The General Election and Why Goleman is Wrong about EQ!

Today we are electing a leader in the UK. Or are we? That rather depends what you mean by leader. We are electing a government, which in turn implies a Prime Minister, who may or may not be any good at leadership.

What is a Leader?

People use the word in 2 ways interchangeably, but with 2 very different meanings. What's the key word in this phrase: 'senior leadership team'? I would argue that the only word which is not open to argument is senior. Because you can be on that team and be very poor at leadership. And I have argued before that many SLTs are dysfunctional by design (even if unintentional). However the people are invariably senior.

Or leadership can mean that others follow you through choice. This trait is independent of seniority and is invariably a function of the person's values and behaviours. I would argue that this is leadership.

What does your best PM look like?

After separating out leadership as above, at Mission Excellence we break out the core competencies in your best ever executive (read PM) as:

• Direction (setting) - an intellectual skill at the top of a complicated organisation in a complex world
• Execution - making stuff happen in the above environment - a physical activity about organisation of resources, resolution of competing priorities and attention to detail (among other things)
• Leadership - bringing others on the journey - a moral and emotional activity

(Thanks to Dr Stephen Bungay for his influence on my thinking on the above).

Let's just go with the model for the moment. Which competency is most important? People like to say leadership. But really? What gets you on in life? Let's ignore the ideological differences; which is most important in a PM? Goleman argues for the primacy of EQ, which I am going to broadly correlate with leadership as defined above. I argue that viewpoint is an intellectual luxury by someone in the stand who will never be judged by performance on the pitch. He may well be theoretically right, but in practice?

Corbyn vs May

Have you voted yet? Who for? Why? Here's my apolitical (trying my best) dissection against the above criteria:

• Direction. Intellectual game. May hands down.
• Execution. Virtually zero data on Corbyn. Never been tested under fire. That alone is pretty damning. Never really managed anything more complicated than a protest. May held one of the senior offices of state and (again) ignoring the political ideology, was regarded as a safe pair of hands. For me, has to be May again. In fact, it's hands down again.
• Leadership. Corbyn is not an obvious big-hitter. But you know, there's just something about Jeremy. His politicians may not like him, but a majority of Labour party members choose to follow of their own free will. QED a leader. His strong core principles, his authenticity, his commitment to his principles (admittedly some have been watered down a little for mass consumption). It's got to be Corbyn. Hands down.

Who Would Make the Best PM?

If you broadly accept the line of argument above, it boils down to an EQ vs IQ argument. Who would be most effective? I actually agree with Goleman (who in fairness, is somewhat less dogmatic in his view than I might have implied - anything for a decent title). EQ/Leadership IS the gamechanger. But it's irrelevant without the other two. Direction and Execution are your cake. Leadership is the icing. Great icing will take an average cake to a different level. Great icing with no cake is just a short-term sugar hit. I want the PM to be a great leader. But if I have to compromise, I'll take direction and execution over leadership, whatever the context. Of course other great leaders (as defined above) have surrounded themselves with a team who cover the other competencies. I pass no opinion on the wider team here - it's hard enough already trying to balance on a very slippery knife edge of neutrality and objectivity...

What do you think? What is there to learn? I’d be interested in any feedback in the comments below.

Thank you for reading. I post on Linkedin  and also HRzone and MissionExcellence, most often on issues relating, at least tenuously, to team and organisational effectiveness. I’d be delighted if you followed or connected either here, or via @JustinMissionEx on Twitter. 

My book, The Business of Excellence, draws on both my time as a fighter pilot and subsequent consulting experience to lay out a roadmap for building high-performance organisations. You can see details on Amazon.