If you want to find a job or keep the one you have, you’d better learn how to brag.

At least that is what Peggy Klaus, the leading lady of bragging, branding and self-promotion is ready to teach the SRJC community on Nov. 1 in the Bertolini Student Activity Center.

Co-sponsored by the SRJC bookstore, Work Experience and Career Services Development, Klaus will teach a two-hour workshop titled “Mastering the Soft Skills Employers Want.” The interactive workshop is set up to learn Klaus’ special set of bragging skills and how and when to apply them in real life.

“This won’t be some boring power point presentation, people are going to work,” Work Experience faculty instructor Renee LoPilato said. “There’s going to be exercises, practicing the skills, talking with each other and bragging.”

In today’s competitive job market it is vital to understand the importance of setting one’s self apart from all the rest. Job seekers can no longer rely on just a resume to get by: it’s about marketing yourself to the company to get them to want to do business with you.

“I think that it’s important to learn these skills because they can be applied to so many different situations,” LoPilato said. “Not only can students take these skills with them into the workplace and after they transfer, but faculty can gain something from Klaus, too.”

Klaus is a world-renowned communication coach who has worked with Fortune 500 firms such as MasterCard, Chevron and the National Football League. She has also written advice columns in the New York Times, BusinessWeek and the Wall Street Journal. Her years of experience in this field and the demand for her leadership coaching is what attracted the Work Experience Department and Career Services to want Klaus to come speak.

Both departments have worked hard for the last two years to put on relevant events at the JC. Together they hope to provide skill-building workshops to aid students and others in succeeding in the workplace.

“I’m really interested in going to this workshop and learning how I can better interview for a job,” said SRJC student Emily Thompson. “Hopefully I can pick up some skills to help me be less shy around managers.”

The soft skills seminar will run from 3-5 p.m., and will conclude with a book signing where people can purchase Klaus’s book, “The Hard Truth about Soft Skills: Workplace Lessons Smart People Wish They’d Learned Sooner.”