Why You Should Care About Your Emotional Intelligence

Massive changes caused by this recession makes EQ even more crucial

I enjoy speaking and writing about emotional intelligence and have done this over the last year and a half. It is a subject that has made a profound impact on me and one that continues to positively impact many people regardless of background or nationality.

There are two categories of questions that I frequently receive, the first is “I like the concept of emotional intelligence, but why should I care about it?”. The second is “How can I start becoming emotionally intelligent?”. These are very fundamental questions that I will try and address in this article.

Why emotional intelligence?

As a career consultant, my role is to work with businesses across multiple industries to fill gaps in their workforce. I have discovered that more and more companies are now seeing emotional intelligence skills as a vital component of their management philosophy.

Emotional intelligence is now the underlying premise for most employee training and development programs across multiple roles, from customer service representatives to senior management executives.

Emotional intelligence is now the underlying premise for most employee training programs, from customer service representatives to senior executives.

Massive change is constant. Technological change, global competition and a recession powered by a once in a generation pandemic are realities that make emotional intelligence even more crucial.

As organizations feeling the effects of this recession start to inevitably shrink through waves of downsizing, unemployed people will need new skills to stand apart from the competition and people who remain employed will be more visible and accountable.

In the past, employees might have easily hidden their hot temper, lack of self-awareness or shyness. Now competencies such as managing one’s emotions, handling encounters well, teamwork and leadership count more than ever. As business changes, so do the attributes needed to excel.

As business changes, so do the attributes needed to excel.

More and more employers are complaining about the lack of social skills in new hires. In the past, many people got ahead by going to the right schools and graduating with excellent grades. This no longer enough. Many once-promising careers have plateaued or worse, derailed because of crucial gaps in emotional intelligence.

For many workers who have been in the workforce for a while, who were taught that education and technical skills were a permanent ticket to success, this new way of thinking may come as a shock.

People are beginning to realize that success takes more than intellectual excellence or technical prowess and that another sort of skill is needed to survive and thrive in today’s increasingly turbulent job market. Internal qualities such as resilience, initiative, optimism and adaptability are now taking on new importance.

How to become more emotionally intelligent

Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to identify and manage one’s own emotions, as well as the emotions of others. An emotionally intelligent individual is highly conscious of his or her emotional states whether positive — joy, love, gratitude or negative — frustration, sadness or resentment.

An emotionally intelligent individual is highly conscious of his or her positive or negative emotional states.

An emotionally intelligent individual is also specially tuned in to the emotions others experience since they are attuned to theirs. Understanding and having this type of intelligence can be a game-changer. It’s quite clear that having skills that encourage sensitivity to emotional signals from within and from the social environment could make one a better friend, parent, partner, employee, and leader.

Work environments have become more collaborative, team-oriented and growth-centred than ever before. There are less emphasis and glamour around solo reclusive geniuses. In this new age, strength in communication, integrity, adaptability, ethics, and leadership are the leading metrics of promotion and employability.

How can you improve your emotional intelligence?

1. Become more self-aware — Stay in touch with yourself, practice identifying the emotions you feel and labelling them. Try to understand if you are feeling anger, joy, frustration, jealousy, fear, trust etc. journaling, trigger and calibration exercises (described below) are good strategies to improve awareness.
2. Practice self-regulation — Being aware of your emotions is the first step, but you also need to be able to manage what you are feeling. People who possess good self-regulation can adapt well to changing situations. They don’t bottle things up, but they do wait for appropriate ways to express their emotions rather than just reacting impulsively at the moment. Mindfulness and mediation help to improve self-regulation.
3. Improve your social skills — When you can understand your emotions, it is easier to understand and interpret other people’s emotions as well. This will serve well in building your social skills since you will find it easier to respond appropriately to different situations. Employees and leaders with great social skills can build rapport with colleagues and communicate their ideas effectively. People with good social skills are not only great team players, but they are also able to take on leadership roles when needed.
4. Work on your motivation — People who have strong emotional intelligence tend to be more motivated to achieve goals for their own sake. Rather than seeking external rewards, they want to do things because they find them fulfilling and they are passionate about what they do. Find your passion.

Calibration Exercise

The ‘calibration’ exercise is a proactive approach to developing your self-awareness. It requires a set of steps that will help you to identify the gap between how you perceive yourself in contrast to how you are perceived by others.

1. Pick a trait that you wish to improve. For example “Patience”.
2. Form a question around the trait. For example: “On a scale of 1–10 with 10 being highest, how patient am I?”
3. Answer the question about yourself: For example “5”.
4. Try to understand your self-assessment by probing further. For example: “Why not 4 or 6?”
5. Write down the names of 3 people you trust to be honest with you.
6. Explain that you are following an exercise to improve your self-awareness. Ask each individual the question(s) in step 2. Write down their answer.
7. Ask each individual the follow-up question in step 4. Write down their answer.
8. Compare your self-assessment with that of your confidants.

If the gap is small or negligible, it means that you are self-aware about a particular trait or topic. You may find that there is a large gap between how you perceive yourself, versus how others perceive you for a given trait or topic. Understanding this gap is important because it allows you to create the next steps for areas that you need to improve.

Trigger Excercise

The ‘trigger’ exercise is a reactive approach to developing your self-awareness. This exercise requires summoning strong emotions and breaking down your triggers.

1. Prepare a notepad.
2. Pick a topic that triggers you. For example: Opposing political view.
3. Find an article or video that argues in favour of the opposing political view.
4. Read the full article or watch the whole video. You should feel triggered — i.e. experience some level of frustration or annoyance.
5. Write down the name of at least one emotion that you feel. If you can note down two or three, that is even better. For example “Disturbed”.
6. Break down each emotion, one at a time: “Why did I feel disturbed? What moment in this article or video triggered this emotion?”. Write down the reasons.
7. Read the article or watch the video again, and as each emotion begins to surface, identify and name it in your head. For example “I am currently feeling disturbed because that reporter said…”
8. Note how you feel each time you finish naming the emotion and breaking it down.

When you name and break down an emotion, it should reduce the physiological tension that gets built up in your body. Being able to shine the light of awareness on a given emotion should give you a higher sense of control to keep a cool head. The more you practice this, the better you will get at reacting on the fly in real-world situations.