What Is Emotional Intelligence?

I was sitting in my office, looking at the forecast results for the end of the financial year. The organisation was not performing to expectation; productivity was good, but not great, and overall, staff did not seem to be engaged in the business. They appeared to be simply just doing enough. I had empowered my leadership team to drive the organisation, but although they were smart people and worked hard, they seem to be lacking the necessary skills to lead and motivate their teams to perform. There was one ingredient missing.

Over the past twelve months, I had sent my leadership team to several highly regarded development courses, but they had no enduring impact and had proved to be expensive, with little or no return on investment. Performance did improve initially, but after the enthusiasm from the learning dissipated, it soon returned to business as usual. Something had to change; this organisation had the potential to be great. I had tried everything.

Or so I thought.

I then remembered reading an article in a leadership journal that referred to a successful leader as emotionally intelligent, and how he had used emotional intelligence to inspire performance and create a highly engaged workforce capable of delivering exceptional results. I searched on the Internet and found the article. The person in question, Andrew Miles, was less than an hour's drive away, I picked up the phone and put in a call to the man they referred to as the emotionally intelligent leader.

Trudi, Andrew's secretary put me through to him immediately. I explained that I had read the article and was intrigued as to how emotional intelligence was helping to drive performance and achieve great results for his organisation.

"I can understand why you are intrigued," responded Andrew. "When I was first exposed to the concept of emotional intelligence, I dismissed it without consideration. How many leaders do you know who talk openly about how they feel and consider the feelings of others? It stuck in my mind, though, and eventually, I made the decision to explore it further. I had nothing to lose and wanted to see if it was all that it was being purported to be."

He continued, "I am so thankful I did. It has changed the way I conduct myself in both my work and personal life in such a way, I feel I need to share my experience. I have some time free tomorrow morning. Why don't you come in at ten o'clock, and I'll explain how I came to be known as an emotionally intelligent leader."

"I would really appreciate that," I replied. "I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at ten."

Having taken the plunge, I was still unsure if this was the right solution for me. Don't die wondering, I thought, and promised myself I would go in with an open mind and leave my scepticism at the door.

I arrived at the premises early the following morning, was escorted to Andrew's office, and was greeted by the emotionally intelligent leader himself. He was not quite what I expected.

"We are a bit pushed for time," Andrew said, "so with your permission, I would like to get straight into why you are here, which I believe is to get a clearer understanding of how emotional intelligence can assist you, your leadership team, and your employees improve performance, from both an individual and an organisational perspective."

"That's pretty much it in a nutshell," I replied. "I have investigated and implemented a number of initiatives, but they had limited impact. I found the article interesting, and it got my attention. However, I wanted to find out more before I waste money on something I had no real understanding of." "Well, it certainly has been a game changer for me and my organisation," Andrew said enthusiastically. "Let me take a step back, though, and share with you a simple formula I have been using to drive success for a number of years now, albeit ineffectively, based on what I know now." He showed me a quote in a frame with a picture below it.

"I have used this model for a number of years," he explained. "Physical. Mental. Emotional. Physical effort is related to the amount of hard work we put in as individuals. The hours we work. Mental effort is the quality of the work we produce over a period of time. Can we remain focused and deliver consistently high outcomes? Emotional effort is how we manage our emotions to ensure we work hard and deliver high-quality results on a more frequent basis. I was aware of how our emotions affected both the physical and mental aspects of work, which ultimately affected performance, but had no idea why. I started reading research based on the concept of emotional intelligence. Let me share what I discovered.

"Emotional intelligence was originally defined in a 1990 article by Peter Salovey, dean of psychology at Yale University, and Jack Meyer, from the University of New Hampshire. In their article, they suggested that there might be abilities that have to do with emotions just as there are with words, numbers, or shapes. They also proposed that individuals differed in emotional abilities and that these abilities may be important because they could be developed and could underpin many important areas of life, such as success at work and the quality of interpersonal relationships.

"It was these latter concepts that caught the attention of Daniel Goleman. It was this connection between emotional intelligence and decisions, and between behaviour and performance, that inspired him to write a book that placed particular emphasis on the links between emotional intelligence and important life criteria. Daniel's first book, Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ, brought widespread attention to the topic and resulted in the emergence of a number of different models and measures of emotional intelligence.

"I looked at a number of these models but was finding it hard to determine which model was right for my specific need. I was then introduced to a Dr. Ben Palmer, founder of genos. His PhD thesis looked at these different models and measures; he developed a common and definitive approach to defining and measuring emotional intelligence and how this applied to leadership."

Andrew handed me a framed print with the genos definition of emotional intelligence and the model with six competencies.

"This was the definition that caught my attention, and the competencies of the model captured the leadership skills and behaviours critical to leadership performance that manifest from emotional intelligence abilities. So I was interested to understand when emotional intelligence was applied to leadership, what impact it would have on my organisation's performance. Let me explain further," he said. "As you can see, the model consists of six distinct competencies:

– emotional self-awareness

– emotional awareness of others

– authenticity

– emotional reasoning

– emotional self-management

– inspiring performance"

Andrew pointed to the model and said, "At the centre of the model is emotional intelligence, as emotionally intelligent leadership competencies are based on emotional intelligence. Our emotions influence decisions, behaviour, and performance, productively and unproductively. Research shows that there is a direct link between the way people feel and how they perform in the workplace....