So what does it take to increase your emotional intelligence? Well in EQ-I 2.0 each of the five major components are broken up into sub-categories. By understanding what the sub components are and your scores on them you can ultimately pick one or two that you want to work on and increase. As you bring self awareness to these areas you can effectively enhance your emotional intelligence in those areas. They are:

Self-perception:

• Self-regard - confidence
• Self-actualization - continuous learning and growing
• Emotional Self-Awareness - understanding your emotions

Self-expression:

• Emotional expression - saying how you feel
• Assertiveness - standing up for yourself effectively
• Independence - standing on your own two feet

Interpersonal:

• Interpersonal relationships - developing and maintaining good relationships
• Empathy - recognizing and appreciating how others feel
• Social responsibility - contributing to society

Decision Making:

Problem solving - effectively managing emotions when solving problems

Reality testing - seeing things as they are

Impulse control - managing or delaying impulses

Stress Management:

Flexibility - adapting to change effectively
Stress tolerance - successfully coping with stressful situations

Optimism - maintaining a positive attitude

If you are looking to understand your emotional intelligence quotient reach out to me and get an assessment and interpretation of the assessment done. It could be a great tool to enhance your leadership skills.

I coached a group of federal leaders last week on Emotional Intelligence. They were high functioning and rated fairly high on their emotional intelligence assessment. Even with those high scores we had a very rich discussion on how they could continue to hone their emotional intelligence skills to enhance their leadership capacity. Here are a few key areas of focus that came out of that discussion:

• There is a need to relate to each person differently - each employee, peer, and/or supervisor is different. As a result there is a need to understand the motivations, best ways to communicate with, and how to resolve conflict with each person differently. Just as you would relate to each person in your family based upon their interests and needs you need to do the same thing at the workplace.
• Listen to other people so that they feel understood - if people don't feel understood then they don't feel valued. Repeat back to others what you heard them say, take a 10 second pause to really hear what they are saying before responding to them, or ask questions to probe more. All of these techniques are good ways to enhance your listening skills.
• Interact directly with all of your employees - even if you have a lot of employees how can you get in front of all of them? Some of my clients managed many different employees at multiple locations. While they had a lot of interaction with the employees they were co-located with they realized that they needed to go travel to the other locations and hold town halls with the employees so that they could really see the leader in person, understand their vision, and express their feedback directly to the boss.

How are you seeing emotional intelligence play out practically in your organization? In your leadership skills? With the people you interact with?

So why does emotional intelligence really matter? Well in practice it is how you are able to emotionally connect to yourself and to others. Some people learn when they are young to swallow their emotions and/or to lash out at others in anger. While we may learn in a work setting to control these emotions better than in our personal lives, those reactions may come out when we are in stressful situations in an organization.

While it is natural to have emotions the more that we are able to manage the ups and downs of our emotions (through stress management techniques) and/or by understanding our emotions and expressing them in a healthy way (e.g. - open dialogue, crucial conversations, transparency in finding a win-win solution to problems) the better off we are going to be in building strong healthy interpersonal relationships and in making wise decisions even when we are leading with our emotions.

What stress management techniques do you use to manage your emotions? Statistics say getting up every 90 minutes in a work place is good for productivity and efficiency. Do you take walks, listen to music, chat with a coworker? What works for you to manage your emotional state? What could you do to help you in expressing your emotions better - take a communications or conflict resolution class?

Each emotional intelligence tool is different, but as a practitioner of the Emotional Intelligence tool EQ-i 2.0 I am partial to their methodology. Within EQ-i 2.0 there are five different categories or components that make up your emotional intelligence quotient:

• Self-perception - understanding your emotions
• Self-expression - expressing your emotions
• Interpersonal - developing and maintaining relationships
• Decision-making - using emotions to make better decisions
• Stress-management - coping with challenges
  

The higher the scores on each of these components (which have sub-categories which I will cover in my next post) the better that you can be as a leader. Ever been around a leader who blew up constantly when things went wrong (e.g. - were not able to manage stress) or who was really controlling or dominant (e.g. - was not great at developing interpersonal relationships)? Well in both of those scenarios their emotional intelligence in those areas were perhaps lower than others and could be developed in order to enhance their success and ability to lead a team. What of the five areas above are you strongest at? Which area could you use some development?

Emotional intelligence is defined as the social and emotional skills we have personally and in our interpersonal relationships. It is the ability we have to be aware of our emotions, regulate them, and interact with other people in a way that is enhancing of the relationship.  Emotional intelligence is a learnable skill and often develops with age. It is also a key differentiator for success for leaders. Statistics show that leaders with higher emotional intelligence are more successful in their work than those who have lower scores. There is also evidence that while IQ is often a key indicator for getting into a role it is the emotional intelligence which then translate into further growth in a role.

So as a leader how able are you to understand how you are feeling, regulate strong emotions, and/or relate to others in your organization? If there are areas for improvement it can be critical to your success to begin to practice one or two of these behaviors.

Do you have to hire people in your organization? Are you hiring people and then realizing that they might not be the right fit? Are you going through a swinging door of employees only be to exhausted constantly trying to bring on the next replacement?

Hiring is a tough business. Bringing on the right people can make or break your team and your organization. Without the right leaders, team members, and employees your organization can be slow, unproductive, and inefficient. It is imperative to hire well so that you can make your organization function as effectively as possible. So makes a person the right one for your team? Here are a few guidelines:

• Competence - make sure the person that you bring on has the right skills, background, and experience to be able to do the job right away. If you are hiring for a leadership position make sure that they have the experience already doing the work that you are asking them to do and/or the appropriate skills to learn the right competencies quickly.
• Integrity - the right person will have a strong character, integrity, and do the right thing even when the going gets tough. There will be ups and downs in any job and/or leadership role and they must have the moral aptitude to perform well even through the valleys.
• Fit - the right person fits into the culture of the organization as well as the pay scale that the organization is willing to pay. There is a congruence between the organization's long term goals and the growth desires of the individual.
• Perseverance - the right person has the perseverance and resilience to make it through when the going gets tough. If they are committed, focused, and disciplined they will continue through as any issues arise and work through it with open communications, transparency, and good conflict resolution skills.

When hiring take your time (if at all possible) to ensure that you are getting the right person in the door. If you hire someone and realize ultimately that they do not fit the needs of your team or organization it is better to make a decision to let them go quickly. I do really stand behind the old adage of "Hire slow, fire fast." At the end of the day the efficiency and effectiveness of your organization relies on the quality of people that you have. Make sure you take the time to hire the best possible team that you can.