Soft Skills as Predictors of Success in Software Engineering Through Analysis of Confidence, Adaptability and Time Management

While successful software engineering students must demonstrate robust technical skills, the ability to acquire and master soft skills is just as crucial to their long-term professional success. These abilities are essential as they compliment technical expertise. Currently, research on soft skills primarily focuses on areas such as communication, teamwork and leadership. However, there is limited research exploring how confidence, adaptability and time management correlate with academic performance and contribute to building better prepared students for the job market. Time management, adaptation and building confidence are crucial non-technical abilities that allow software engineering students to succeed in a holistic way in academia and in their careers. In addition, the belief of a student in their own abilities to accomplish tasks and understand the concepts or modules learning outcomes presented to them forms the foundation of their growth. This study investigated whether soft skills such as confidence, adaptation and time management can be a predictor of success for software engineering students. The analysis of student self-reported data identified four principal clusters: high achievers (46.4%), mid-high performers (33.3%), mid-performers (13%) and developing performers (7.2%). Performance indicators suggest high reliability in grade prediction with an R2 value of 0.837 indicating that approximately 83.7% of the variance in student grades can be explained by the model results. Furthermore, an RMSE of 3.63 indicates that predictions deviate by less than 4 points on a 100 point scale. A standard deviation of RMSE (0.98) suggests consistent prediction accuracy across different student data. This study shows that software engineering curricula should also focus on equipping students with not only cutting edge technological tools and technical skills but also the most effective approaches to education by incorporating these soft skills.