There are some fields like sales and politics where being extroverted (or being able to fake it really well) are pretty much a requirement for success. I imagine that in the more collaborative creative fields, perhaps like movie director, being more outgoing and able to communicate verbally are probably very valuable. For solo work, I don’t think it matters that much – some great artists are notorious recluses. It may be that artists as a whole tend to one side of the scale or the other but you’ll probably find a lot of variation.

As in the previous great talent debates, I definitely agree that the “talent” part is harder to teach and is more of an inherent trait. You can teach color theory, rendering techniques, the “Golden Mean,” anatomy etc. but the end result isn’t necessarily a talented, creative artist, as opposed to technically proficient. You can be a great technical photographer for example, but knowing the one little prop that will transform the picture or knowing when to catch that one fleeting moment that really captures the personality of a subject are the kind of things that are IMO as much instinct as anything else. That’s not to say that years of practice can’t yield excellent results but there’s always something that separates the good from the not as good. There are plenty of examples where passion for something pushes people to expand, but in reality, everyone’s passion has its limits. I’m sure if I read that book on string theory one more time I’d learn more than I did the first or the second but…

P.S. the “ladies at work” are probably too limited a pool for developing interpersonal skills. An established flock of hens (or cocks) can be difficult to break into, especially if you tend to be introverted to begin with. Doing something like taking a class where no one knows each other to start with might be better IMO.
 

"Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance." - H. L. Mencken