When we are young, we are told to study hard and score good marks in examinations so that we get admitted to good colleges thereby enabling us to get well-paid jobs. While in college, we work hard to hone our skills sets in various streams like Engineering, Medical, Accounting, or any other skills, so that we can get those plum jobs after we leave college.

While these skills are very important, many of us do not realize that there is an additional skill that is probably more important than all the technical skills!! The skill that helps us in shaping our career and life. And It is “Communication skills”.

Many think that communication skills is the ability to create good presentations or writing good reports. While this is undoubtedly true, communication is a far deeper concept. It is important to convey the information in a meaningful way that is understood by the other person.

To ensure this, the first requirement in being a good communicator is to be a good listener. “Listening” is not merely about verbal listening. It is a broader concept that implies that you understand what the other person is interested in, what he or she wants, and what he or she is trying to achieve. And this effort to understand has to be sincere. You have to listen with attention and concentration to what the other person is saying. Only when you understand what the other person wants can you respond in a way that is useful and relevant to them.

As Swami Vivekananda said, “You cannot talk philosophy to a starving man.”

Or, as the modern guru and the author of “The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People,” Stephen Covey, has said, “Seek first to understand; and then to be understood.”

But once you understand the other person, how do you communicate your message best?

The first skill you need, of course, is command of the language in which you are interacting with the other person. Both written and spoken language is important, and the best way to improve these is by reading a lot in the language. If you are going to communicate extensively in English, for instance, it helps to read a lot of classic English literature. Parents and teachers can facilitate this in schools and homes by not restricting students only to the prescribed textbooks used in school but encouraging them by buying interesting, age-appropriate books from a young age and asking children to read them. It is important to do this in the school-going years because it is only in these years that students have plenty of free time to develop these hobbies or habits, especially in summer vacations.

Writing is another skill that is needed in tandem with reading, as is public speaking. Both of these will fully develop only with practice, and so teachers must regularly hand out both writing assignments and make students speak on the subject of their written reports (i.e., present them) in class. In today’s interconnected, digital world, we often have to work with colleagues sitting in Europe or the US, and we may need to communicate with them through email, teleconferences, or even video conferences. So you need both good writing and presentation skills.

One of the important things to learn during writing and speaking is to differentiate between fact and opinion. Students should be asked to justify everything they write and say with verifiable references, such as news reports, text books, and the like, because only factual reports are credible. When you enter the workplace, you will find that your bosses check every claim you make in your reports carefully – and you have to justify what you have written.

Another thing you will learn while practicing writing is how to write a coherent article. What this means is that the entire written piece should have a central idea, and ideas should flow from one paragraph to another. Paragraphs themselves require careful structuring, so that each paragraph captures a single sub-idea concisely.

The same ideas apply to creating presentations. A presentation has to have a central theme running through it, and each slide or group of slides has to capture a coherent sub-idea.

You will also learn with practice how to write with grammatical, syntactical, and semantic accuracy. Grammar and syntax have to do with the correct form and structure of sentences. Semantics has to do with meaning – it is important to choose the correct words so that you can be precise in what you mean to say. And for this, a good vocabulary is needed, so that words are not repeated or improperly used in your writing or speech. And this is where reading widely, which was discussed earlier, comes in handy.

In the movie, “The Last Emperor,” the English tutor to the last Chinese boy Emperor explains why one must be precise in language:

“Because if one cannot say what he means, he cannot possibly mean what he says, and one who does not mean what he says can never be a gentleman.”

To most people, the word “creativity” is synonymous with art. People think of a creative painting or a creative musical or dance performance or a creative movie. But in truth, creativity is present in every aspect of human activity. For years, people travelled by horse-carts. And then, in 1712, Thomas Newcomen invented the steam engine, and this enabled people to travel farther and faster than they ever could. Or think even further back, to when our ancestors first discovered how to make fire. That was the creative spark that changed the future of humanity. Or think of the electric bulb an invention by Edison that profoundly changed the world. Each of these was a creative innovation.

We live in an age of rapid innovation and creativity. One just has to see the tech world to see the speed of innovation. In 1981, IBM launched their newest machine at the time, which had 640 Kilobytes of RAM. Today, we have smartphones (which are essentially computers) that routinely offer 64 GB RAM – that’s 100,000 times more RAM in 38 years, and we constantly need more memory. The largest supercomputers in the world today have RAM of the order of terabytes – that is a billion times more memory than the computer in 1981. And scientists want even more.

Innovation is a consequence of market economics, whereby companies constantly have to produce new products with better features to stay competitive. And therefore, to succeed in this global marketplace, it is important to develop creativity and the innovative spirit in yourself. How do you do this?

The first step in developing an innovative mindset is to unlearn many lessons that we internalize in India through our schooling system. Our school system emphasizes memorization and does not motivate students to ask questions. This must change. Only when you understand that the way that things are today is not the way they necessarily need to be in the future can you be truly creative and innovative.

It goes without saying that to create something new, you have to think differently. Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook out of a really simple idea – that people would like to share things about themselves on a public platform. While there obviously was the technology to be created for Facebook, what was really original and creative was the concept itself, which no one before him had thought of. So how does one see what others have not yet seen?

One way to make this happen is to try to look at a problem from multiple perspectives. This is harder than it appears, because often we are emotionally attached to one way of looking at a problem. For example, if the front of a house is painted red and the back is painted green, and if you only look at the house from the front, you will insist that it is red; whereas if you were to walk around and see the other side, you would realize it is green as well. One way to do this is to ask someone from a completely different field for an opinion on what you are looking at.

And this leads to an important realization about the creative process: it is fundamentally interdisciplinary. Steve Jobs makes this point in his famous convocation speech at Stanford in 2005, titled, “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish,” where he talks about how taking a calligraphy class in college that nobody would think had any practical value ended up in the Macintosh computer having beautiful fonts. Creativity, as Jobs explains it is about “connecting the dots.” Combining disciplines automatically brings with it the idea of multiple perspectives and working in diverse teams greatly helps in obtaining them.

There is an important distinction between what is called an invention and what is called an innovation. An invention is something new that someone has created. It may potentially be very useful, but at the point, that something is called an invention, it is only a proven technical concept at a lab scale. Innovation is the process of taking this invention and making a successful commercial product out of it. So one needs technical creativity to be inventive, but one needs a lot more than that to be innovative.

What are those other components? Making a commercially successful product involves a lot of skills other than technical skills – you have to engage with product design, marketing, and sales teams. In addition, as the product is being developed, you will encounter several challenges, both technical and non-technical. It is important to understand that for an innovation; ultimately it is the commercial value of the product that will determine its feasibility. So you need an ability to solve problems, both technical and non-technical. You will need to learn to prioritize the challenges to be solved – some are absolutely necessary, whereas others are good to have. Finally, you need to know how to work collaboratively in cross-functional teams (involving people from different disciplines). Practical innovations are impossible without cohesive teams.

To enable young people to be more creative, teachers have to develop these thinking patterns at a young age. Teachers and parents must encourage students to ask questions incessantly and drop their unquestioning respect for authority. One does not need to build the next Facebook or smartphone to become creative. Even daily challenges, such as how to conserve water usage in the home, can be given as projects to students to demonstrate their creativity in a hands-on way, particularly in a non-judgmental atmosphere. This helps students develop the habit of thinking differently. Once students develop these ways of thinking at the school stage, they are more likely to succeed in today’s highly competitive globalized world.

Our education teaches us how to make a living, i.e., how to make money. But we also need to know how to manage money. That may be more important than making money. History is full of examples of famous people who earned huge sums of money in their lifetimes only to die paupers. An example is the famous composer Mozart, who was a rich celebrity all his life, but died so poor at the age of 35 that he was buried in what was known as a pauper’s grave.

So it is important to save and invest your money properly. In today’s world, we are living longer and longer lives; but our productive life, where we can earn money, is limited by our health conditions.

How can we save money? The first thing is to save money when you do make it and not be extravagant in your expenses. For this, it is helpful to keep track of income and expenses by making what is known as a budget. The budget helps us realize where we might be wasting money on unnecessary things.

We are surrounded with choices. One could even say we have too many choices today. If you wanted to buy a car in the early 1990s, there were only three options: Fiat, Ambassador, and Maruti. Economic liberalization, which started in 1992, has brought market economics to India, and with market economics came choices. Now we have dozens of car models to choose from. Every manufacturer wants you to buy their product today. If you want a tablet; Apple, Samsung, HTC, Lenovo – everyone has a tablet for you. And they keep updating their products every six months. But do you need a new smartphone or a laptop or a tablet every six months, or even every two years? It is the job of the manufacturer to advertise their product so that they can sell it and make profits. But it is your job to understand what you really need and to understand how to spend your money.

So no, you don’t need a new smartphone every six months. And most people hardly use the full features of their smartphone, so you don’t need the latest and greatest. But in today’s world, you do need a smartphone! For example, you cannot book a cab without it; and numerous important chores like paying bills, shopping, banking, etc. can be completed with ease.

It is important to understand when you need to replace anything – your smartphone, your motorbike, your car, etc., because all of these have a life. And that means that you need to arrange for money to buy a replacement. In financial terms, if our smartphone has become worthless after 4 years, we say that the phone has depreciated in four years. So whenever we make a budget of our expenses and income, we must factor in the depreciation of the goods we own. That means that if we buy a car for 5 lakhs, and if we expect to drive it for 10 years before replacing it, then the depreciation cost, roughly speaking, is Rs. 50,000 every year.

Many other things have changed in India since the early 1990s. For one, we have moved very much into the digital space. Few of us carry much cash on us. We often use credit and debit cards to make purchases. There is an important distinction between the two. A credit card purchase is a loan and you need to pay interest on the purchase after a short grace period, within which you need to repay the loan. A debit card takes money directly from your bank account. Unfortunately, many people do not realize the dangers of using a credit card and often run up huge debts with it. When you have a credit card debt, the amount to be repaid keeps increasing due to compound interest, which can be very high – as much as 40% annually. If you have borrowed a huge amount on your credit card, you may be unable to repay the amount, which can eventually lead to delinquency and bankruptcy. If you do suffer a bankruptcy, it is a very serious matter, because you will never be able to get a loan from anyone in the future for anything, whether it is to buy a car, a house, or whatever. There are benefits too of using a credit card when you pay back the amount within the specified time frame in the form of rewards like cash back offers, coupons, etc. It is therefore, advised to use these different forms of plastic money judiciously.

We have even newer techniques for spending cash, such as online payment and apps such as PayTM, Google Pay, Phone Pe, and others. Some of these, like PayTM, require you to deposit the money in advance in their account so they can pay for your purchases. Other, like Google Pay, are directly linked to your bank account.

There are many options available today on how we can spend our money, but in the end it is our responsibility to spend our money wisely. Whatever we may wish to buy for our fancies, it should be remembered that sometimes we face sudden emergencies, such as a health problem or an accident that requires a large sum of money – and we must always have enough in our bank balance to be able to afford such unexpected expenses.

We are raised with the idea that all of us are Indian citizens from the time we are young. But, in recent decades, the realization that this segregation of humanity into distinct bins called nations does not hold very well today has been becoming clearer and clearer. This is because our actions in one country have consequences that are not limited to that country alone. They also affect the neighbours of that country. In many cases, our actions affect the entire planet. It is therefore important for us to start thinking of ourselves as global citizens.

One example of how we affect each other, wherever we live, is global warming. When we emit carbon dioxide, be it through automobile emissions or by increased consumption of electricity which occurs because of coal-based or natural gas-based power plants, we increase the total greenhouse gas present in the environment, and that contributes to raising the overall temperature of the planet, and not our country alone. This can have spectacular and drastic consequences if unchecked.

Another example that illustrates the interconnectedness of peoples is the contamination of our waterbodies by microplastics. Unchecked disposal of plastic waste into the sea from several highly populated Asian countries, has led to the formation of what is called the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch.” This is a huge area in the Pacific Ocean covering 1.6 million square kilometres, containing 80,000 metric tons of plastic. Much of this plastic is in the form of microplastics whichis not visible to the eye. Marine life such as fish, consume these microplastics, and they then come into the human food chain all over the world – not only in Asia.

We are also united by technology in the digital age in a way that our forefathers could not have imagined. A server fault in Facebook or Google headquarters today can mean that the entire world is unable to communicate with each other.

It is therefore important to understand that everything we do in our lives impacts the lives of others. In the context of the microplastics example, if you toss a used plastic bottle on the road, a part of it might end up in the stomach of a fish or even in the river water that someone in some other city may drink. As the poet John Donne (1572-1631 AD) famously said, “No man is an island.” Or, as the famous phrase from the Upanishads says,

“Vasudhaiva kutumbakam” or “The world is one family” - Maha Upanishad.

This shows how the Indian ancients had recognized this truth millennia ago – a truth we seem to have forgotten today.

How should this awareness affect our behaviour? If we can cause harm to others through our actions, it is equally possible for others to cause us harm through their actions, because we are so interconnected.

Once we understand this principle, a consistent ethical view of the world is automatically obtained. For instance, you do not discriminate against others on the basis of race, religion, caste, colour, sexual orientation, physical or mental disability, or nationality, because you would not like to be discriminated against in the same way. You do not pollute the environment for others, because you would not like the environment to be polluted for you – and so on. And because “others” are not only those who live next door, but those who might live a continent away, these are the rules for becoming a responsible global citizen.

This awareness that we are all global citizens must be fostered at an early age, and so parents and schools need to lead the way. For example, by campaigns asking students to eliminate the use of single-use plastic; to adopt water conservation methods in their own homes; to give away old products such as toys to those in need rather than toss them in the trash; and so on. Because, as Nehru once said,

“The only alternative to co-existence is co-destruction.”

One of the cornerstones of success in life is an old saying which everyone has doubtless heard: “Honesty is the best policy.” We as kids in India often learn this concept but abandon it later in life because we see people gaming the system everywhere – the (in) famous Indian “jugaad.” But that would be a mistake. When you move up in the real world, you realize that while taking shortcuts can get you ahead in the short run, it will fail you in the long run.

Why is this so? Because the need for honesty comes from a more fundamental, universal need: the need for fairness. Even small children understand when they are being unfairly treated, as any parent can vouch for: “But you let him eat chocolate – why not me?”

And so, honesty is valued because if you cannot be honest, you cannot be fair. Dishonesty is disliked because it is seen as unfair behaviour. If you cheat on paying taxes when I am paying mine, I see it as unfair. If you work hard at a job and are not rewarded, but I am lazy and get a promotion, you will see it, correctly, as unfair.

Fairness can be ensured if everyone learned to live by what is known as the Golden Rule:

“Do unto others as you would have others do unto you” - Matthew 7:12, The Bible.

Integrity has many facets. One of them is the act of taking responsibility. Have you ever seen a famous and successful sports captain or coach operate? When the team is successful, he always gives credit to the players other than himself. And when the team fails, he takes the responsibility. This builds trust within the team, because teammates will know that they will not be unfairly blamed when failures occur. And when there is trust within a team, people will automatically work harder to make the team succeed.

One of the first things that Indian students who go abroad notice, and are surprised by, is how Professors in Western Universities simply say, “I don’t know. Let me find out and get back to you,” when confronted by difficult questions from students. Why is this important? Because if the teacher can be honest about what he does not know, then you can be sure that he is also honest about what he knows. Your trust in his teaching immediately goes up a few notches.

Another key aspect of integrity is respect. Respect is not about agreeing with someone else – you will never agree 100% with someone else. But it is about respecting their identities, choices and their right to have opinions that differ from you. Just as you would not want to explain why you are a certain way, others also do not like to be interrogated about who and why they are – again, an application of the Golden Rule. As long as someone’s choices do not restrict your own choices on how to live or work, they have the right to be who they are. This applies to anything from race, colour, religion, gender, caste, sexual orientation, and food choices.

Integrity is something that needs to be fostered by parents and teachers at an early age, because it is at this age that habits like lying take root. How can parents and teachers do this? By encouraging kids to openly admit mistakes without punishing them for telling the truth. If children learn at an early age that it is not worth speaking the truth, they will learn to lie all their lives. On the other hand, if they are encouraged to speak the truth, they will see no need to lie.

Now, you may think, do I need to worry about these things if I am not playing a sport or being a teacher? Actually, the reality is that we are always living and working in teams. Your family is a team. Your office group is a team. Your community where you live is a team. And since you need to succeed within all those teams and be trusted by other team members, these are universal values. And especially, in a globalized world in the 21^st century, when team members cannot personally interact with each other, the perception of integrity is extremely important.