Tinyfool同学介绍过这个帖子
其中有一个答案很赞。英文如下：
Two skills are incredibly rare: (1) Doing what you say you will do (be reliable); (2) Keeping track of yourself
Doing what you tell people you will do
If you can teach your kids a useful skill that will always help them with their career: teach them to be reliable -- to do what they say they will do. (It is harder than it sounds.)
If you consistently do what you say you will do, you will almost certainly be someone people desire to have on their teams. It is so rare that when you work with someone who is reliable, you never ever want to work with anyone else. You will do anything to keep that person on your team.
Doing what you say you are going to do starts with setting the right expectations. If you tell someone you will get them the deliverable by Tuesday, you need to understand that it can actually be delivered by Tuesday. If you are good, you are probably factoring in slack in case someone in corporate slows you down or your child gets sick.
And so if your boss wants something done Monday and you think it cannot be done until Wednesday, you need to be up-front. Because once a date is agreed to, you're on the hook for accomplishing it.
On the less-skilled end of the job spectrum, many people cannot commit to showing up to work consistently and on time. There are many external factors in their life that make even these commitments hard to achieve.
So do everything you can to be reliable -- because there are very few people that one can rely on.
Keep track of yourself
The corollary to being reliable is to make sure you manage yourself.
If you can manage all your tasks and deliverables without reminders, you will be treated like the golden child.
If your boss or colleagues never need to remind you about a project, deliverable, an answer to an email, etc., they will be able to take a load off their mind and be allowed to focus on other areas. And they will appreciate not having to have the uncomfortable conversation with you ("where is that item that was due yesterday?").
This takes a lot of hard work and organization, but most people can do it. You don't need a PhD (or even a college degree) to be on top of everything. You just need to be organized and prioritize its importance. Of course, while most people CAN do this, most people DON'T do this -- so doing it will be a huge differentiator for you.
The underrated skills
If all you do is be reliable and keep track of yourself, you will be indispensable to any company.
我做了一下快速的简单翻译。如下：
两个非常普通的技能：1、靠谱，做到你承诺要做的。2、自我跟进。
做你承诺要做的
如果你要教给你的孩子们一个能够一直帮助他们职业生涯的有用技巧，那就告诉他们一定要靠谱，去过他们承诺要做的事情——这其实比听起来要困难得多。
如果你一直保持“完成你承诺的任务”这个习惯，你几乎是任何一个团队最渴望的成员了。你过你和一个靠谱的人合作过，你基本不会愿意和其他人共事了。你会尽力将这样的人留在你的团队里。
做你承诺要做的，让你在事务开始的时候，可以设定正确的期待值。如果你告诉他人，你会在周二交付任务，你需要懂得这意味着任务就必须能在周二交付。如果你擅长这个的话，你可能还需要考虑到意外情况：项目可能被其他人拖累或者你的孩子突然生病。
所以，如果你的老板认为某个事情应该周一完成，而你认为周三前不可能搞定，那你需要预先明说。因为一旦这个日子被确定，你就陷入了完成任务的陷阱。
在一些普通的工作领域，也有很多人没法按照预期准时完成工作，因为他们的生活中有很多外部因素导致他们很难实现工作承诺。
所以，尽一切可能让自己靠谱，因为很少有能真正做到这个。
自我跟进
要能够做到靠谱最重要的就是能够进行自我管理。
如果你不需要别人的提醒，就能够管理好自己的工作任务和工作交付，那么你就是工作上的金宝贝。
如果你的老板和同事，从来不需要提醒你某个项目、交付或者回复邮件等等，他们就不需要时刻保持高负载关注你的项目，而能够聚焦去处理其他工作。他们会非常高兴不需要和你进行不愉快的对话，比如：昨天需要提交的工作内容究竟在哪里？
这个确实需要花费心力去组织自己的工作，但是大多数人能能够做到。你不需要一个博士学位（甚至一个学士学位），你只需要去组织自己的工作并把重要的事务排在更高的优先级。当然，很多人能做到这个，也有很多人做不到——做到这个，会让自己完全不同。
这是被低估的技能
所以，如果你能够做到靠谱并且时刻跟进自己的工作，你对任何一个公司都是必不可少的。
