EQ and the Roles of Leadership
In my professional practice, I am continually aware of the importance passion plays in fulfilling work. When I am working from my heart, my work takes on a deeper feeling of enrichment and satisfaction. Talking about heart and passion may seem a rather romantic spin on achieving excellence in leadership for the twenty-first century. But developing a passion for what you do and encouraging others to do the same is what distinguishes an effective CEO. It also requires a specific set of EQ skills to express and manage passion effectively. Based on daily observation, there are three domains of performance excellence - technical skills, intellectual capacity or IQ and emotional intelligence or EQ.
According to Daniel Goleman in his 1995 ground breaking book, Emotional Intelligence, (newly released in a ten year anniversary edition), EQ is twice as important as IQ plus technical skill combined for optimal performance. His research also showed that the higher we go in organizations, the more important EQ becomes. For the CEO, it is 85-90% of the job!
Broadly speaking, we can define EQ as consciously handling knee jerk reactions and distressed feelings. For example, being patient instead of exploding. Using EQ means we are able to see things from another person's point of view -- listening even when the content pushes emotional buttons.
Developed EQ means being able to get along with others -- to be persuasive, working well within a team, charming key stakeholders, in short, the good old kindergarten "plays well with others!" The encouraging news is that the research is that EQ skills can be developed and nurtured, in life as well as in leadership.
How does a leader with EQ skills behave? For starters, they are able to give hard messages in a humane way. They appear to love what they do. People around them sense this. When 360-degree feedback tools are used, others describe a high EQ leader as someone with warmth, empathy, a sense of inclusiveness and a sincere sense of caring for others. They describe how natural it feels to follow that particular leader because they have the ability to engage their hearts as well as their minds.
Key questions can help us to identify and enhance Leadership EQ:
- Does this leader hold people accountable for their performance and promises?
- Is this leader comfortable and confident in delegating important tasks to others?
- How much time does this leader spend developing other leaders?
- How much time doesthis leader spend communicating their organization's vision, purpose, and values?
- Are people around and down the line able to apply this leader's vision to their day to day work?
- How comfortable is this leader sharing information, resources, praise, credit?
- Does this leader really listen?
Daniel Goleman's research indicates that not only is the bedrock of successful leadership emotional intelligence, but the leaders who achieve the best results are emotionally competent and capable of combining emotional competencies into several different leadership styles. The key is knowing what role to play when - just like golf, cards or skillful negotiations.
Here are the basic leadership styles from the Harvard Business Review article of Goleman called Leadership that gets Results (March 2000):
Coercive: demands immediate compliance
Authoritative: mobilizes people toward a vision
Affiliative: creates harmony and builds emotional bonds
Democratic: forges consensus through participation
Pacesetting: sets high standards for performance
Coaching: develops people for the future
Many studies have shown that the more styles a leader exhibits, the better the overall leadership results. Extensive research findings say that those who master four key styles create the best climates and performance. Authoritative, Democratic, Affiliative and Coaching are the four EQ styles in combination that are most able to influence organizational climate and performance positively. The most effective leaders switch flexibly among the styles as needed. They are sensitive to the imp
act they are having on others and adjust their style to get the best results. Leaders who don't have all the styles available at their command can augment their styles by working with others whose styles are complementary, as with leadership teams. Experts agree that coaching is the most effective style for long term EQ influence as a leader.
A leader is a dealer in hope.
-Napoleon Bonaparte
A Trimtab on the rudder of a ship.
First, the trimtab is turned, which applies enough reverse pressure on the rudder to turn the entire rudder. It's a fraction of the size of the rudder and one of the smallest parts of the ship, yet it guides the entire vessel. |
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As a highly regarded Performance Coach, David Butler combines his initial career as a professional actor and stage director with his extensive experience in personal and corporate transformation initiatives. In Organization Development/Management Consulting, he has established himself as an authority in leadership development, executive coaching, teaming and communication skills. Mr. Butler frequently appears as a guest speaker on these subjects, and his client list includes many Fortune 100 companies.
The Power of 1%
In these Holiday times of family and parties, end of year bonuses, and all of the feelings about the past year colliding with the stresses of the coming year, I find myself in a unique emotional place. Sensitive, yet nostalgic, Edgy, but thankful. Hard working to finish the unfinished, but working hard to relax with friends and family. The smallest little thing - a photo, a call from a friend - can bring me the warmest feelings, and other small things - disappointment at work, a missed lunch - can send me in the other direction. These little things have a distinct and intense impact on me, my world and those around me. With everyone else having these little things as well, I see there is a wealth of potential for peace or for anxiety. This infectious quality of little things has me intrigued as I review the work of 2005. In particular, it brings to mind some early reading and research that has always guided my coaching and development work - It is the story about the trimtab effect that Buckminster Fuller uses as a key metaphor on how the actions of one individual can affect mankind. His words from "Be a Trimtab" -
"I would never try to reform man - that's much too difficult. What I would do was to try to modify the environment in such a way as to get man moving in preferred directions. It's like the principle of a ship's rudder. The interesting thing about a rudder is that the ship has already gone by, all but the stern; and you throw the rudder over, and what you're really doing is making a little longer distance for the water to go round. In other words, you're putting a low pressure on the other side, and the low pressure pulls the whole stern over and she takes a new direction. The same in an airplane - you have this great big rudder up there, with a little tiny trim tab on the trailing edge; and by moving that little trim tab to one side or the other, you throw a low pressure that moves the whole airplane. And so I said to myself, I'm just an individual, I don't have any capital to start things with, but I can learn how to throw those low pressures to one side or the other, and this should make things go in preferred directions, and, while I can't reform man, I just may be able to improve his environment a little. But in order to build up those low pressures I'm going to have to really know the truth."
Bucky went so far as to request that his tombstone simply say,
"Call Me Trimtab".
This brings me to this month's main article on EQ. In IQ we are shooting for 100% - pass/fail, get it right, be perfect. In EQ we are shooting for 1%. The small improvement of 1% more empathy and openness to another person can have far reaching effects on the quality of an interaction, which in turn may continue to grow and affect the network of interactions that we are all members of - like ripples in a pond reaching some far distant shore that we may have no knowledge of. In leadership, this 1% is especially potent as it ricochets throughout our organizations, setting the tone and acting as a model for others to follow. This effect of the 1% compounded over and over in any situation is contagious and can result in significant results. It is like a compass to me - a ¼ degree shift here results in a difference of hundreds of miles at the journey's end.
Join me and the WorkLife staff in making 2006 the year of the Trimtab. Look for little ways to insert the "1% difference" in your own lives and organizations. It may be a 1% increase in confidence or tolerance or support or trust - one thing is sure - it will make a difference on some far distant shore.
May peace and wellbeing be yours in 2006.
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