At the beginning of 2021 I posted the following quote by Brene Brown on LinkedIn:
'We desperately need more leaders who are committed to courageous, wholehearted leadership and who are self-aware enough to lead from their hearts rather than unevolved leaders who lead from hurt and fear.'
In these unusual times, many people are feeling more isolated and vulnerable. Now, more than ever we need to invest in developing emotional intelligence in our leaders. This quote made me reflect on two leaders with who I have worked with in my career. If Emotional Intelligence had a spectrum, they are at different ends of the scale.
I was lucky enough to meet Helen early on in my career. Like many people at the start of their working life, I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do. I was working for a very large employer, who employed tens of thousands of staff. I had worked in a few different departments, performing mainly administrative roles. In such a large organisation it felt that I had no identity and the amount of encouragement and support I received from my line managers was minimal.
Then Helen joined the organisation, an inspirational and charismatic leader. Immediately, she took the time to get to know all the people in her department. Helen was open and was comfortable sharing her vulnerabilities.
Through her strong relational behaviours and intense work ethic, the performance of the department excelled.
Her investment in getting to know her people, together with her empathy enabled her to know what to say and do to support her team.
As a leader, Helen had high emotional intelligence (EQ).
Author Daniel Goleman argues emotional intelligence is far more important to the success of a good leader than that of intellectual intelligence (IQ).
He proposes there are five key components of emotional intelligence in the working environment. These are:
Self-awareness, which is the ability to understand your own emotions and drivers and how this may impact on those around you.
Self-regulation means managing any disruptive emotions and being able to be curious instead of judgmental.
Motivation, desire to achieve goals, and desire to work which is not money or status.
Empathy is the ability to understand the emotions of others and being skilled in supporting people through their own emotional reactions.
Social skills, which are the relational skills needed to find common ground and build rapport.
Goleman argues successful leaders give attention to and care for their people.
Helen saw potential in me and offered in her own time to coach and develop me. Through her support and coaching, I found my passion – People and Organisational Development. Over 25 years later I look back on this time with great affection and gratitude for helping me to develop the career I have now.
By contrast, a few years ago I was working with an organisation to develop the leadership skills of both the managers and Board executives.
One of the tools I used to support this development was something called The Emotional Intelligence & Social Competency Inventory.
The Emotional and Social Competency Inventory (ESCI) is a 360-degree survey designed to assess 12 competencies that differentiate outstanding from average performance at work. The ESCI measures the demonstration of individuals' behaviours through their perceptions and those of their raters.
Goleman suggests as leaders rise through the hierarchy of an organisation they give less attention to their people, are more likely to interrupt them, or are more likely to monopolise their conversations.
This is what has happened with one of the executives. He scored really low in the ESCI.
Together with his ratings, people had taken to time to provide feedback on what he could do to develop his EQ. There were two pieces of profound feedback.
He didn't listen. He worked with many functional Heads of Department, with specialist knowledge in their fields. However, despite their expertise, he would insist things were done the way he wanted them to be.
He showed little interest in other people. He was high on task behaviour, and low on relational behaviour.
Sadly, when presented with this feedback, it was dismissed. He didn't seize this opportunity to further develop his EQ & leadership skills. Over time, this negatively impacted the culture of the organisation. Which led to talented people leaving to work elsewhere.
In his book Leaders Eat Last, Simon Sinek comments:
'When a leader embraces their responsibility to care for people instead of caring for numbers, then people will follow, solve problems and see to it that the leader's vision comes to life the right way, a stable way, and not the expedient way.'
This pandemic could be the catalyst for all of us to develop our emotional intelligence. To help create better cultures and improve organisation performance. If we want to enable long-term success, we can't afford not to!
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