The POWER of Emotional Intelligence
Posted: Monday, January 11, 2010
by The Exhorter
The Exhortation Life & Business Coaching Services
Currently one of the hottest buzzwords in the corporate world, Emotional Intelligence, also called EI, and often measured as an Emotional Intelligence Quotient or EQ, describes the ability, capacity, or skill required to perceive, assess, and manage the emotions of one's self, of others, and of groups. Basically, it is the ability to steer others towards an agreeable direction in the midst of high emotions, and the leading research on the concept originated with Peter Salovey and John "Jack" Mayer in the late 1980s.
1. The ability to identify and name one's emotional states and to understand the link between emotions, thought and action
2. The capacity to manage one's emotional states — to control emotions or to shift undesirable emotional states to more adequate ones
3. The ability to enter into emotional states (at will) associated with a drive to achieve and be successful
4. The capacity to read, be sensitive to, and influence other people's emotions
5. The ability to enter and sustain satisfactory interpersonal relationships
Besides the fact that recent EI researches claims 85 to 95% of the difference between a "good leader" and an "excellent leader" is due to emotional intelligence, and that some major business corporations claim to have saved millions of dollars by providing EI training to their leaders, the main reason for us to enhance our emotional quotient is because we deal with people everyday, amidst numerous daunting factors that affects both our emotions, and the emotions of those we are dealing with.
In addition, the amygdala, which is part of the human brain that forms and stores memories associated with emotional events, receives information before the neo-cortex, which is another part of the human brain that is involved in higher functions such as sensory perception, generation of motor commands, spatial reasoning, conscious thought, and language.
In other words, information or situations hit the emotional part of the brain first, before hitting the thinking part. And since the amygdala, which is the emotional part, is unaware whether an information or situation is real or simply perceived, it presumes a threat. This causes it to release cortisones into the blood stream, thus stirring our protective reflexes within 0.08 milliseconds, to produce emotional responses that could in turn ignite the amygdala of others around us.
When in this state, people are referred to as being emotionally hijacked, and the chemicals released by the amygdala into the bloodstream during this presumed threat could take anywhere between 18 minutes and 4 hours to clear! During this time, sadly, the neo-cortex, where our IQ resides, shuts down, eliminating the 4 to 8 thinking options and numerous corresponding variables that is usually available for us to intelligently and calmly cope with a real or perceived threat.
In order to avoid being emotionally hijacked, the symptoms to be aware of include increasing heart rate, heavy breathing, increasing reflexes, increasing tone of voice, widening eyes, stomach cramps, trembling, and sweaty hands. Suggested ways to avoid being hijacked are:
- Listen attentively to the information being conveyed, thus soothing the current emotional need of the other party, which is to be listened to.
- Label by paraphrasing and asking non-triggering questions in order to identify the unmet emotional need.
- Look for solutions by working with the other party to bridge the differences.
Listening, which is the most critical requirement of being emotionally intelligent, is the act of attentively gathering information non-judgmentally, and without inwardly preparing a response to the information while it is been conveyed. A true listener, according to experts, withholds his or her response for a minimum of 4 to 6 seconds in order to allow the brain process the offered information - even longer when information is being communicated through email or other impersonal medium that are mostly the means of communication in today's world.
For example, if my 14-year old daughter were to ask me for $150 to buy a new pair of jeans, my brain would most likely grasp the $150, even though the underlying emotional need in her may be that she wishes to fit in with some friends at school who have similar clothing. In the same way, the emotional need of an employee who requests a salary increase may be that he or she feels unappreciated. So granting the raise without addressing the emotional need is actually inutile.
In retrospect, being emotionally intelligent helps to better address the emotional needs of those around us in order to enhance our personal leadership and effectiveness; and in a business environment, the bottom line. Unlike good leaders, exceptional leaders, being more emotionally intelligent, can manage their emotions effectively, and are able to simultaneously connect to the emotions of others. They are self-aware, especially of the impact of their default emotional response, rather than their intentions since people do not judge us based on our intentions, but rather on our impact.
According to the Institute for Health and Human Potential, to determine our level of Self-Awareness, we need to rate ourselves and be rated by those around us on our Self-Assessment, Emotional Self-Awareness, Self-Regard and Optimism. To determine our level of Emotional Management, we need to rate ourselves and be rated by those around us on our Impulse Control, Adaptability/Flexibility, Authenticity and Personal Drive. And to determine our level of Emotional Connection, we need to rate ourselves and be rated by those around us on our Empathy, Communication and Ability to Coach Others.
As leaders, we need to be more conscious of our impact, which could be very damaging, rather than our intentions, which are often good. The acronym for their suggested ways to manage heightening emotions is S.O.S.S.:
- Stop for a brief moment in order to allow the information or situation reach the neo-cortex
- Oxygenate and control your breathing and other symptoms of emotional trigger in order to avoid further releases of cortisones.
- Strengthen your appreciation/gratitude by revoking pleasant memories and successes, which experts say is actually the only emotion that can flush out the cortisones from our bloodstream.
- Seek more information to understand - rather than to justify.
While it is acknowledged that enhancing our Emotional Quotient is more difficult than enhancing our Intelligent Quotient, it is also agreed that the deterring character traits can be unlearned. In the words of Alvin Toffler, "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn".
Truly, people do no really care how much you know until they know how much you care.
Copyright (c) 2010 The Exhortation Life and Business Coaching Service
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Currently one of the hottest buzzwords in the corporate world, Emotional Intelligence, also called EI, and often measured as an Emotional Intelligence Quotient or EQ, describes the ability, capacity, or skill required to perceive, assess, and manage the emotions of one's self, of others, and of groups. Learn more at http://www.TheExhortation.com
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