emotional intelligence at work beliefs

emotional intelligence at work has a very simple rationale.  Using this foundation, we have refined and concentrated our beliefs down to three.  In conjunction with three concepts, and three characteristics of our approach, these make emotional intelligence at work different.

Whenever someone tells us they have a problem, all we know at that moment is that that is not what the problem is

This belief comes from practical experience, time and again. Whether as an IT or business consultant, or as a coach or mentor, it has invariably been the case that a little probing, a little refusal to accept what is said at face value, has reaped rewards, not least for the client.

There is more about this here. The story, ‘Drill’, exemplifies this in a humorous—but not necessarily untrue—way.

The way that people form and manage their relationships with other people is independent of context

(where context can be intimate, social, work, sport, church, politics…)

Again, this belief comes from practical experience. Of course, relationships in business are usually more muted than those we have in private. But just because the plates aren’t flying around the kitchen, doesn’t mean there isn’t some sort of power struggle going on which needs to be resolved as it would be in a marital situation.

Leadership is an attitude—management is a job—and ‘being in charge’ is a role

The leadership attitude or approach is one of principally
(a) creating a facilitating environment in which the individual, the team and the enterprise can thrive
(b) showing the way, by being willing to deal with their stuff

Leadership is a stage in the Psychology of Vision model of (business) relationships. If leadership is a way of relating to other people, what does that relationship look like? What do managers who are leaders do that managers who aren’t leaders don’t do?  PoV has a lot to say on this (which was helpful), but the general concepts show up in places as varying as the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst (whose motto is ‘Serve to lead’); Christianity (where Jesus says, for example, ‘Whosoever will be great among you, shall be your servant’ (Mark 10:43)); and organisations dedicated to promoting the concept of servant-leadership—eg, the Greenleaf Center.

The concept of a ‘facilitating environment’ is widely found in writings about good leadership; we use this phrase deliberately as a reference and homage to DW Winnicott who advocated that the principle job of a mother is to create a facilitating environment (his term) in which the child can thrive. In particular, the mother cannot do the thriving for the child.

The need for leaders to be willing to show they way by dealing with their stuff simply arises, again, from observation. Over and over, poorly performing teams and businesses turn out to be acting out stuff that is going on for the boss. The fact that this is often done subconsciously doesn’t make it less real.