Emotional Intelligence Summary

Emotional Intelligence. The new elephant in the room.

When emotional intelligence first appeared to the masses in 1995,?we realized that?people?with average?EQ’s outperform those with the highest IQs 70% of the time. This anomaly threw a massive wrench into what?many people had always assumed was the sole source of success—IQ.?Decades of research now point to emotional intelligence?as the critical factor that sets star performers apart from the rest of the pack.

Emotional intelligence affects how we manage behavior, navigate?social complexities, and make personal decisions that achieve positive results. Emotional intelligence is made up of four?core skills that pair up under two primary competencies: personal competence and social competence.?

Personal competence?is made up of your self-awareness?and self-management skills, which focus more on you?

individually than on your interactions with other people.?

Personal competence is our ability to stay aware of your?emotions and manage your behavior and tendencies.

? Self-Awareness?is our ability to accurately perceive?your emotions and stay aware of them as they happen.

? Self-Management?is our ability to use awareness of?your emotions to stay flexible and positively direct your

behavior.

Social competence?is made up of our social?awareness?and relationship management skills.?Competence is?our ability to understand other people’s emotions and use awareness of our emotions and that of others to manage interactions successfully.?

? Social Awareness?is our ability to accurately pick up on emotions in other people and understand what is really going on.

? Relationship Management?is our ability to?interact with others.

Emotional Intelligence, IQ and Personality Are Different.

Emotional intelligence taps into a fundamental element of human behavior that is distinct from your intellect. There is no?known connection between IQ and emotional intelligence; you simply can’t predict emotional intelligence.

Emotional intelligence?is an essential part of the?whole person.

Intelligence is our ability to learn.?

Personality is the final piece of the puzzle. It’s the stable?style” that defines each?of us. Personality is the result of?hard-wired preferences, such as the inclination?toward one's. However, like IQ, personality can’t be used?to predict emotional intelligence. Also, like IQ, personality is stable over a?lifetime and doesn’t change. IQ, emotional intelligence, and personality each?cover unique ground and help to explain what makes a person tick.

success.?It’s a powerful way to focus our energy in one direction with a tremendous result.?A study of?emotional intelligence alongside 33 other important workplace?skills found?that emotional?intelligence is the strongest predictor of performance.?

Your emotional intelligence is the foundation for a host of critical skills—it?impacts most everything you say and do each day. Emotional intelligence is?the single biggest predictor of performance in the workplace and the strongest?driver of leadership and personal excellence.

Of?all the people we?studied at work, we found that 90% of top performers?are also high in emotional intelligence. On the flip side, just 20% of bottom?performers are high in emotional intelligence. You can be a top performer?without emotional intelligence, but the chances are slim. Naturally, people?with a high degree of emotional intelligence make more money—an average?of $29,000 more per year than people with a low degree of emotional?intelligence.

Emotional Intelligence Can Be Developed.

The communication between your emotional and rational “brains” is the physical source of emotional intelligence. The?pathway for emotional intelligence starts in the brain, at the spinal cord.?Our primary senses enter here and must travel to?the front of your brain before you can think rationally about your experience. However, first they travel through the limbic?system, the place where emotions are generated. So, we have an emotional reaction to events before our rational mind is?able to engage. Emotional intelligence requires effective communication between the rational and emotional centers of the?brain.