How can you improve your EQ and leadership skills?

I feel the greatest way to develop EQ is to be in mindfulness. When we are mindful of everything , we develop self awareness. Which in turn is the basis for understanding your whole way of life. It can be strength, resilience, empathy or communication. Self awareness is the basic pillar for strengthening EQ.

Listening with a nonjudgmental mindset would let you truly engage in listening. Listening is a skill and intention. It takes a conscious effort to build this skill.

Empathy and active listening are two sides of same coin. Listening will come naturally when we develop empathy to next level. Good news is that EQ is not like IQ which can be improved only by knowledge. EQ is like muscle which can be improved with practice and listening is the base for improving your empathy Quotient.

We face many challenges and opportunities that can trigger various emotions. These emotions can either help us or hinder us, depending on how we manage them. Therefore, it is crucial to identify our emotional triggers and learn how to leverage them for success. Reflection is a process of examining and understanding our emotions and their causes. We can use questions such as "Why do I feel this way?", "What does this emotion tell me about myself or the situation?", or "How does this emotion affect my performance or well-being?" to reflect on our emotions and gain insights. For example, we can reflect on why we feel anxious before a pitch, what it reveals about our expectations or beliefs, and how it impacts our confidence or delivery.

Developing breath-awareness is the most powerful tool we have for developing emotional awareness. Emotional awareness is the first pillar of EQ. Your emotions affect your breathing - often before you are consciously aware that your emotions are heating up. When you notice that your breathing is changing (usually in response to difficult emotions), you can then us your breath to take control of your emotions before they take control of you. Breath Awareness = Emotional Awareness Breath Control = Emotional Control = Higher EQ You can develop breath awareness by practicing slow deep breathing exercises for just 5 minutes a day.

Emotion management has become very vital in this digital age where alot of things on social media can trigger emotions. Always being able to sense when something has impacted you negatively is key. Then you take decisive actions to return yourself to a positive state. This is resilience too

Emotions are not to be controlled but managed. EQ is all about recognizing the emotions.Then analysing the triggers and then managing them. Like anger bout must be having a trigger point somewhere, reflect on what is the cause for this anger bout and try to analyse the situation and find a solution within to manage it more rationally.

Feedback and reflection on situations are basis for improving any situation or event. Purpose is to learn from feedback. Take feedback as positive learning and move forward with the changes required, after analysing the feedback comments. Feedback is your best teacher. Your Guru who can put forward all your weaknesses in front of you.

We stood on shoulders on many giants and now it’s our turn. If you can develop others it’s paying back to some extend. Not many leaders do that.