1

Success in any business is 85% ability to relate to

other people and attitude, and only 15% job

knowledge and technical skills. Dale Carnegie

The Complete Soft Skills Program

EMPLOY ABILITY

2011

EDITION

Contents

• Introduction to Hopstaken 2

• Soft Skills work! 3

• The Soft Skills Program 4

• Interviewing for the Right Skills 5

• Contact information 6

2 Introduction to Hopstaken

20 years of training experience, delivering exclusively to companies In 1991 Loek Hopstaken founded Hopstaken Bedrijfsadvies, a training & consultancy firm located in

Amsterdam, The Netherlands. At the time he was working as a Senior Quality Consultant for what was

soon to become ING Bank. As a seasoned project manager and specialist in 3 areas: personnel,

organization, and communication, his passion became sharing his knowledge & know-how. Over the

years he delivered his services to thousands of leaders, managers and specialists. In 2003 he was

invited to teach at international management schools. This awakened his interest in Vietnam. After

several business visits he decided to live and works in Ho Chi Minh City, as a business trainer,

consultant, coach and university teacher. Besides running training programs, he is a Guest Lecturer at

Vietnamese and foreign universities, delivers both public and in-company seminars, and regularly

appears as a jury member in the Key to Success TV-show on VTV1.

He retains his post as Guest Lecturer and Professor at Wittenborg University of Applied Sciences in

Apeldoorn (The Netherlands). In 2009 he was appointed by its Director as its Resident Representative

in Vietnam.

‘Professor Loek’ as his Vietnamese students often call him—is married to a Vietnamese lady. Since his

Vietnamese wedding he lives the Vietnamese life. This means: being integrated into Vietnamese family

life, formally and informally being introduced to Vietnamese business leaders, Vietnamese dinner

parties, and last-but-not-least, a stable circle of both Vietnamese and expat friends.

Pricing policy • A company team pays a group fee. This includes an intake meeting. A team consists of max. 20

participants.

• Returning customers receive a 10% discount, starting with the 3rd service.

• Payment must be made 50% before start of the service, and 50% upon completion.

• When the service is delivered outside Ho Chi Minh City, client pays the expenses.

• Hopstaken delivers his services through his Dutch, or an associated Vietnamese company.

• In this case, a red invoice can be provided. Note: all prices exclude VAT & PIT.

Through the years, Hopstaken has delivered services to:

In Vietnam: a.o. Type of business

• Tan Thuan IPC (seminars) Industrial development

• Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (presentation skills) MBA-IMC program

• RMIT (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, HCMC campus) (id.) BBA program

• PACE (public courses—HRM) Business training

• SPECTRA (seminars; in-company courses) Training & consultancy

• NIKE (performance management workshop) Shoes production

• CapitaLand (intercultural communication / business etiquette workshops) Real Estate

• Petronas Chemicals (team building workshop) Chemicals plant

• Royal Business School (seminars; public courses—HRM program) Business Training

• Vietnam Airlines (leadership workshop) Airline

• SONY Vietnam (public speaking seminars) Electronics

• Ministry of Labour, Invalids & Social Affairs (leadership seminars) Ministry (Hanoi)

• Hoanggia Media Group (Jury Member) Key to Success TV Show

• Unique Design (consultancy, coaching) Interior design

In The Netherlands, a.o.

• ING Bank (workshops, seminars) Financial services

• Philips (workshops) Electronics

• Heineken (workshops) Brewery

• Voerman International (workshops, consultancy, coaching, seminars)International

relocations

• Campagne (workshops, consultancy, coaching, seminars) Advertising, promotion

• Damen Shipyards (consultancy, coaching) Ship building & repair

• Dutch Delta & Wittenborg Universities (teaching, workshops) IBA—BBA, MBA

• Royal Van Zanten (workshops, consultancy, seminars) Pot plants, cut flowers

• WVL Staalbouwers (workshops) Steel construction

3

SOFT SKILLS WORK! Did you ever have a colleague whose contributions were disappointing, despite his

impressive CV, lots of diploma’s and certificates, and an impressive list of job titles

and projects? Who failed completely as a team member? Sadly, this recruitment

mistake is being made daily. When faced with such a situation, it’s often hard to grasp

why academic brilliance and years of on-the-job experience apparently offer no

guarantee for sound performance. Still, there is a reason: lack of soft skills.

What are soft skills? (sources: Whatis.com; Yahoo! answers)

Soft skills are personal attributes that enhance an individual’s interactions, job per-

formance and career prospects. Unlike hard skills, which are usually specific to a

certain type of task or activity, soft skills are broadly applicable. Soft skills are

sometimes broken down into

a. personal attributes, such as: optimism, responsibility, sense of humor, integrity,

time-management, self esteem, and motivation. They also include certain artistic and

ceremonial qualities, including knowing how to dress to the occasion, and combine col-

ors.

b. interpersonal abilities, such as: empathy, leadership, communication, good manners

and etiquette, sociability, working as a team member, use of proper language, the abil-

ity to interact with colleagues, intercultural skills, ethics, persuasion skills, customer

friendliness and service, utilizing tact, courtesy and civility and the ability to teach.

A practical grouping of soft skills: a. Problem Solving; b. Communication; c. Inter-

personal Skills; Teamwork. (William Sterling; see page 5.)

When we are young, our parents and school teachers take care of our basic soft

skills education. Yet, many people grow up just copying weak ly developed or even

lack of soft skills from their environment—often, un-civilized companions. Some simp-

ly seem to lack the talent. Others simply forget their basic education.

Tailor made or done with a team

To enhance your soft skills, you first needs to find out your strengths and weaknesses.

When this is done, a tailor made program is designed to add missing and improve

weakly developed soft skills. The Soft Skills Program can be done in a group or with a

team, but also individually with a personal trainer/coach.

If soft skills get you a job, then they will also help you

keep it.

When managers would improve their soft skills, they

would have to spend less time on personnel problems

and have more time to spend on their management du-

ties.

When entrepreneurs would improve their soft skills,

they would be more successful in business – and in

their personal life. In fact, soft skills form the lubricating oil of cooperation.

The Soft Skills Program

Hard skills will get an applicant an interview, but soft

skills will get that person a job. Ian Morrison

SOFTSOFTSOFTSOFT

SKILLSSKILLSSKILLSSKILLS

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THE SOFT SKILLS PROGRAM

Situation:

A person / team’s lack of soft skills

leads to tensions in the work

place, and/or loss of fine

employees and clients. Again and

again, managers and HR need to

repair the damage.

Solution:

The person / team follows a tailor made,

practical program to add missing and

improve under- developed soft skills. This

may take 1—8 program steps, depending on

the results of a soft skills scan. Each step

consists of one seminar and one workshop.

I. The Soft Skills Program

The objectives of the Soft Skills Program:

1. To train people to enhance their communicative abilities, so they can

2. function more effectively and efficiently in their organizations and teams.

The Soft Skills Program consists of a series of 4-hour seminars, each followed by a 1-day

workshop. The emphasis of the seminar is on theory, delivered interactively. The workshop

consists of exercises and practical assignments.

Note: each seminar-workshop may also be done in a 1:1 setting, with a personal trainer/coach.

The 14 Soft Skills most in demand:

• Personal Communication Skills

• Personal Ethics & Integrity Skills

• Empathic Skills

• Problem Solving Skills

• Team Communication Skills

• Intercultural Communication Skills

• Commercial Communication Skills

• Management & Leadership Skills

• Persuasion Skills

• Presentation Skills

• Coaching Skills

• Skills for Dealing With Difficult People

• Dispute Resolution Skills

• Time Management Skills

• Hospitality Skills

II The Soft Skills Train-the-Trainer Program

The objective of the Soft Skills Train-the-Trainer Program:

To train in-house, Vietnamese trainers so they are able to run the Soft Skills Program in Viet-

namese. The trainers participate in a special 5 day program in which they learn both the the-

ory and practice of running a Soft Skills Training Program.

The Soft Skills Program addresses one skill at a time, during

a half day seminar plus a full day workshop.

These are delivered in-company to groups of 4-20 participants.

Anyone who feels the need to improve her/his soft skills is welcome.

Contact loek@hopstaken.com for information & booking.

THE SCOPE OF SOFT SKILLS

IN PROFESSIONAL RELATIONS

LEADERSHIP

MANAGEMENT

RELATING CULTURALLY

RELATING WITH OTHERS

COMMUNICATION

(Source: ‘Social Domain’

Leise, Beyerlein, Apple)

5

In ‘Interviewing for the Right Skills’, William A. Sterling gives tips for pre-

paring a job interview, and for selecting new employees (on www.apwa.net):

“So how do you prepare your interview for a new employee or prepare for that exciting

new position? Hard skills got you the interview; soft skills will win (or lose) the job. Some

examples of questions you or the organization might prepare for include:

All of the above questions are geared towards what I call soft skills. Yet, you normally

don’t put them on your resumé. Another thing you should notice is that the questions are

open ended, requiring the candidate to give answers which may reveal a soft skills abil-

ity. These types of questions require a story in response.

You may not even be prepared to answer these types of questions at the interview; but

you should. It isn’t your purpose to sit there and hope the right questions will be asked.

Remember, the interviewer is looking for your personal accounts, not the ‘textbook’

answer”.

Tool: How to determine a candidate’s level of soft

skills during a selection interview

Problem Solving

• What are the critical factors you look for in evaluating the work of others? How did

you develop these concepts and how, specifically, do you use them?

• Describe a situation in which you found yourself to be very good at analyzing a

problem and deciding on a course of action.

• Describe a situation in which you had to solve a problem without having all the in-

formation you needed. What did you do and what happened?

Communications

• Tell me about a time when you made a serious mistake. What happened?

• What has been your experience in dealing with the poor performance of subordi-

nates?

• What types of experiences have you had dealing with irate citizens?

Teamwork

• Describe the types of teams you have worked in and tell me what worked well and

what did not.

• Give me an example of a situation in which you managed or led a team and were

able to create a high-morale, high-productive work group.

• Tell me about a time when you had difficulty getting others to work together. How

did you handle?

Interpersonal Skills

• Describe how you developed relationships with others when you were new on your

current job.

• Describe a time when you had problems with a supervisor and had to communicate

your unhappy feelings or difficult disagreements. Tell me what you did. What hap-

pened?

• When you are dealing with co-workers or citizens, what really tries your patience

and how do you deal with that?

“The best news of all is that soft skills can be developed

and honed on an on-going basis through good training,

insightful reading, observation and of course, practise,

practise, practise.” Impact Factory

6

Do you want to know more about the

content of my services, and the possibility

of training and/or consultancy packages?

Feel free to contact me:

email loek@hopstaken.com

skype id mrloek

Hopstaken International

Trainer/Consultant:

Prof. A.A.M. (Loek) Hopstaken

62/44 Duong So 6, Phuong 5, Go Vap District,

Ho Chi Minh City

Mobile: 090 888 9450

Assistant: Ms. Vo Ngoc Lien Huong

Mobile: 090 888 9451

Email: loek@hopstaken.com.

Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/loekhopstaken

After an 18 year career in Dutch banking

(HRM, PR, TQM) and a 15 year career in

training and education, Loek Hopstaken

works in Vietnam as a business trainer,

consultant, coach and teacher.

His specializations include:

• personnel issues (HRM)

• organizational development

• communication.

Loek is familiar with many types of

companies and organizations. He is a

Professor and Guest Lecturer at Dutch

and Vietnamese business schools, and a

regular Jury Member of the VTV1 ‘Key to

Success’ business game TV show.

’Professor Loek’ lives with his family in Ho

Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Twice a year he

returns to The Netherlands, for busininess,

and to see family & friends.