EQ and Leadership Credit:forbes.com
Introduction
We intuitively know that suspicion destroys our desire and believe that information or ideas are true. If one is suspicious of major institutions, researchers, doctors, teachers and even one’s neighbours, it becomes impossible to gather information that can be the basis of sound decision-making grounded in truth. Real-world experiences are necessary for the development of an individual’s intellect. Resolving the problems of life, he or she is exposed to reality where trust is a prerequisite. We know that digital talent as analysed and measured by the IQ (Intelligent Quotient) is scarce and the corporate run for ‘the best brains’ is in full swing. However, to overcome the current AI-credibility problem imposed by technologies like GPT4, applying the EQ (Emotional Quotient) offers one solution to tackle the problem of truth to restore trust in AI.
EQ and Behaviour
EQ by definition is not behaviour, it is a connected system that produces behaviour. Every leadership development program ultimately exists to produce change in behaviour that supports key business goals. Accordingly companies have spent decades teaching leaders about behaviour. While these approaches often produced short-term gains, leadership development programs achieved inconsistent results. In 1995 Daniel Goleman’s landmark book, ‘Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ’, helped fill in the missing explanation. Along with other groundbreaking research at the time, Goleman showed that emotional intelligence explained why some leaders were dramatically more effective than others. Learning and development teams widely embraced the concept of EQ. But it seemed challenging to develop, and most organisations already had behavioural training systems in place. More than 30 years later, most organizations either think of EQ as a ‘have or have not’ skill in leadership selection or train it as a skill among many other equally important behavioural skills.
Development of the EQ
EQ needs to be developed as an integrated capacity that is central to every leadership skill. Not as just another leadership skill among many, the EQ cannot be separated from leadership behaviour. It is a structural prerequisite by building the connections required for behavioural skills. Without these connections potential leaders can recite the right thing to do for solving a problem but fail when asked to apply behavioural knowledge on the job. Emotional awareness and a regulation to sustain it are interlinked which is what most Leader and Development Teams (L&D) teams want to develop. But you cannot achieve this goal without awareness. When organizations describe what they want from EQ training, they usually suggest that the educational process requires to be regulated and individual composure must be taught to handle the related stress. The implication is not that awareness training replaces regulation training because regulation fosters leadership. A leader can be coached to pause before reacting to a question, for example taking a breath before choosing the best words for answering a question. Without the underlying ability to identify what they are feeling and why, that pause is required. The first time that pause fails to produce a correct response, the regulation for producing this response breaks down as well. Awareness is what makes regulation durable. Programs that target regulation without first building awareness are training a behaviour that has no foundation. When leaders understand how their emotions are helping or hindering their thinking, they make higher-quality decisions. Decision-making is usually treated as a cognitive skill based on mental models and structured analysis. The role of emotion in decisions is often framed as a contaminant to be controlled. However, there is a chain underneath this connectivity. Leaders who identify their emotions with precision are more likely to a understand what those emotions are signalling about their thinking. Decision science tells us, that this ability allows leaders to make higher quality decisions by understanding the biases that might be clouding their judgment.
The Issue of Trust
We need a minimal level of trust to use any type of new technology. Some of this trust is based on rational thinking and some is grounded in emotions. But what happens when emotions overshadow the rational evaluation of the technological ability to solve problems and why is this important? Research shows that the more technology is represented as a living organism, the more we like it and believe in its capabilities and moral values. In several studies, researchers found that people tend to trust anthropomorphic robots, even when their poor performance was evident. Although these studies were performed in labs where the actual implication of robotic performance is questionable, they raise the question as to how the power of human emotions affects our basic trust in technology. For example, the more complex the outcomes of an algorithmic computation are, the more difficult it is to correctly evaluate its reliability. Hence, the role emotions play in the evaluation of technology becomes more significant as the disassociation between technology’s capability and its actual reliability and performance can be highly problematic. As result, there is a growing need to better understand how to balance the positive emotions evoked by technology’s achievements with the rational evaluation of its limitations for solving real-world problems.
Results of a Survey
A survey published by On Edge: 7 surprising findings about EQ and leadership performance · SIY Global Research over the last two years with 512 leaders, shows why EQ is inextricably linked to leadership behaviour, and what it reveals about the wiring underneath every leadership skill. Identifying emotions is crucial to decision-making. When leaders understand how their emotions are helping or hindering their thinking, they make higher-quality decisions. Decision-making is usually treated as a cognitive skill. The role of emotion in decisions is acknowledged but often framed as a contaminant to be controlled. The data provided by the research study argues for a more nuanced view. Decisions are not improved by stripping out emotions. They are improved by understanding what the emotion is, signalling about the thinking itself and opening the leader’s understanding to a broader range of possibilities. Leaders who can communicate what they are feeling but cannot interpret what it means are operating with a warning light which he or she is unable to understand. A leader who understands the possibilities has access to information that pure analysis would never provide. Changing leadership is often used for solving an organisational problem but this is very short-sighted. Today every organization is in the middle of a transformation, a reorganization, a platform shift and the integration of AI. The expectation is that leaders will absorb the disruption and continue to make sound decisions. Change generates emotional stress as uncertainty and fatigue accumulate. Without a strong understanding of awareness, regulation and decision quality deteriorates. This is not a failure of training design. it is the predictable consequence of building development systems around behavioural change without addressing the underlying emotional capacities required for solving today’s problems. Rethinking and reframing is the best practice of stepping back from an emotional first reaction and asking whether there is a different way to interpret what is happening. This capability is one of the most-cited skills in changing and improving leadership. It is also one of the most fragile because the research data shows that reframing and regulation are nearly inseparable. The two skills are so closely associated that they functionally behave as a single integrated capability. A leader who has not built a regulatory capacity cannot react in the moment that matters, because the emotional reaction has already taken the steering wheel and he loses control over the situation.
Conclusion
For decades, leadership development has operated on a simple model: identify the right behaviour, train them repeatedly, and expect leaders to transfer the knowledge gained for the position and tasks they are responsible for. In a stable environment, this approach in the past produced satisfactory results. But the environment is no longer stable. In order to develop the future qualities required for leadership, we have to shift our focus from drilling behaviours and instead focus on helping leaders to manage the perceptions and emotions that drive their behaviour. Organizations that move ahead, building und supporting the emotional intelligence that is structural to every leadership behaviour, will develop leaders who can adapt and make sound decisions. The combination of EQ, IQ and AI provides new opportunities for successful leadership required for solving todays as well as tomorrows problems.