A Preliminary Analysis of the Effects of Perceived Soft Skills on the Leadership Styles of College Students Abstract Soft skills are important to leadership and leadership styles; however, there are limited studies on how perceived soft skills affect the leadership styles of college students. Therefore, the study assessed the effects of perceived soft skills on the leadership styles of college students. The data were collected from a purposive sample of college students in a leadership training program and analyzed using descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis. The results show that the most dominant leadership styles were, telling, selling, and delegating. Regarding the selected soft skills vis-à-vis what participants would do in scenarios, there were four high combined “most likely” and “likely” responses, 70% or above for communication: particularly, for active listening, conflict resolution, writing a letter, and public speaking. For problem-solving, all five combined “most likely” and “likely” responses, were high, above 70% for creative skills, research and consult, consensus solutions, decision-making skills, and critical thinking skills. For work ethic, there were four high combined “most likely” and “likely” responses, above 60% for correcting an oversight, doting “is” and crossing “ts”, doing a task methodically, and completing a task on time. Additionally, the results of the multiple regression showed that the problem-solving soft skills, overall, dominated the composite leadership style. Therefore, problem-solving appears to be a critical soft skill that affects leadership styles. Keywords: College Students, Leadership, Leadership Styles, Soft skills