Why soft skills are important for a programmer?

#explainlikeimfive #programmers #hiring

I am curious, why soft skills are so much demanded today on software engineering job market. Aren't programmers engineers?
If they must develop soft skills, why do we need managers and recruiters? They seem to be useless, having soft skills only.
Then they should develop hard skills too, learn at least one programming language (so they would be any much precise in their choices).
Please, explain me, why things are as they are?

Top comments (4)

gokayburuc.dev • Jan 15

Soft skills are essential for every profession You can be a very good engineer, you can be a very good programmer, but if you cannot manage to produce a product as a team, everything you do means zero.

You may be talented in computer science and want to work alone, but at the end of the day, everything you do is for and with people.The computer is just the tool you use to do this.The aim is to make everyone's life, especially your own, more livable and more valuable.This is where human communication skills come into play.

Chris Enitan • Mar 6

I was just thinking about these about a week ago... I think over time you'd find that experience and platform knowledge is key to most employers, thats because writing code can be done by anyone who tries but making good architecture needs a team and team players that know how to excel together. So on that note, here is my list:

Communication is key and knowing when and how to, matters.
You've got to be patient with non-technical people and be good at walking people through things that may seem obvious to you.
Good recall memory. You need to be able to hold lots of context in mind and draw up relations mentally. (Its the reason AI went the reasoning route)
Be curious and attentive, you'll get more done while away from the screen if you can coast ideas casually.

These are all things I have noticed and had to learn myself sometimes the hard way but certainly always beneficial.

hypervanse • Jan 26

Because programmers are soft? Mathematical computational theoretical physics is hard? But really, what are soft skills! Are programmers soft because they deal with soft skills? Meanwhile, math and theoretical physics are like the gym for the brain! But wait, what even are soft skills?