Emotional Intelligence's Influence on Military and Company Management

Emotional intelligence is as important in the business world as it is in the military battlefield. When times get tough, it is emotional intelligence that keeps the team moving forward to accomplish goals. Executives and officers who show empathy and self-reflection have higher levels of emotional intelligence that can garner support when times are tough. Whether you are at war on the battlefield or the boardroom emotional intelligence can make all the difference.

Emotional intelligence is that which stops us from making quick and irrational judgments without engaging our more rational processes. A surge of feeling can lead to outbursts of anger, berating employees, or a poor decision that impacts the rest of the department/company. Those with emotional intelligence can gain influence through their ability to deal effectively with others.

Emotional intelligence can be dividing into four core competencies that include (Goleman, Byatzis & McKee, 2013):

-Knowing one’s emotions

-Managing emotions

-Recognizing emotions in others

-handling relationships

One must first understand themselves to understand others. Once this understand sets it the ability to understand and influence others becomes apparent. In the military, command and control structures create authority but not the highest levels of performance. Excelling beyond the call of the duty requires leaders with high emotional intelligence that can push people to the upper reaches of effort.

In the military emotional intelligence can influence subordinates in a positive way (Abrahams, 2007). Such leaders can move beyond structure to create inspiring relationships that draw subordinates to help solve problems. The leader can command a level of respect through his/her even keel personality and appropriate reaction to events.

Emotional intelligence is important in both the business and military world where strict organizational structure limits the amount of personal connections that can occur. Information is transferred through these personal connections and those with higher emotional intelligence can maintain their relationships and develop higher levels of performance among their employees by understanding their needs and motivations.

Goleman, Boyatzis, and McKee. (2013). Primal leadership, with a new preface by authors: unleashing the power of emotional intelligence. Paper back. 

Abrahams, D. (2007). Emotional intelligence and army leadership: give it to me straight! Military Review, 87 (2).

The Benefits of Social and Emotional Intelligence in MultiCultural Organizations

Today’s workforce is more global than it was in the past and has multiple generations working under the same roof. According to a paper in the International Journal of Information Business & Management the diverse nature of the work environment we find that social and emotional intelligence is important for the overall ability to deal with and relate to people of different backgrounds (Njorge & Yazdanifard, 2014). Organizations rely on the skills of future managers to create highly functional and highly diversified workforces that can meet tomorrow’s challenges. 

Having emotional and social intelligence is beneficial for executives and managers that must effectively work with and motivate employees from different backgrounds. Through their ability to act and interact with various cultures they can help people stay focused on organizational objectives and command a higher level of multicultural leadership. The management of global firms requires executives and managers with stronger global capabilities. 

It is beneficial to discuss the definitions of emotional and social intelligence.  Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand, control, and expresses emotions while creating empathetic relationships with other people. Social intelligence is the ability to negotiate and navigate complex social environments and create meaning out of these networks.

The ability to relate to other people is a very valuable skill that people often use to further their influence. Bridging two cultures to create networks and influence are extremely difficult as each side has their own way of viewing the world. The more in tune we are with our own emotions we are able to understand others and use social networks to connect to a wider group of people.

Emotional and social intelligence are soft skills that are learned over a long time. You can teach the components to communication, impression, critical thinking, etc... but you can't easily teach someone to tune into the nature of other people. As a soft skill developed over a lifetime it is important for organizations to consider hiring people to meet these in firms where inter-generational and inter-cultural reside. Those executives and managers who have already developed these skills can use these skills to create alignment toward organizational objectives by understanding the different cultural lenses at play within the workplace.

Njorge, C. & Yazdanifard, R. (2014). The impact of social and emotional intelligence on employee motivation in a multigenerational workplace. International Journal of Information, Business & Management, 6 (4).

Including Emotional Intelligence In the Real Estate Profession

Emotional intelligence may be the primary difference between those that are successful and those that are not. High emotional intelligence has been touted as an important predictor of a person's ability to master their environment from an emotional standpoint and continue to work on their goals through effectively engage those around them. The higher the emotional intelligence the capable the person is at understanding themselves and others.

The following presentation offers insight from Dr (s) Swanson, Hamilton and Zobisch into the very real benefits of developing higher emotional intelligence among real estate professionals:

Establishing Best Practices for including Emotional Intelligence in the Real Estate Professionals from AC Swanson Group

Emotional Intelligence Can Make or Break Your Career

Emotional Intelligence (EQ) may just make or break your career. You earned that prestigious MBA, sowed the deals, and mastered your job but did you master yourself? If your not sure you may want to take a look at your emotional talent to see if it can take you to the next level of performance. 

Having the right skills is important but may not be the deciding factor in long term success. It is an ability to handle the day-in and day-out emotional aspects of work and life. This is not easy as multiple pressures and issues seem to attract and distract our attention raising stress levels.

That isn't always easy as life is messy and comes with many ups and downs. The extent of our peaks and valleys and how we deal with them defines our emotional resilience. At times we are better than at others. There may be a few days that we feel like we are at our brink.

Emotional intelligence influences our ability to interact effectively with others and understand the origins of our emotions. Work is naturally stressful and the barrage of other peoples needs and issues mixed with a fast paced environment can be overwhelming to most.

Emotional intelligence is a decisive factor in career success. In a complex global business environment emotional intelligence is needed among managers that work at multinational companies. Where emotional intelligence is lacking, or unable to be developed, is a hole the skill battery of an organization.

Organizations often focus on the hard and easily measured skills that are based in results or job function. They ignore those soft skills that require something more subtle out of people. Winning at all costs without being able to develop quality relationships can be disasterous to turn over rates in the future.

Emotional intelligence is so important it can even be used as a predictor of the ability to communicate with others domestically and internationally (Fall, et. al. 2013). According to their work emotionality, sociability, and self-control make their way into higher emotional intelligence.

People that score low on emotional intelligence are also unlikely to be able to understand the nuances of international relationships. They are limited by their own perception and ability to control their emotions. People of different cultural backgrounds often look for these cues to determine intention.

The same process occurs within the same culture as it does internationally. The use of verbal and non-verbal expressions creates the total message. In international relationships the subtle nature of these impressions can change the dynamics of the relationship.

Emotional intelligence can be developed and enhanced through practice and persistence. Taking a few moments to analyze a situation critically before responding can do wonders. At times emotions can be more of a knee jerk response. If you do happen to master emotional intelligence and match your business skills to it you will have an unbeatable combination.

Fall, et. al. (2013). Intercultural communication apprehension and emotional intelligence in higher education: preparing business students for career success. Business Communication Quarterly, 76 (4).

The Influence of IQ, EQ, and Personality on Student Academic Success

Some students excel at learning while others lag behind in the overall process. What makes one student more successful than another has always been an interesting topic for educators. A study by Kiss, et. al. (2014) delves into higher academic achievement and its association with intelligence (IQ), emotional intelligence (EQ), and personality preferences of students. Understanding what types of students are most likely to be successful helps in college selection and advanced placement. 

Intelligence can be something difficult to define as it takes into consideration a broad range of skills that impacts a person’s ability to navigate their environment. It can be seen as, “a very general mental capability that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly and learn from experience” (Gottfredson, 1997, p. 13).

Those who are intelligent question their environment and try and understand the world around them. As intelligence rises, the higher the ability to solve complex problems becomes apparent. Intelligent thinkers excel quickly in learning and seem to grasp concepts faster than others. 

Emotional intelligence is also something that can be difficult to comprehend. It can be defined as “a type of social intelligence that involves the ability to monitor one’s own and others’ emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions” (Mayer & Salovey, 1993, p. 433). It is a process of awareness of internal and external states of feeling. 

Emotionally intelligent people are not unemotional but are aware of the ranges of their emotions and can monitor them. They may also be more in-tune with the emotional nature of those around them. They can pick up on the cues, behaviors, facial expressions, and logic of language to assess how others are currently feeling. 

The student’s personality type is the way in which the student views the world. It is the style of understanding they are most natural and comfortable with. Tests such as the Myers–Briggs Type Indicator measures introversion-extraversion, sensing-intuition, thinking-feeling, and judging-perceiving planes of personality. Different personality characteristics determine how we understand the world and come to conclusions about it. 

The study found that lower IQ hindered academic performance while education could not indicate individual cognitive differences at higher levels of intelligence. Lower EQ hindered performance while higher EQ improved performance. Success was also associated with introversion-extraversion, thinking-feeling and judging-perceiving. Educational attainment certainly has many other compound factors such as access, cost, and social support that help students be successful but IQ, EQ, and personality influence the success of those that attend higher education institutions. It should not be forgotten that formal education does preference particular styles of learning and those that fit within that style are more likely to be successful than those who do not fit within institutionalized education curriculum. 

Gottfredson, L.S. (1997) „Mainstream Science on Intelligence: An Editorial with 52 Signatories, History, and Bibliography,” Intelligence, vol. 24(1), p. 13-23.

Kiss, M., et. al. (2014). The relationship between intelligence, emotional intelligence, personality styles and academic success. Business Education & Accreditation, 6 (2). 

Mayer, J.D. and P. Salovey (1993) “The Intelligence of Emotional Intelligence,” Intelligence, vol. 17(4), p. 432-442.

Emotionally Intelligent Servant Leaders…a Compassionate Facilitator of Learning

By Dr Andree Swanson
 

One evening, I was exasperated over the loss of another student.  No, the student did not die, did not even move to another state or city.  This student was a loss in the program at the on ground school where I was teaching.  This student could not manage the rigor of higher education, did not come to class, did not submit work on time, and did not even try.  My mentor, Dr. Robert Throop, author of Reaching Your Potential: Personal and Professional Development, told me “you can’t save everyone!”  Throop told me that much like patients who have cancer, even though you try to save the patient (or in this case, a student), you lose some patients (students) some of the time. 

Since that date, over 15 years ago, I have been in higher education in a variety of capacities, mostly in the online arena.  I have seen many ideas to retain and support students.  Yet these ideas are like medicating the symptom without finding the root cause of the disease.  A few of them work and are often good, but a more empathetic facilitator may be more appropriate for the adult learners.  A paradigm shift must occur from getting the faculty member from the “sage on the stage” to the compassionate facilitator of learning.

 Emotional Intelligence in the Online Classroom 

In 2008, Berenson, Boyles and Weaver after doing research on emotional intelligence as a predictor for success, they concluded that knowing the soft skills attributes to student success.  If the emotional intelligence skill improves student success, woudn’t an emotionally intelligent instructor improve student success, which would, in turn, improve retention?

Many studies have been published on how individuals with high emotional intelligence can enhance and increase the potential for positive outcomes.  Those outcomes can be in the online classroom.  An example is that people can work to increase their emotional intelligence, thus, improving performance.  So, what is the performance for a compassionate facilitator of learning?   Helping the students instead of enforcing obstacles.  Adult learners WILL have obstacles, but the obstacles are not insurmountable. 

Emotional intelligence is a learned and practiced skill.  Daniel Goleman stated that for individuals in leadership positions, 85% of their competencies are in the emotionally intelligent domain.  Compassionate faculty can be trained in improving their emotional intelligence.

 Servant Leadership in the Online Classroom 

 Many faculty members may not admit this, but they are authoritarian in nature.  With courses being short, they lay down the ground rules early.  NO LATE WORK.  Ten percent deduction for each day late, etc.  Not only does this cause students stress, the professors are stressed by their own guidelines.

From my own experience, I was the instructor who stayed up until 12:01 (in your time zone) and by 12:06 I had posted all of my zeros for the next day.  Off to bed now for a good rest!  I reveled in deducting points per each day late.  This is how I will establish my grade variance, I thought.  Oftentimes, I was thankful for those that posted late just so that everyone would not “earn” the same grade.  Not only did this build stress on my students, it was very stressful for me.

It was about this time that I learned of the teachings of Robert Greenleaf, author of The Servant as Leader.   Greenleaf stated, “A servant-leader focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong.”  Dr. Niall Ferguson, the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, said, “As a teacher, my strategy is to encourage questioning.  I’m the least authoritarian professor you’ll ever meet.”  Some of the traits of a servant leader include humility, good listening skills, empathy, and commitment to the people who are followers.

The Compassionate Facilitator of Learning Model

  Step 1 – Learn more about improving your emotional intelligence and seek to bring these qualities into the classroom.

 Step 2 -- Humble yourself.  Establish yourself as an expert in the field.  Engage with the student in a way that shares this expertise but present yourself with humility.  This is the “you get more bees with honey” approach.

 Step 3 – Empathize with your students.  Remember the times when your baby was sick, your mother was dying, you just had a car accident.  Stuff happens.  Give the student a break.  That one break might be the one that student needs.

 Step 4 – Improve your listening skills (even in the online classroom).  Are you really reading what the student is writing to you?  When apply the Socratic method are you listening to what your student is saying?  Can you hear the real issue when the student says, “I don’t understand?”

Step 5 – Commitment to the students.  The bottom line is what you are being paid to do.  Grade papers?  Yes.  Submit your grades on time.  Yes.  Nevertheless, the most important aspect of an online faculty member’s job is helping the student be successful.

The other day Dennis Prager, a nationally syndicated talk show host, said the most important thing that parents can do is to raise children who are successful in their own right.  As online faculty members to achieve our mission is to be able to go to sleep at night and not count the zeros as they rest on your pillow.  Our daily mission is to help students achieve his or her dream.