Is Your Emotional Intelligence Helping or Hindering Your Leadership?

The last couple of months have brought unprecedented changes to our lives. Homelife and work-life have, overnight, been forcibly fused together.  

Put yourself in the shoes of your team, customers or family. No doubt, like you, they’ll be experiencing emotions that are outside normal comfort zones. Uncertainty creates fear and anxiety. As a leader, be aware that your emotional intelligence is needed more now than ever – potentially saving you serious pain and regret.

I've seen too many memes passed around WhatsApp about the toll this is taking on personal relationships. Although some bring a smile to my face, I'm sure the lawyers' offices will be extra busy in the coming months as relationships become a silent victim of this pandemic.

Effective Leadership - Time for Some Self Review?

But what about your work-life? When things start to get back to some sort of semblance of what they were, how will your colleagues have judged your leadership during these times?

Will they be looking for a divorce from you?

This pandemic, if it teaches us anything, then it should be about ourselves. How have we coped? What do we need to work on?

To help with this self, take a look at HBR's model on Emotional Intelligence (EI) that they've developed over 30 years of studying the strengths of outstanding leaders. It delves into an array of specific EI capabilities that prepares a leader for exactly the kind of challenges which have arisen.

You'll see below these are grouped into four domains: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management.

Emotional Intelligence is not just about being a likeable and 'positive' manager or spouse/partner. Conflict management is a key element of effective leadership - you'll need to be unafraid to ruffle feathers in order to drive change.

It's worth remembering, particularly so in conflict management – it's not what you say, it's how you say it.

If you avoid the issue, your team, your customers or even your personal relationships could become the next casualty and head for the exit.

I'm sure we've all had situations during this pandemic, whether that's been managing a team remotely for the first time or juggling home/work-life balance where a combination of the above EI competencies has been called upon, but they're not there or just didn't show up.

Don't beat yourself up about this. Just learn. And make sure next time, you're a better version of yourself. You'll be a better leader.