top | item 20507506

A short soft skills course

65 points| rfreytag | 6 years ago |createcapsule.com

67 comments

order
[+] cwyers|6 years ago|reply
It costs $84 for an individual. I support their right to charge whatever they want for their product, but I had to click through about three pages to get to that info, so I though someone else here might want to know that up front.
[+] ghostbrainalpha|6 years ago|reply
This sentiment gets shared a lot. In cases where someone is shopping around for a specific product, it definitely makes sense to make the price as obvious as possible.

But in cases where the service needs to be explained and demand generated AFTER explanation in can be counter productive to lead with pricing.

[+] runxel|6 years ago|reply
Definitely a dark pattern.

Why should I want to buy a product/service when you are so bloody shady about the price...

[+] xyclos|6 years ago|reply
and it says: "Free for the first week.

$84 thereafter."

so, is it $84/week?

[+] DisruptiveDave|6 years ago|reply
> Working on yourself shouldn't feel like work

Yes, it should. It should be difficult, challenging, at times it should make you want to give up, confusing, even painful. It should take quite a while, too.

[+] vinceguidry|6 years ago|reply
I mean, if you want to believe this, I'm not going to try to stop you. Consider though that you may be identifying with a feeling rather than the results. Meaning you'll pursue less-effective methods because they'll give you that feeling over more-effective ones that don't.
[+] geoffreyhale|6 years ago|reply
Working should produce results. How it feels is incidental.
[+] dvtrn|6 years ago|reply
Personally I'm inclined to disagree that it should be difficult, but am also not fully expecting my own journey for self-improvement and a modicum of actualization to just present itself like a one-click order Amazon package on my front door either

(but wouldn't that be nice?)

I like the way American actor Denzel Washington put it: "Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship".

/slams $0.02 on the bar and walks off to read Thoreau :P

[+] pessimizer|6 years ago|reply
Measuring accomplishment in personal suffering is a religious idea. I prefer to measure accomplishment in tangible accomplishment.
[+] komali2|6 years ago|reply
If you're looking for alternatives, I recommend reading "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. Get the OG version (even if it comes with forwards or whatever), not the "for the age of the internet" or whatever version.

It sometimes uses outdated language but it is to date the best compilation of "how to interact with other humans effectively" advice that I've read, and I've read lots of these sorts of books.

Honestly, I think it should be required reading in highschool, if nothing else because of the huge focus on empathy would be very healthy in interpersonal communication in our country.

[+] hi41|6 years ago|reply
This is my personal experience. I read HTWFAIP when I was in 8th grade. As a young teenager I was a timid person and I placed huge importance on what other people felt about me. As an adult in 40s, I am still timid and never say no. I say yes to everything and I usually get assigned to shitty tasks. I wish I wasn't such a people-pleaser and I wish I had the guts to say no. I attribute my current professional breakdown to reading HTWFAIP which by its very title hopes to be a book through which you can influence others. I wish I did not care so much about what other people thought about me and I wasn't such a back-bone-less people pleaser. I hate "How to Win Friends and Influence People"
[+] jc3110|6 years ago|reply
Hi everyone,

WOW, thank you for all the feedback and signups! My name is Jasmine and I'm the creator of Capsule. To sign up free, just submit your name and email (no need to complete the PayPal screen), and I'll send you an activation link (check for [email protected]). I did NOT expect to get featured today, so thank you for bearing with the slight delay!

I originally wrote Capsule for myself and for my friends -- busy professionals who “didn’t have time for self-development” but were struggling with problems we all face, whether relationships, career uncertainty, stress or self-doubt. I'm also an independent introvert - the type to want to introspect as opposed to seek therapy. So, I set out to create a one-stop-research-shop. An avid reader, I quit my hedge fund gig to bring you only the research that I found compelling from a sea of content :) My hope is, if it can help me, maybe it can help others, too. Any and all comments appreciated and will help improve the product -- many thanks!

[+] funmi|6 years ago|reply
I just tried to visit the site on mobile Safari with adblockers[1] enabled, and all I see is a blue background with no content: https://ibb.co/z5cH5FC. Going to Chrome on iOS (where the adblockers don’t work) worked fine. Thought I’d share!

[1] On Safari, I have 1Blocker and AdGuard — General enabled.

[+] didymospl|6 years ago|reply
The course description certainly strikes a chord with me but there's no trial, no opinions on it outside their website, it looks like they've barely started(in late June this year), basically no way to find out the course quality whatsoever so I'm not going to buy a pig in a poke.

Maybe OP can elaborate on that submission?

[+] jc3110|6 years ago|reply
Thank you for the feedback! That makes a lot of sense, and we've included a free option based on your comment. Just input your name and email, and we'll add you to the course, no payment info needed. We're indeed a young company (incorp in March), but the research behind the course has been long in the making. All scientific sources (139 of them) are cited in-text so you know the exact attribution of each takeaway.
[+] filmgirlcw|6 years ago|reply
I’ll probably get downvoted in this crowd by saying this, but I attribute my soft skills and self-awareness (which aren’t directly linked, but I would argue that if you have good awareness of how you are perceived and an honest assessment of strength/weaknesses, that has a direct line to social and emotional intelligence) to psychotherapy.

(I’m also of the opinion that regardless of mental health status, every person can benefit from a good therapist. Note, I said good. A bad therapist can be worse than no therapy.)

A lot of soft skills really do come down to introspection — and while it’s certainly possible to get those insights outside of a psychologist or psychiatrists office (my psychiatrist also does psychotherapy, but it’s more common for the disciplines to be separate), having a third-party pose questions and stimulate discussions is something difficult to replicate by self-study alone.

[+] mattnewton|6 years ago|reply
I have never been in therapy so I can’t weigh in there, but I am commenting to say I hope you continue to feel free to talk about mental health services, which seem to often be unfairly stigmatized. I hope this community wouldn’t downvote that.
[+] RIMR|6 years ago|reply
$84 is really steep for a product I don't even get a sample of.

They really should offer the first lesson for free so people know what they're paying for.

I pride myself on my strong soft skills, so I know I won't be paying that kind of a price on these lessons just to see what they look like.

[+] jc3110|6 years ago|reply
Thanks for the feedback! We'll set up a free trial for anyone who includes name and email during signup (no need for PayPal). We are always looking for ways to make the content even more advanced, and would really value your feedback as someone who already has strong soft-skills.
[+] sct202|6 years ago|reply
I'm going just off the website, but this honestly feels like one of those personal development courses that your employer pays for and you go to and feel like it's a waste of time.
[+] waylandsmithers|6 years ago|reply
Am I the only one who abhors the term soft skills?

I have been trying to put my finger on what about it rubs me the wrong way so much but can't quite figure out why the phrase makes me so uncomfortable. Part of it is the implication that we're all socially inept computer nerds, part of it is the implication that technical skills are "hard"...

[+] ddrager|6 years ago|reply
This seems interesting, but without knowing what a course looks like, I won't sink $84 into it.

If the creator(s) are reading, I would suggest making the first chapter free. That would work better to get visitors to sign up & pay. For example, from what I can see there are 9 missions, so the first is free, pay to continue.

[+] jc3110|6 years ago|reply
Thanks so much for the feedback! We've changed it to the first week free, so you can see the entire course in that span if you'd like. Hope you like it!
[+] nick007|6 years ago|reply
DISCLAIMER - I am a customer.

I found Capsule very valuable. The content is 2nd to none, they boil down some huge concepts that span thousands of pages across multiple books/papers into dense and digestible bites of material. Very high bandwidth and efficient.

I see a lot of commentary about the price being high. I'm not sure whether they have the right price point or not, but what I would say as someone who considers myself pretty frugal, I would compare the value I got from Capsule to a series of books and probably therapists that would've cost hundreds or thousands of dollars (and many more hours).

[+] egorfine|6 years ago|reply
What is it like inside? Is it videos, content pages or some soft of interactive tutorials?
[+] granshaw|6 years ago|reply
How many weeks did you end up using Capsule for?
[+] proc0|6 years ago|reply
Soft skills really means learning the corporate protocol, which is basically top-down control, akin to military. Leadership means understanding and contributing to the hierarchical nature of companies. There's nothing wrong with this except when it comes to software companies that should be more creative yet they push these soft skills almost like military has code of conduct. In any software company, if everyone could code, they would, and then they would realize soft skills are just an indirect way to influence what people code without knowing how to.
[+] filmgirlcw|6 years ago|reply
I completely disagree with this assessment. Soft skills may be synonymous in some areas as “corporate protocol” or politics, but it’s really about effective communication — and that’s beneficial regardless of what you’re doing or what type of place you work in.

>In any software company, if everyone could code, they would, and then they would realize soft skills are just an indirect way to influence what people code without knowing how to.

This is completely untrue and is frankly, insulting. It’s not an either/or. You can know how to code or know how to architect a system or do design and also have soft skills. Moreover, the idea that non-coders can only have an indirect influence on what people code seems to be a fairy fundamental misunderstanding about how projects work.

Plenty of people can code and don’t — and plenty of people who don’t code don’t have any interest in doing it — still have major roles in software development. Look at Steve Jobs.

If anything, the soft skills are what allows a programmer or a program manager or PM or designer or architect to help express the case for any something is coded a certain way or why it isn’t.

Being able to explain and communicate design decisions — and to be able to talk through problems and blockers is incredibly important, not just to push or influence a decision, but to solve problems or come up with new innovations.

[+] cwyers|6 years ago|reply
Having been in the military, any civilian company is going to have a vastly different experience than the military. In the military, hierarchies are regimented (unsurprisingly, as regiment is a unit in the military). Corporate hierarchies are not as clear or as easy to navigate.
[+] superhuzza|6 years ago|reply
Demonstrably untrue, lots of software engineers end up in non-coding roles. Perhaps they want to make larger contributions, have more responsibilities, more money, whatever.
[+] motohagiography|6 years ago|reply
A bit confused about the point of a personal improvement program if you can't use it as a pretext to fire yourself after.

Or maybe that would be the best improvement program of all?

[+] goelsar1|6 years ago|reply
Thank you for being so quick to respond to user feedback - shows how dedicated you are to shipping a high quality product :)
[+] babblingfish|6 years ago|reply
It says the first week is free, but then it asks you to pay? How do we access the free first week without paying? @jc3110
[+] jc3110|6 years ago|reply
Hey @babblingfish! Thank you for the ask! All you do is submit your name and email -- you can skip the PayPal page for now :)