Emotional Intelligence

"... in navigating our lives, it is our fears and envies, our rages
and depressions. our worries and anxieties that steer us
day-to-day. Even the most academically brilliant among us
are vulnerable to being undone by unruly emotions. The price
we pay for emotional illiteracy is failed marriages and
troubled families, stunted social and work lives,
deteriorating physical health and mental anguish and,
as a society, in its tragedies .."

Daniel Goleman "Emotional Intelligence"

When change occurs we can react like a hedgehog, unquestioningly defending the status quo withdrawing from the situation, or like an octopus, we engage, exploring the possibilities to try and get around the problem. It depends what we decide to do with our emotions. We are emotionally intelligent when we challenge our assumptions and move to a new understanding and a more heightened state of awareness or consciousness.

Try the Quiz

If you answered "yes" to these questions you are beginning to develop your emotional intelligence. The core competencies are:

Being aware of one's emotions
Being able to recognise and acknowledge emotions in others
Being able to make others acknowledge your emotions

They are important skills to develop as research suggests that upwards of 70% of your decisions are made emotionally. They are also the building blocks for controlling your emotional impulses, to create and maintain successful relationships and achieve your goals.

What is Emotional Intelligence ?
It covers five aspects or capabilities. Daniel Goleman believes we should teach them as essential skills. They are explained in his book "Working with Emotional Intelligence". Published by Ted Smart 1998 ISBN 1-8561-3501-2

They can be summarised as:
Self-awareness - knowing your emotions, recognising feelings as they occur, and discriminating between them.
Mood management - handling feelings so they are relevant to the current situation and you react appropriately
Self-motivation - by gathering up your feelings and directing yourself towards a goal, despite self-doubt, inertia and impulsiveness
Empathy - recognising feelings in others and turning into their verbal and non-verbal cues
Managing relationships - handling interpersonal interaction, conflict resolution, and negotiations

Did you know that emotional intelligence competencies account for up to 85% of what sets outstanding managers apart from the average ?

What's the value of Emotional Intelligence ?
This new knowledge is emerging from a better understanding of brain-based learning. There is a growing appreciation that emotional health is fundamental to effective learning, leadership and change.

The key ingredients of Emotional Intelligence are:

xxxxxx Confidence
xxxxxx Curiosity
xxxxxx Intentionality
xxxxxx Self-Control
xxxxxx Relatedness
xxxxxx Capacity to Communicate
xxxxxx Ability to Cooperate

They are proven to be a better predictor of future success than IQ Tests. People who manage their own feelings well, and deal effectively with the emotions of others, are more likely to live contented lives. Happy people are more likely to retain new information than dissatisfied people.

What is an organisation's Emotional Reality ?
What is it that people in your orgnaisation really care about ? What actually helps them to succeeed ? What gets in the way of real change ? A new process known as Dynamic Facilitation gets underneath the superficial responses obtained from employee attitude surveys.

Dynamic Facilitation involves focused conversations and open ended questions intended to get at people's real feelings. It is an effective way of getting at the root causes of problems and the sources of inspiration for change.

Dynamic Facilitation enables people to uncover the soul of the organisation - the hidden forces that affect people's day-to-day lives and their hopes for the future. The themes that emerge reflect the issues that are important to people, and how they can be connected to the bigger picture that is an organisation's vision.

The conversation is important as it reveals the common language that gives change initiatives their unity and resonance. Examples of Dynamic Facilitation can be found in Open Space Technology, Future Search Techniques and Learning Labs. All of these approaches try to reconnect people with the spirit of their organisation.

For a detailed explanation go to: http://www.tobe.net/papers/facilitn.html

This website contains a wealth of of information on Emotional Intelligence