No one wants to be seen as pushy at work — but if you’re looking to get ahead, it pays to be persistent.
When asked what soft skill has helped them most in their career, 32% of people said “persistence,” according to the latest reading of an ongoing query by Comparably. The next most popular response was “likability” (26%), followed by “humility” and “logic” (tied at 15%). The least popular response overall was empathy (12%).
More than 5,000 people across the tech industry responded to the query.
— Men vs. women: The most marked difference in the responses of men and women was that women chose “empathy” much more than men (14% women vs. 9% men). Men, on the other hand, chose “logic” more than women (17% men vs. 13% women).
— By ethnicity: People across all ethnicities ranked these skills in the same order; however, 23% of African Americans chose “humility,” making it close behind “persistence” at 29% and “likability” at 27%. Humility, on average, was chosen by 15% of people.
African Americans
- By age: The importance of persistence was shown to increase with age: for workers aged 18 to 25, the percentage of people who chose persistence was 28%; for workers aged 51 to 55, the percentage of people who chose persistence was 39%.18 to 25
51 to 55
The data above is as of Feb. 6.
