Classroom Techniques for Soft Skills Development of International Business Students

Abstract

Due to the highly competitive labor market environment, the relevance of students' and graduates' soft skills is becoming paramount. The skills, which include communication, emotional intelligence, creative thinking, and teamwork, are critically important for a successful career, particularly in management, because of growing demands for both professional and personal qualities. The aim of the study is to develop, describe and verify teaching techniques aimed at improving the communicative soft skills of future managers during English language classes. The research methods include the scientific literature review on the topic, experimental training, observation, interview, as well as qualitative methods of the result evaluation. The results of the study showed that the implementation of the techniques significantly enhances students' communicative skills, improves their ability to conduct business negotiations, make presentations and deliver speeches, resolve conflict situations, and interact in an international environment. Such interactive teaching methods, as brainstorming, discussions, debates, case studies, business and role-playing games, projects, the Jigsaw method, and creating mind maps in English, contributes to the development and improvement of communicative soft skills, as well as critical thinking and creativity among students. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the comprehensive approach to developing communicative soft skills through English language teaching methods and the integration of interactive teaching techniques into the university educational process starting from the first years at university. The practical significance of the work lies in the possibility of using the teaching techniques to train highly qualified specialists capable of effectively working in a business environment. The research results can be applied to improve professional training programs for managers in response to growing employers’ demands for graduates' soft skills.