Soft skills

By Prof. Binod Mishra | IIT Roorkee

Learners enrolled: 19174

Soft Skills, a buzz word today has attracted the attention of students, professionals and entrepreneurs all over the world. Employability, being the major concern today, every individual aims at getting coveted jobs. Employability today is commensurate with proving multiple skills in varied situations in a fast changing world. Hence, everyone aspiring for jobs today has to prove one’s mettle in various situations where one requires to be armed with different skills, which, collectively come under Soft Skills. One may be armed with good competence of one’s subject but one cannot compete with his peer groups unless one has the potential of performance. Performance can be ensured with the demonstration of certain abilities that can help a professional communicate, corroborate, convince, evaluate and look into the continuing as well as the upcoming trends of the corporate world from time to time.The course aims at creating awareness among the stock holders of the corporate world in which the role of individuals as team players and also as responsible leaders materializes to a great extent. The course, with its interactive and need based modules, will address various challenges of communication as well as behavioural skills faced by individuals at workplace and organizations in bridging the gaps through effective skills of interviews, group discussions, meeting management, presentations and nuances of drafting various business documents for sustainability in today’s global world.

INTENDED AUDIENCE : BE/B.Sc/B.A, ME, M.Sc./M.A, Ph.D,Open to everyone desirous of honing one’s employability skills

PRE-REQUISITES : Basic knowledge of reading and writing English.

INDUSTRIES SUPPORT :Can be useful to all major companies, such L&T, BHEL, NBCC, NTPC, WIPRO, INFOSYS, and other organizations where HR has a crucial role.

Summary

Course Status :	Completed
Course Type :	Elective
Language for course content :	English
Duration :	12 weeks
Category :	Humanities and Social Sciences
Credit Points :	3
Level :	Undergraduate/Postgraduate
Start Date :	26 Jul 2021
End Date :	15 Oct 2021
Enrollment Ends :	09 Aug 2021
Exam Date :	24 Oct 2021 IST

Note: This exam date is subject to change based on seat availability. You can check final exam date on your hall ticket.

Page Visits

Course layout

Week 1: Introduction to Soft Skills, Aspects of Soft Skills, Effective Communication Skills, Classification of Communication, Personality Development

Week 2: Positive Thinking, Telephonic Communication Skills, Communicating without Words, Paralanguage

Week 3: Proxemics, Haptics: The Language of Touch, Meta-communication, Listening Skills, Types of Listening

Week 4: Negotiation Skills, Culture as Communication, Organizational Communication

Week 5: Communication Breakdown, Advanced Writing Skills, Principles of Business Writing

Week 6: Business Letters, Business Letters: Format and Style, Types of Business Letter

Week 7: Writing Reports, Types of Report, Strategies for Report Writing, Evaluation and Organization of Data

Week 8: Structure of Report, Report Style, Group Communication Skills

Week 9: Leadership Skills, Group Discussion, Meeting Management, Adaptability & Work Ethics

Week 10:Advanced Speaking Skills, Oral Presentation, Speeches & Debates, Combating Nervousness, Patterns & Methods of Presentation, Oral Presentation: Planning & Preparation

Week 11:Making Effective Presentations, Speeches for Various Occasions, Interviews, Planning & Preparing: Effective Résumé,

Week 12: Facing Job Interviews, Emotional Intelligence & Critical Thinking, Applied Grammar

Books and references

1.Butterfield, Jeff. Soft Skills for Everyone. New Delhi: Cengage Learning. 2010.

2.Chauhan, G.S. and Sangeeta Sharma. Soft Skills. New Delhi: Wiley. 2016.

3.Goleman, Daniel. Working with Emotional Intelligence. London: Banton Books. 1998.

4.Hall, Calvin S. et al. Theories of Personality. New Delhi: Wiley. rpt. 2011.

5.Holtz, Shel. Corporate Conversations. New Delhi: PHI. 2007.

6.Kumar, Sanajy and Pushp Lata. Communication Skills. New Delhi: OUP. 2011.

7.Lucas, Stephen E. The Art of Public Speaking. McGraw-Hill Book Co. International Edition, 11th Ed. 2014.

8.Penrose, John M., et al. Business Communication for Managers. New Delhi: Thomson South Western. 2007.

9.Sharma, R.C. and Krishna Mohan. Business Correspondence and Report Writing. New Delhi: TMH. 2016.

10.Sharma, Sangeeta and Binod Mishra. Communication Skills for Engineers and Scientists. New Delhi: PHI Learning. 2009, 6th Reprint 2015.

11.Thorpe, Edgar and Showick Thorpe. Winning at Interviews. Pearson Education. 2004.

12.Turk, Christopher. Effective Speaking. South Asia Division: Taylor & Francis. 1985.

Instructor bio

Prof. Binod Mishra

IIT Roorkee

Binod Mishra, a faculty in the Department of HSS, IIT Roorkee has an experience of teaching English at various levels. He has to his credit 20 books and more than hundred articles in different reputed journals and books. His MOOC course on Soft Skills has been received well by learners. He has delivered a good number of invited talks in various conferences and symposiums. Besides being a teacher and researcher, Dr. Mishra is also the Vice Chairman of Association for English Teachers of India, the largest body of English teachers. Prior to this, he had also been the two times Editor-in Chief of Indian Journal of English Studies, one of the oldest journals of English language and literature.

Course certificate

The course is free to enroll and learn from. But if you want a certificate, you have to register and write the proctored exam conducted by us in person at any of the designated exam centres.
The exam is optional for a fee of Rs 1000/- (Rupees one thousand only).
Date and Time of Exams: 24 October 2021 Morning session 9am to 12 noon; Afternoon Session 2pm to 5pm.
Registration url: Announcements will be made when the registration form is open for registrations.
The online registration form has to be filled and the certification exam fee needs to be paid. More details will be made available when the exam registration form is published. If there are any changes, it will be mentioned then.
Please check the form for more details on the cities where the exams will be held, the conditions you agree to when you fill the form etc.

CRITERIA TO GET A CERTIFICATE

Average assignment score = 25% of average of best 8 assignments out of the total 12 assignments given in the course.
Exam score = 75% of the proctored certification exam score out of 100

Final score = Average assignment score + Exam score

YOU WILL BE ELIGIBLE FOR A CERTIFICATE ONLY IF AVERAGE ASSIGNMENT SCORE >=10/25 AND EXAM SCORE >= 30/75. If one of the 2 criteria is not met, you will not get the certificate even if the Final score >= 40/100.

Certificate will have your name, photograph and the score in the final exam with the breakup.It will have the logos of NPTEL and IIT Roorkee.It will be e-verifiable at nptel.ac.in/noc.

Only the e-certificate will be made available. Hard copies will not be dispatched.

Once again, thanks for your interest in our online courses and certification. Happy learning.

- NPTEL team

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