As companies grow, soft skills like negotiation and influence without formal authority matter more than technical expertise. In matrix organizations, you often lead people who don't report to you, so the ability to persuade becomes your real power.
So consumer obsession is the starting point. In whatever department you work, if you are not very close and very keen to hear the consumer on a daily basis, that is a competitive disadvantage. When it comes to the competence profiles, today more than ever, the soft skills are, I think, very important. The more you scale the hierarchy in a company, More you need to be able to negotiate, to handle complex stakeholder portfolio, to influence without having the stars on the shoulders, because nowadays in big corporates, the functional matrix is very common. So you are not the direct leader of a person, but you are influencing his or her agenda.
