The Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) found that the primary causes when executives lose their jobs involve deficiencies in emotional competence such as difficulty in handling change, inability to work well in a team, and poor interpersonal relations.
Executive search firm Egon Zehnder International analysed 515 senior executives and discovered that those who were strongest in emotional intelligence were more likely to succeed than those strongest in either IQ or relevant previous experience.
The Carnegie Institute of Technology carried out research that showed that 85 per cent of our financial success was due to skills in "human engineering", personality, and ability to communicate, negotiate, and lead. They found that only 15 per cent was due to technical ability. In other words people skills or skills highly related to emotional intelligence were crucial skills. Nobel Prize winning Israeli-American psychologist Daniel Kahneman found that people would rather do business with a person they like and trust rather than someone they don’t, even if that person is offering a better product at a lower price.
Much of the research that has been done on emotional intelligence has been at the executive leadership level. The higher up the organisation, the more crucial emotional intelligence abilities are as the impacts are greater and felt throughout the entire organisation. There have been some studies, however, that show impacts at all levels. For example, a study by McClelland in 1999 showed that after supervisors in a manufacturing plant received training in emotional competencies such as how to listen better, lost-time accidents decreased by 50 per cent and grievances went down from 15 per year to three.
What are the key features of emotional intelligence?
Self-awareness. People with a high degree of self-awareness have a solid understanding of their own emotions, their strengths, weaknesses, and what drives them. Neither overly critical nor unrealistically hopeful, these people are honest with themselves and others.
Ability To Self-Regulate Emotions. We all have emotions which drive us and there is nothing we can do to avoid them. People who are good at self-regulation, however, are able to manage their emotions so that they do not control their words and actions. While they feel bad moods and impulses as much as anyone else, they do not act upon them.
Empathy. Empathy is another important aspect to look for when hiring. Someone who has empathy will have an awareness of the feelings of others and consider those feelings in their words and actions. This does not mean that they will tiptoe around or be unwilling to make tough decisions for fear of hurting someone’s feelings. It simply means that they are aware of, and take into consideration the impact on others.
Social skills. To have good social skills requires a high level of the other skills aforementioned as well as the ability to relate and find common ground with a wide range of people. It goes beyond just friendliness and the ability to get along with others.
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