Lexington, KY - I think we've all met someone who is highly intelligent but unable to communicate with us mere mortal beings who have IQs of about 100. Companies want to hire smart people, but they need to be able to relate to others, especially when working in a leadership role.
Enter the concept of emotional intelligence in 1995, with Daniel Goleman's book Emotional Intelligence. The holy grail of predicting job performance had been discovered - or so it seemed. I wish it were that easy.
Let's begin with a bit of history. The concept of an intelligence relating to social abilities was offered up early in the 20th century and tossed around through the years. The concept of emotional intelligence was well-defined by two academics in 1990 and then picked up and popularized within the business community by Goleman.
An intelligence, as defined by psychologists, must reflect mental performance (not preference), describe closely related abilities and develop with age. Emotional intelligence is our ability to recognize our own emotions as well as the emotions of others. It also comprises the ability to reflect on those emotions, use the emotional information to solve problems well and manage those emotions. The key word in this definition is "ability."
For most jobs, especially leadership and service-related ones, navigating through our emotions, as well as our team member's or customer's emotions, can be quite a challenge. Ideally, we would like individuals who can do a superb job of evaluating the dynamics of each interaction and create and implement a creative solution. Can we assess the emotional intelligence of an employee or potential employee, or evaluate that person's ability to create positive outcomes when working with others?
Fortunately the answer is yes; we can do some testing. While no assessment method is foolproof, utilizing an emotional intelligence assessment, along with other types of tests, can increase the likelihood that we will hire or promote a high performer. However, the buyer should beware. All emotional intelligence assessments are not created equal.
Today's popular emotional intelligence assessments fall into two basic camps: ability-based and what are referred to as mixed-model. The ability-based assessments attempt to measure something true to the meaning of an intelligence - ability. They do this by providing situations that require an emotional evaluation and response with correct and incorrect answers. The results measure an individual's emotional ability relative to a large norm group.
The mixed-model assessments measure a broad range of emotion-related abilities, competencies and preferences. While these mixed-model assessments may be useful for coaching situations where a large spectrum of information is desired, they do not provide a measure of a "true" intelligence. In the world of organizational psychology, the concept of emotional intelligence has largely been derided. However, the ability-based concept, which is closer to a true intelligence, is slowly beginning to be embraced.
And so, let's take a look at jobs that may require a high level of emotional intelligence, such as sales, customer service or leadership. In these situations, the workers must be able to judge the situation, perceive their own emotions, as well as the emotions of the customer or client, and develop options. How well the employee is able to evaluate the situation will depend on his or her overall cognitive ability, willingness to listen (a personality factor) and emotional intelligence.
Your employee's ability to craft a resolution to a customer's problem or create a sales proposal can easily make the difference in closing a sale. Therefore, looking at all three elements - cognitive ability, true emotional intelligence and personality - may mean the difference between a mediocre and a stellar performer.
A recent paper by two researchers at the University of Illinois showed how these components may work together. Take a hypothetical situation in which a conflict between two team members is brought forward to a leader. This leader must be open to the situation and willing to listen to both sides of the argument. He or she must also be conscientious enough to want to work on the problem rather than push it away and emotionally stable in order to calmly deal with the situation rather than blow up. All of these are personality traits measured by the popular and well-respected Five Factor Model.
The leader must then have the emotional intelligence to perceive her own emotions and those of the team members. Combining an overall cognitive ability with emotional intelligence the leader must be able to think how to reason with the emotions, discover the true source of the conflict and develop potential solutions satisfactory to all parties.
Finally, using emotional intelligence to control or set aside her own emotions, the leader must calmly work with both parties to explore the options for a solution satisfactory to all parties. It sounds like a lot of work, and it is - if you want superior leadership.
Emotional intelligence is indeed a useful tool in our toolbox, but it is not the holy grail we had hoped for. Combined with personality and cognitive ability, however, it can be used to create a valuable portfolio of information.
Joel DiGirolamo heads the firm Turbocharged Leadership and can be found on the web at www.turbochargedleadership.com.