Steve Jobs once famously said, “Leadership is about inspiring people to do things they never thought they could.” To achieve this, you have to lead teams from within and not necessarily from the front. It takes the right attitude, determination, skills, and vision. But it also takes an ability to understand and respond to people in a way that will make them grow, even when they don’t know how. Enter emotional intelligence.
What is emotional intelligence, though? The Daniel Goleman’s Model of EI breaks it down into the following 12 competencies.
Empathy: Leaders with empathy execute over 40% higher in decision making and employee experience.
Emotional Self Awareness: A self aware leader identifies their limitations, biases, and blind spots to solve issues more tactfully.
Emotional Self Control: As a leader, having enough self control to say no to things at times can be empowering and productive!
Adaptability: Every changing situation brings with it the need to develop the power to flexibly adapt to changing situations to stay relevant and excel.
Positive Outlook: Whether the glass is half empty or half full, depends on our outlook. People may have different outlooks on similar scenarios, but in leadership trying to keep a positive outlook often defines the culture.
Achievement Orientation: Having a driven, ambitious, and motivated mindset to succeed comes with achievement orientation. This competency has 5 stages – Awareness, knowledge, skill, mastery, and expertise.
Organizational Awareness: Leaders should always read the room, and navigate workplace politics to gain more organizational awareness. When leaders are well versed with their environment, they can influence and make a positive impact on people.
Coach and Mentor: It takes leaders to grow more leaders. Coaching and mentoring is one such key competency that leaders can use to pass on their expertise and knowledge to the future leaders.
Influence: Leaders who possess the skill of influence can easily garner support from others, resulting in an engaged and mobilized group, prepared to execute tasks proficiently.
Teamwork: Teamwork results in not only successful outcomes but also fosters innovation, many a time leading to unexpected positive results.
Conflict Management: 68% of employees at organizations with strong conflict management practices were highly engaged, compared to just 14% of employees at organizations with weak conflict management practices. This is typically spearheaded by leaders who, when perceived by their subordinates as being good at conflict management, are more likely to be viewed as effective leaders overall.
Inspirational Leadership: When Martin Luther King had a dream, it became a shared dream of millions of African Americans. An inspirational leader offers a clear and compelling vision for the future that motivates others to work towards a common goal and follows it up by practicing what they preach.
How many of these competencies are your core strengths?
