Identifying and Measuring Soft Skills for Cross-Sectoral Youth Development 
Laura Lippman
YouthPower Action 
Organization: FHI 360, Implementation IDIQ holder 

Evidence is abundant that soft skills (or personal qualities, competencies, or attributes) help youth to succeed across multiple areas of their lives. As part of USAID’s YouthPower mechanism, this research contributes to the field by identifying soft skills that lead to positive outcomes across the fields of workforce success, violence prevention, and sexual and reproductive health. We identify a key set of cross-sectoral soft skills that enjoy strong support across all three youth outcome areas. Come learn which skills should be included in every youth development program. The ability to measure these soft skills across sectors is key for programs seeking to build these skills among youth. This research effort has created and analyzed an inventory of tools that measure youth soft skills in order to help practitioners navigate the diverse landscape of tools and select appropriate tools for assessing the development of youths' soft skills within a particular program.