"The empirical evidence of a new model to test the individual soft skills".

Abstract

The aim of this research is proving the reliability of the New Competency Model developed by the Cà Foscari Competency Centre in order to test the soft skills of the individuals. More precisely, the analysis is focused on 4 of the 31 competencies that compose the model. The first chapter consist of a literature analysis which outlines the concepts of competence, emotional intelligence, and the most relevant models, with a specific focus on their limitations. The second chapter introduces the New Competency Model developed by the Cà Foscari Competency Centre: a questionnaire for testing the soft skill which is composed by 31 competencies, classified in the 6 clusters of awareness, action, social, cognitive, exploratory and commitment toward the group. Furthermore, follows an analysis based on the most representative literature for what concern the 4 competencies that belong to the “social cluster”. They are conflict management, leadership, networking and developing others. In particular, the analysis aims to depict the reciprocal correlation between the 4 competencies and how they are interwoven with demographic variables and the performance results. In order to prove and validate the conclusions that have been collected in the first part, an empirical investigation will be performed based on the information gathered from two different samples. The first one collected in the period of February- March 2017 and composed of 94 master and MBA students. The second one collected in May- June 2017 and composed of 325 bachelor, master students, and young professionals.