Discover 7 opportunities in skills

The following article first appeared in the INOMICS Handbook 2024.Download the INOMICS Handbook“The master-economist must possess a rare combination of gifts. He must reach a high standard in several different directions and must combine talents not often found together. He must be mathematician, historian, statesman, philosopher…He must study the present in the light of the past for the purposes of the future. No part of man's nature or his institutions must lie entirely outside his regard. He must be purposeful and disinterested in a simultaneous mood; as aloof and incorruptible as an artist, yet sometimes as near the earth as a politician.”– John Maynard Keynes

Having helped so many economists take their next career step, we at INOMICS know full well how rewarding working in economics can be. When you find that solution you've been looking for, or contribute some research that actually seems to get read and make a difference, it can be the best feeling in the world. But this won't happen unless you work on yourself and the skills that are essential for becoming a successful economist in general.

Everyone knows about the hard skills you need to be able to succeed in economics or in academia in general: excellent writing and proofreading skills, the ability to extract information from what are often dense scientific texts, and being able to evaluate and analyse data effectively, among other things. But they aren’t the only skills you need to have. There are, of course, the dreaded soft skills – a slippery term that can mean anything from being able to clearly communicate your ideas to another human being to more abstract concepts like emotional intelligence. But what are the most important soft skills to have, and how can you develop the ones that need some more work?