AS PUBLISHED IN
Leaders need self-awareness, emotional intelligence
At a recent social function attended by leaders from a local organization, conversation revolved around traditional “work” topics until the moment the boss left. Within 10 minutes, the group was dancing to “Motown’s Greatest Hits.” The group members did not allow themselves to “live” fully until the pressure to conform to the “worker” role was removed. Consider the losses in productivity stemming from the absence of trust, creativity and openness that became apparent only when the leaders were “reborn” as fully functioning, multi-dimensional humans. In considering the work/life balance issue, leaders should ask themselves: Are our people really committed to achieving our company’s goals? Have we done everything possible to ensure that they are?
GUEST COLUMN
Thomas R. Saavedra
By paying attention to employees’ personal goals, an organization creates a culture associated with higher satisfaction and lower role conflict, work avoidance and turnover.
EQ FIGURES IN
An organization’s capacity for creating a constructive organizational culture is determined by the emotional intelligence of its leaders and its capacity to focus on people. In their 1997 book “Executive EQ — Emotional Intelligence in Leadership and Organizations,” Robert K. Cooper and Ayman Sawaf defined emotional intelligence as “the ability to sense, understand and effectively apply the power and acumen of emotions as a source of human energy, information, connection and influence.” Daniel Goleman, in his 1998 book “Working with Emotional Intelligence,” identified these emotional and social competencies as fundamental elements of emotional intelligence in leadership: • Self-awareness: Knowing what we are feeling in the moment and using those preferences to guide our decision making. • Self-regulation: Handling our emotions so they facilitate rather than interfere with
RESPECTING HUMANITY
Productivity can be sustained only in an organizational culture that stimulates loyalty and commitment from its employees. To compete, an organization’s leaders must recognize that they can achieve the internal stability necessary to cope with constantly changing pressures only by acting on the obvious — human beings perform best in environments that honor their humanity. Paul J. Meyer, author of “Bridging the Leadership Gap,” identifies the key areas in employees’ personal lives as financial and career, family and home, mental and educational, physical and health, social and cultural, and spiritual and ethical.
the task at hand, and recovering well from emotional distress. • Motivation: Using our deepest preferences to take initiative and strive to improve and to persevere in the face of setbacks. • Empathy: Sensing what people are feeling, being able to take their perspective, and cultivating rapport and attunement with a broad diversity of people. • Social skills: Handling emotions in relationships well and reading social situations and networks. Using these skills to persuade and lead, negotiate and settle disputes. When star performers are compared with average ones in senior leadership positions, nearly 90 percent of the difference in their profiles are attributable to emotional intelligence factors rather than cognitive abilities. Emotionally intelligent leaders employ the setting of clear, mutually agreed upon goals, a preference for praise as a coaching tool, and a reliance on decentralization and shared influence in achieving goals. They focus on the “human” aspect of human resources. By demonstrating their ability to integrate work and life, they serve as role models. Only by living fuller lives can leaders develop the emotional intelligence necessary to create organizations with the constructive cultures of productivity they need to prosper in the “new age” of business. Thomas R. Saavedra founded Becoming Unlimited Inc., a leadership and organizational development consulting firm in Tampa. He can be reached at (813) 416-4680 or tsaavedra@becomingunlimited.com. www.becomingunlimited.com
This article appeared in the September 15-21, 2000 issue of the Tampa Bay Business Journal. Reprinted by Bob’s Busy Bee Printing with permission from the The Business Journal Serving Greater Tampa Bay to print a total quantity up to two hundred and fifty copies. Further reproduction by any other party is strictly prohibited. Copyright 1999 by the Tampa Bay Business Journal, 4350 West Cypress Street, Tampa, Florida 33607. Phone (813) 873-8225.