I WISH TO LEAD

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Abhijeet works in a very large company. He is a hard worker, sincere in his work. He has good technical knowledge. He is a good learner, picks up new things rapidly. With all these good aspects, he also possesses some bad or negative characteristics. He is scared to take any decision boldly. He gets disgusted very fast. And at times gets angry very quickly. And when he is angry, his subordinates prefer to stay away from him. He loses his sympathetic nature, practically becomes inhuman. This lasts for short period. After that, he is back to normal. He curses himself for his misdeeds but in difficult situations again tends to behave similarly.

The last financial year was over. His company made good profits. The increments and promotions were declared. Abhijeet was disappointed. He got an increment but he wasn’t promoted. He was hurt. Abhijeet is a very ambitious person. He wished to lead the organization.

His elder brother, Parikshit understood the problem correctly. He took an appointment with a well-known psychologist. Both of them walked into the clinic of Dr. Sahastrabudhe as per the appointment. Abhijeet narrated his story with some incidences. Parikshit helped him to put it in proper perspective. Dr. Sahastrabudhe smiled and whispered that this was a case of Emotional Intelligence. He explained them in detail ‘Emotional Intelligence’ as follows.

Emotional Intelligence or popularly known as EI can be defined in many ways. It is the capacity to understand our feelings and the feelings of others. It helps to motivate ourselves and also manages our emotions effectively in our relationships. It is also called “people smart”. It doesn’t get noticed in the traditional concept of IQ, which normally concentrates on conceptual abilities. But it is a very important personal characteristic. It is an allied state of mind. In short, it is being intelligent about emotions.

The emotions are of six types. They are 1. Happiness, 2. Surprise, 3. Disgust, 4. Fear, 5. Anger, and 6. Sadness. Happiness and surprise are positive emotions. They create positivity in you and you get energized. Disgust, fear, and anger are negative emotions. They drain you.

Emotional Intelligence is necessary for all human beings since it is a very important factor of relationship management. While working in a group or a team, its necessity enhances. It helps in self-management, motivation, retention, and managing the other members of the group. EI exhibits the ability of a person to manage himself and deal successfully with other people. It helps to motivate other people. It understands your feelings and responds to the everyday situation accordingly.

The leaders and the bosses especially need to have high EQ since they represent the organization to the public. They are supposed to interact with a high number of people within and outside the organization. They are expected to upgrade the morale of employees. Please remember that when you work with people; you work with their emotions. Emotions are always there in any workplace. You can develop EI by doing something intelligently with them. It is observed that people commit mistakes not because of a lack of technical knowledge or skills but due to emotional failings.

On the contrarily, persons with high Emotional Intelligence get an advantage over their colleagues who have the similar intellectual ability, educational background, training, and experience.

Let us discuss EI in detail:

Emotional Intelligence can be organized into four clusters. They are:

1. Self-Awareness

2. Self-Management

3. Social Awareness

4. Social Skills

1. There are three subcategories of Self- Awareness:

· Emotional self-awareness

· Accurate self-assessment

· Self-confidence

Emotional self-awareness guides you to identify your own emotions and their effects, to point out how you react to cues in the environment, and bring to your notice how your emotions affect your overall performance.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Are fully aware of their feelings

¨ Co-relate the connection between their feelings and their behavior

¨ Take note of why specific feelings occur in themselves

¨ Notice the role their feelings play on their performance

¨ Judge the implications of their actions

Accurate self-assessment does the work of SWOT analysis. It is the process of understanding your inner resources, abilities, strengths, knowing and accepting your limits. It is interested in getting feedback and thrives for continuous learning and self-development.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Can laugh at themselves

¨ Have good judgment about their strengths and weaknesses

¨ Eager to learn from experience

¨ Welcome candid feedback, new perspectives, continuous learning, a self-development

Self-confidence is your own belief in yourself, your competitiveness to complete a task. Self-confidence states as a fact that you are the best person to do this job. It also conveys your opinions and ideas with confidence impacting positively on others.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Have the belief

¨ They carry the firm belief that they are the most competent person for the job

¨ They opine their views which may be unpopular

¨ They don’t hesitate to decide despite uncertainties and pressure

2. Self- Management is the ability to recognize your emotions and then use them to turn situations to your advantage. Self-management is also the ability to use your feelings to reason well and act accordingly.

Self-management is important in everyone’s life. It is seen that people do better in their lives when they can manage their emotions properly. On the other hand, when people allow their emotions to control their behaviour, they commit serious mistakes in their lives. People who have control over their emotions are open to change. They have a positive attitude. They are more productive and behave rationally.

There are six subcategories of Self-Management:

· Emotional self-control

· Conscientiousness

· Trustworthiness

· Adaptability

· Optimism

· Initiative

Emotional self-control is the ability to control impulsive feelings and emotions. It is to keep away from negative actions when provoked.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Think rationally and stay focused under tension

¨ Deal calmly with stress

¨ Stay positive in trying moments also

Conscientiousness is about taking responsibility for personal performance. It displays the underlying drive of a person’s reliability and capacity to deliver quality work.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Stick to their commitments

¨ Hold themselves responsible for meeting their objectives

¨ They are persons with details

¨ Are organized and skilful in their work

Trustworthiness maintains standards of honesty and integrity. It communicates intentions, new ideas, and feelings openly. It appreciates the openness and honesty in others.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Build trust through reliability.

¨ Are ethical. They cannot be criticized easily.

¨ Are transparent in their dealings.

¨ Dislike unethical deeds of others

Adaptability is the ability to be flexible. It can work in changing situations and circumstances.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Adapt plans, behavior, or approaches to align with changes in situations.

¨ Can easily handle multiple tasks, demands, changes in priorities.

¨ They fit in any team

Optimism is the ability to see something good in others and the situations. They even view threats as opportunities and work to take advantage to achieve maximum benefits. For them, glass is never half empty, but it is always half-filled.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ See opportunities in place of threats

¨ Are always hopeful that the future will be brighter

¨ Expects positive results from others

The Initiative is the ability to visualize a problem, obstacle, or opportunity and take action on it quickly. They are the people with initiatives who are always eager to do better, to face new challenges. They hold themselves accountable for their ideas and actions.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Act rather than wait

¨ Look for fresh ideas from different sources

¨ Generate new ideas while solving problems

¨ Induce fresh perspectives and risks in their thinking

3. Social awareness refers to how people handle relationships and their concerns about others’ feelings and needs. It is the ability to identify and respond to the feelings and emotions of others.

There are three subcategories of social awareness:

· Empathy

· Organizational awareness

· Service orientation

Empathy is about understanding other people. It’s a great ability to hear and understand unspoken or partly expressed thoughts, feelings, and concerns of others. People with empathy take interest in picking up the emotional cues of others. They listen to what people are saying and go deep to understand why they are saying so.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Are good listeners and are attentive

¨ Read people’s minds correctly

¨ Respect and relate with great enthusiasm to people of different backgrounds

¨ Show sensitivity to understand others’ perspectives.

¨ Extend the necessary help based on the needs and feelings of others

Organizational Awareness is the ability to know the relationships in one’s team or organization. It is to identify the decision-maker and his influence on the group. It is also to understand the values and cultures of the organization and their effects on people’s behavior and working.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Recognize the political movements at work in the organization.

¨ Accurately read important power relations in the team or the organization.

¨ Know the values and cultures of the organization.

Service Orientation is anticipating, understanding, and meeting other people’s needs. It focuses one’s efforts on others and the timely response to the request of others.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Are happy to provide satisfaction to others

¨ Match their services to meet others’ requirements

¨ Ready to offer their services

¨ Make themselves available to others

4. Social Skills refer to an expertness to get desirable responses from others. People having mastery of social skills are successful business leaders, leaders in society. They are good parents also since they know that personal success and family or group success are inseparable. They lead by example, encouraging others, improving them, and creating trust within them.

There are five subcategories of social skills:

· Developing others

· Providing Inspirational leadership

· Communication

· Conflict management

· Teamwork and collaboration

Developing others is the ability to plan long-term learning or development of others. Its focus is on purposeful and effective development. It is not traditional teaching or training. Those who are experts spend time helping people find their way to excel.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Act as a mentor by providing timely coaching and offering assignments that challenge and grow a person’s skills.

¨ Gives useful feedback and identifies people’s needs for development.

¨ Acknowledge and reward people’s strengths, achievements, and development

Providing Inspirational leadership is the ability to shoulder the responsibility as a leader of the team. Inspirational leaders bring people together to get the job done. They inject a strong sense of belonging within the team.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Inspire others by connecting and arousing enthusiasm for a common vision and mission.

¨ Streamline the performance of others while holding them accountable.

¨ Step forward to lead, as and when it is necessary.

¨ Lead by example

Communication is the ability to give a clear and convincing message to an audience effectively. People high in communication engage the audience in their presentation and are open to interacting with the audience.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Give nonverbal hints, like a change in voice tone to reinforce the message in presentations.

¨ Face the difficult issues easily

¨ Are good listeners, expect mutual understanding, and welcome more information

¨ Promote open communication and accepts even bad news

¨ States changes in working boldly

Conflict management is the ability to handle difficult persons, groups of people, or tense situations with prudence. This involves facing the conflict rather than avoiding it. This characteristic involves focusing on the issues rather than the people. This eliminates bad feelings.

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Supports the debates and open discussions

¨ Allows win-win situations

¨ Announce the positions of those engaged in a conflict to all concerned

Teamwork and collaboration are about working cooperatively with others, performing as a team and not separately or competitively. Teamwork and collaboration are enjoying shared responsibility and also rewards for accomplishments

Persons who have developed this competency

¨ Develops and maintains an extensive informal network

¨ Promotes a friendly, warm, cooperative climate in teams

¨ Brings all team members into active and enthusiastic participation

¨ Collaborates and shares plans, information, and resources

¨ Gives team identification with commitment

EI Importance to the Workplace:

Ø Improves cognitive processes

Ø Helps in decision making

Ø Encourages flexibility and change

Ø Sustains organizational culture management

Ø Strengthens teamwork

Dr. Sahastrabudhe took a pause. He said very few people can correctly identify their emotions as they happen. In this case, women score higher than men. Emotional awareness is not taught in school. We lack the skills to manage our emotions. Emotional pressure affects your health, relationships, and your career.

We should learn

v Optimism

v Hope

v Understanding oneself, others, and the situations

v Empathy

v Being positive under any circumstances

v Being real, and not acting “nice”

He also opined that IQ remains relatively fixed for an individual’s lifetime; whereas EQ can enhance an individual’s lifespan

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Dr. Sahastrabudhe turned to Abhijeet and said, “I don’t want to prescribe any medicine for you. But tell me have you understood what went wrong in your case?”

Abhijeet replied immediately, “Yes doctor. I understood my shortcomings. While you were explaining Emotional Intelligence to us, I wrote some important points in my diary. I will strive to improve accordingly.”

Dr. Sahastrabudhe was very happy. He patted on Abhijeet’s shoulders and quoted Mahatma Gandhiji’s words, “Become the change that you want to see in the world.”