
Take the proper time to develop and refine your skills. Just become great at what you do.
If you want to get to that destination, then you’ve got to start taking action.
- Understand what is holding you back. Oftentimes it is yourself and your thoughts. Stop overthinking so much and take that leap of faith to just do it because if you can't, you'll never get to your destination.
Have a game plan for how you want to get to where you're going to go. Inevitably it will change and you will have to adjust. But you have to have some type of framework or blueprint of where you want to go to start.
- “You shouldn't ever be in a state of confusion where you're just throwing stuff out there and hoping it sticks to the wall.”
Take inventory of what’s working and what isn’t because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, thinking this is going to change.
- Measure your performance or progress in some fashion so that the steps you’re taking make sense
As you grow and go in different directions, realize those skills picked up along the way in the past will be utilized in the present in a beneficial way.