New research indicates that high-paying, skilled jobs (e.g., managers and consultants) increasingly demand better interpersonal skills, which are typically sharper in women. David Deming, a Harvard economics professor and author of the study, terms STEM and computer science “high cognitive skills,” which he says are still highly valued.
However, he sees social skills as an important complement to tech-intensive work because human interaction can’t be automated or replicated. Not surprisingly, jobs that Deming (by way of the Department of Labor) classifies as “routine” – e.g., assembly-line and manufacturing jobs – have greatly declined in the U.S. in recent decades due to automation and globalization.
Moving up the ladder, the demand for “non-routine analytical” jobs like computer programming grew concurrently, at least through the 1990s. With the onset of the Millennium, the growth in such high-wage technical jobs slowed, seemingly in favor of work requiring a higher level of social skills – findings corroborated by some of Deming’s colleagues.
The upshot: occupations calling for both cognitive and interpersonal skills have done well in the past 15 years. Think doctors, dentists, consultants; even lawyers and physical therapists, which don’t require math, have done comparatively well.
Professions that call for math but not much in the way of social skills – e.g., actuaries or billing clerks – have not done as well. According to Deming, the real winners in this dual-capability job market are women, who have it all over their male counterparts when it comes to interpersonal skills.