Daniel Goleman has defined Emotional Intelligence (EI) as ‘the capacity for recognizing our own feelings and those of others, for motivating ourselves, and for managing emotions well in ourselves and in our relationships’. That sounds great – but what does it actually mean?
If you imagine IQ as representing ‘the tip of the iceberg’, EI is often described as the huge part below the waterline. Whilst having a high IQ may be helpful in your career, there is more to being a successful, effective and valued leader than this alone. Research has shown intellectual intelligence to predict merely 20% of leadership success. The remaining 80% includes a large number of people-focused abilities. In other words, getting on with people (staff, colleagues, clients and other stakeholders) is what really matters.
Developing your emotional intelligence will lead to sustainable behaviour changes that will impact on improving the ways in which you manage yourself and your relationships with others. However, this takes time and isn’t something that can happen overnight. The four domains below break emotional intelligence up into its key components to help explain: how you can improve your relationships and communication skills; deal with change more effectively; juggle multiple demands without losing focus; generate an atmosphere of friendly collegiality and be a model of respect, helpfulness and cooperation.
The Domains of Emotional Intelligence
What is an emotionally intelligent person like?
• Resilient, adaptive and creative in response to setbacks and obstacles
• Able to manage themselves with confidence, motivated to work towards goals such as career development and takes pride in accomplishments
• Effective interpersonally, co-operative and team-focused, skilled at negotiating disagreements by listening and exhibiting good oral communication
• Effective and participative in the organisation, they want to make a contribution and often show leadership potential
• Emotionally Competent – an emotional competence is a learned capability, based on emotional intelligence, that results in outstanding performance at work
Research has shown a number of benefits of applying emotional intelligence in the workplace and how it is related to increased leadership performance and organisational productivity.
Bottom Line Benefits
• Sales agents selected on the basis of EI outperform those selected using traditional methods (at L’Oreal)
• Managers trained in EI were shown to have less staff turnover (less than half in year 1. American Express)
• Financial advisors trained in emotional competence were shown to be 20% more successful than colleagues (Goleman)
• 90% of failure in leaders of Fortune 500 companies attributed to lack of inter-personal skills (Stanford University)
• Research shows significant relationships between EI and leadership effectiveness across a range of emotional competences
Recently, as part of a large project with a leading organisation in the commercial property sector (MEPC), we designed and facilitated a workshop on Communication, Adaptation and Emotional Intelligence to help make the team even more effective and add to their success. The quote below outlines some feedback from the Managing Director (MEPC Birchwood Park, Warrington) about working with us:
“Our relationship with Impact Consulting Psychologists goes back to 2011 and has continued on a regular basis since that time. In 2013 our Birchwood estate will generate the strongest overall returns that have been achieved over the last 7 years. The overall returns are around 30-40% higher than most of our competitors’. We consider that these returns have been driven by multiple factors, a significant one being a highly effective and focussed team. This has been hugely influenced by the work carried out by Impact Consulting in initially diagnosing the changes that were needed as well as implementing a structured and targeted management development and customer focussed culture change programme. I will gladly recommend them to growing businesses.”