You guys really exaggerate how much people lack social skills in our field. Most people have perfectly good social skills (at least those I'm friends with). Someone that exceeds you in technical skills is gonna snag that shiny internship away from you AND have the social skills to boot.
I guess I'm being unfair when I say that most software developers lack social skills, it's rare for me to run into another dev who I can't hold a decent conversation with (it's rare for me to run into another dev at all to be honest). It's more that most devs are usually bad at workplace communication with non-technical people.
Besides that, most software developers just aren't that great. By definition half of them are below average in their ability, so if you're an average programmer with good business communication skills you're ahead of the curve by a good margin.
At the end of the day, the best way to get an internship is to know the right people. My brother went to university with the lead developer of the company I got my internship at, it wasn't the only reason I got the job, but it was definitely a big contributing factor. My B- GPA definitely wasn't why I got the job, and I had literally zero experience with Ruby on Rails or JS at the time either.
Upon saying that, my experience doesn't necessarily map to everyone else. At the risk of sounding arrogant: I'm a very talented, although not necessarily motivated, programmer. I managed to get my degree without attending more than a week of lectures each semester, while at the same time feeding a pretty heavy drinking problem.
Building on this, I think good technical skills will definitely help get you in the door but won't get you that far up the ladder if your ambitions are management/executive track. And that's not for everybody, which is why larger companies have built individual contributor tracks.
Social skills in a career context are not just getting along well in the office and being able to make small talk in the snack room. It's about creating a strong and deep network, and as an engineer, being able to interface effectively with business and other stakeholders on a social level. It's also about seeking out, recruiting, and fostering new talent, moreso at growing companies. I work at a unicorn tech company and very few engineers meet these criteria.
