In this episode we explore emotional intelligence... what is it? How aware of your own emotional intelligence are you as a leader? Can you look to build an emotionally intelligent team? We also reference the work on emotional intelligence by Daniel Goleman.

In this episode we share our thoughts, experiences and learning, including:

• 05:47 – being vulnerable as a leader
• 18:23 – putting your judgements aside
• 24:30 – values-based recruitment and EQ/ IQ
• 26:26 – how to become more emotionally intelligent

For further reading, Lee recommended Connect by David Bradford and Carole Robin.

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They seem to be put up on a pedestal and and it

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I knew your soapbox moment was coming.

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Hello everybody welcome to episode four of How

To Take The Lead podcast series. It's me Carrie-Ann and I am here

with the lovely Lee. Hello Lee.

Hello.

Thank you to everybody who is joining us to

listen to this episode and as always really keen to hear

people's thoughts. So after people have listened we'd love

people to comment, tell us what they think about what we've

talked about. But in this episode we are going to be

focused on emotional intelligence.

Sounds very sophisticated.

And do you know what I think people think that

and actually it is really not when you really start to think

about it. It's not at all but it sounds like some big scary,

lofty, lofty topic, but we want to cover what is emotional

intelligence in the context of leadership. That's the plan for

this conversation. And I did a Lee in my preparation for this

session. I thought I'm going to be more Lee.

You mean get it all wrong and misquote it?

No, no, I've been doing I've been doing good

on that front in this series so far myself. No, I thought what

would Lee do. I'm gonna start out with a good old fashioned

Google and just to recap what Google said around emotional

intelligence so that hopefully it feels slightly less scary as

we start our conversation. So emotional intelligence,

according to the wonderful world that is the internet, is the

ability to understand use and manage your own emotions in

positive ways. And in doing so you might be doing a number of

things, you might be relieving stress. You might be

communicating more effectively, empathising with others, looking

to overcome challenges and potentially defusing conflict.

So actually it's just all about how we as individuals and humans

kind of understand and manage our sort of own emotional input

and impact I guess that's what I was taken from, from that. So I

don't know initially if you've got any thoughts about that Lee,

but also taking it that one step forward, how you might describe

emotional intelligence in the context of leadership.

Yeah, I like that definition. And I agree that a

lot of it, it does start with yourself. So being aware and

recognising your emotions when they arise. But using that to

bring awareness in your interactions with people, in

order to build connection, and to be adaptable in different

situations is kind of how I look at it. It's a really interesting

one because I think being emotional at work. Is something

that has got better but still has quite a stigma attached to

it. And that old advice of you know, don't wear your heart on

your sleeve.

I was waiting for you to get that saying wrong

there. Lee with that little stutter I was like, hang on,

we're gonna have our first Leeism of the series.

Nope, I got it right I remembered. As a woman,

you know, you can be told you're too sensitive or don't be

dramatic, or you need to toughen up or man up you know, that's a

phrase that absolutely I was gonna say swear word then and I

stopped myself. So I think people are being more accepting

now in the leadership world of emotional intelligence, but

there's more work to do. And I think that the other thing is

that their emotions in themselves is you can have more

than one emotion at one time. And they can be conflicting with

each other. And that can be quite a personal challenge, but

also even more complex when you're dealing with other people

and that interaction with people. You asked me a question,

which was how to leadership and I haven't answered that.

Honestly, I was just gonna come in on your point

you made there about having different emotions at play

because that's absolutely true, that you don't experience

things, whether that's in the workplace or, or outside of it,

often where you only have one emotional reaction or, or one

emotional response to that. So actually, I think, in the

context of emotional intelligence, it's about exactly

the point you made around having that self awareness to think

about how you're going to manage those conflicting emotions. And

which of those might you need to kind of bring to the forefront

to be able to defuse the situation, overcome the

challenge, empathise with others and which of those might you

have to park and and deal with in a different space and a

different time to support yourself? Because I guess you're

right, isn't it is that conflict of dealing with more than one

emotion and also that potential conflict of dealing with your

own personal reaction in response to something versus

that of your wider team or your organisation. But sorry, I was

just responding to what you said but appreciate I've posed your

question that I've not let you answer yet Lee.

I think you've raised an important point. And I

always look at it from a leadership perspective, your

mood, or your emotion is the thing that sets the tone and

standard for others. And if we look at it through the lens of

vulnerability and showing your emotion, if you're not

vulnerable as a leader, you are not encouraging other people to

be even if you think you are, your actions will speak volumes

more than than your words. So whilst you might be encouraging

people to speak out and speak up and come and talk to you open

door, blah, blah, blah. If you don't show your vulnerability

and show when things are getting you down or when things might be

a challenge or whatever, then you're not giving that

permission to your team. So I think that's a really important

part of leadership. Yeah, and the precedent that you set.

Yeah, I absolutely agree. And, you know,

Yeah, I mean, you're talking you talked about crying at work.

I guess working through the pandemic, for many people have

provided some of these really extreme sort of challenging

situations where there be highly emotional responses and, and I

remember working for my chief executive at the time, and

having to deal with a really difficult situation where we

I've cried many a time at work, but I remember one boss that I

were having to manage and plan the communications around the

death of the staff member from COVID, which is just the worst

possible thing we could be thinking we'd have to

communicate and actually the way, the pace, everything that

was going on at work. I remember being in front of my chief

executive and bursting into tears about it, because I just

had, who didn't do tears, and I remember crying and they're like

found it really difficult. And actually, I was thinking, we're

finding this difficult we're doing the work bit imagine this

person's family. Imagine this person's team, it just feels a

bit too much. And then I do remember thinking at the time,

like oh god, how's my chief exec gonna react to this? Actually,

I don't know what to do, literally it was and that made

he was so I don't know so empathetic, I guess about my own

reaction to it that actually, it didn't make me feel like I'd

done the wrong thing by expressing that emotion. And he

actually said, it would be really strange if we weren't

responding to this situation in this way because it wouldn't be

me worse. And then I was really conscious afterwards of not

natural for us not to be upset by having to deal with something

like this. And I could tell that he was shaken and upset as well.

Not to the point of tears, but enough to know that that made me

feel okay that I was having that reaction. So yeah, I do think

it's, there's something about demonstrating sort of your own

wanting to show that vulnerability or emotion again,

integrity and authenticity, as a leader like you were saying, if

you're not prepared to be vulnerable, or demonstrate that

how can you expect other people to be?

now I'm can easily cry, but my crying isn't often as a result

I was gonna say, note, note to self if I ever make Lee cry it

of me feeling upset. I'm one of those people that can get angry,

basically just means she's really peed off with me and I've

frustrated. And then cry as a reaction to that actually I get

made her very angry.

But obviously I get upset. At other things at

other times, but usually in the workplace, my tears would come

angry quite a lot so it can easily be triggered.

out of the frustration at the situation. The fact that I

couldn't express that frustration frustrates me even

more, so. It was just a very messy, messy situation, but it's

had quite a lasting impact on me.

Yeah, and I think you made a point earlier

about adaptability and being able to demonstrate that

adaptability as a leader. And I think that you know, that

example that you've just given your boss didn't do tears. I

mean, that just goes to show a leader who's not going to be

adaptable, and you have to realise as a leader that not

everyone is going to deal with the situation in the same way as

you not everyone's going to respond in the same way as you.

But if they don't, that doesn't mean it's the wrong response.

You have to be adaptable and supportive. work through that

with people people as their leader, so I'm going to move

this on slightly, but I think it fits nicely because we've just

been talking about sobbing, crying, showing all of that

emotion and maybe that links a little bit with with a

perception I think that some people have in the leadership

space, in the in the workplace that all of these things we've

talked about around kind of communicate. It's about like

communicating and building empathy, building trust,

building relationships. Often these sorts of things can be

seen as soft skills. And I feel a soapbox moment potentially

coming on here because I know throughout this series and

others of Take The Lead we don't agree with these things being

soft skills. What are your thoughts on that? And does it

talking about leadership, needing to be more emotionally

intelligent kind of get badged into that perception that that's

just soft skills that are not particularly important?

Yeah, it's a really interesting one. I was

reading some research a while back which said, one of the most

common complaints of new leaders is that they lack empathy. And

it's usually because they've probably excelled as an

individual in their area, and then they've never had to deal

with that team dynamic before and I think this absolutely

comes down to the fundamental point that organisations and

individuals don't value these so called soft skills, which are

actually I want to call them bloody hard complex skills.

Because they take a lot of work. They are so dynamic in the sense

of every you can say maths is really hard or building a

skyscraper is really hard and really complex, but they're not

because they've got a formula that you follow. And yes, you

need to be skilled and specialist in that area, but

usually there's a manual or something that you follow. When

you come down to the soft skills, how you communicate with

people, how you should how you demonstrate active listening,

how you connect with people, empathy and all of that. It is

so complex because it is so different for every single

person and we can look at it through our own lens and what we

believe our context to be but then we have to understand it

from the context of others. Every single person's context is

different. You know, this is a really, really intricate skill

and understanding that leaders need to have yet they are

devalued so much, whereas the skills that can be learned in

terms of are you good at maths, can you do a spreadsheet, blah,

blah, blah. They seem to be put up on a pedestal and and it

drives me mad.

I knew your soapbox moment was coming

because we've had this conversation before about

exactly as you say like things that are specifically linked to

maybe a profession, say finance, HR, whatever, are often seen as

far more important sort of skill point of view than these

perceived softer skills, but actually, like you say, often

you can teach some more of those professional skills in a way

that you really can't teach somebody about being more

empathetic, about how to defuse conflict, about being more

diplomatic, potentially, you know, it's not necessarily

things that you can just put someone on a course on and teach

them how to do it's actually something that people have to

practice and people have to, there's a bit of it that people

have to want to be able to demonstrate that skill set,

people have to want to actively listen to somebody, empathise

with somebody in a way that is different from being a finance

person.

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I guess with that in mind, and us talking about the perceptions

of sort of emotional intelligence and the types of

skills that we're talking about, how as a leader, can you

actually demonstrate that you are operating with emotional

intelligence? What are your thoughts around that?

Well, I think going back to your previous

point, which which links to this question is that it is something

that you can work on and improve. And actually it's one

of those unique areas almost that you can almost get better

with age. Because older people as you get older and you have

more experience you do tend to become better with your

emotional intelligence, which is quite an interesting, and

there's data to back this up. It's not just me with some, you

know, stereotype that I'm forcing on you. So it's quite

interesting. Daniel Goleman has written quite a lot around

emotional intelligence using what's called EQ that the fact

that actually your EQ is a better skill set and marker than

your IQ for people but he looks at five areas in terms of how he

defines it or how you demonstrate it. There's a thing

about self awareness which we've been talking about a lot, that

thing about being curious, inquiring what's important to

that person that you're talking to or engaging with or

understanding for yourself what's important to you. Self

regulation, so removing that up and down of emotion that can

happen, leading by example, which we've already talked about

quite a few times. Motivation is the third area that he talks

about a lot. So understanding and we mentioned this a lot

going back to the why understanding the why what what

your why is and what someone else's, why it is and how you

use in a form of optimism to motivate and again, I think

we've we've talked about the fact that leaders can often do

scaremongering tactics to try and get action from their teams.

Actually, there's the emotional intelligence around optimism is

a really great driver. And takes greater action. Empathy, we've

talked a lot about and then the social skills so that connection

to communication. For me, I think there's the skills of

listening, making sure that you're being fully involved in

that conversation and fully understanding of the other

person. It's really important we don't bring our own judgement

into discussions that we're having as a leader, and that we

don't go to that place of trying to figure out a solution, which

particularly if you're a high achiever, you might want to get

in there and tackle topics straight away. But that can turn

a lot of people off. And so it is that thing for me about being

curious and asking lots of questions, open ended questions,

don't close down the discussion and listen for emotions in

people. So it might be some physical things that you can see

in people but it might be words that they use to then go on and

expressing emotion and I suppose the other thing is how you

respond to someone. So using words to say that you recognise

what someone's feelings are, that you empathise with, that

sounds really upsetting or I can understand why you're feeling

like that. Is a really good way to demonstrate that empathy and

emotional intelligence if someone else and gets them to

open up.

Absolutely. And it's funny, you should talk

about kind of then what do you do when someone has shared with

you? How do you respond to that and actually I did some training

today in my day job around supporting people in your

organisations to speak up when potentially something goes

wrong. And there was a huge amount in there about how you

recognise how challenging it can be for people to actually share

where they're at, raise concerns, and actually a really

important part not only of that, is saying what you're going to

do about it, and reflecting back what you've heard, and checking

in that what you've heard is what that person is trying to

say to you, that just the basics of thanking somebody for sharing

something that might actually have felt like a challenge for

them can go a long way in terms of connection and empathy. So

yeah, it's interesting that you mentioned a couple of things

that you've said that really resonated with me so it's funny

that you should talk about how with age yu probably your EQ, so

your emotional quality and probably improves because of the

experience that you bring, but I've had experiences before

where I started new, very senior roles and actually been put into

some quite difficult challenging conversations with people. I

actually had somebody say to me afterwards, after a particularly

challenging conversation, I was really surprised at how well you

handled that person and how you were able to defuse that

situation. I wasn't expecting you to be able to do that so

well, because you're so young. So I do think, you know, there's

the flip side to that, which is making an assumption that that

maybe people don't come with that level of emotional

intelligence, because maybe it comes more ayurally in the the

way that they deal with but But the other point that he made

that really resonated with me and actually, I was thinking

about this in terms of you know, we like to share I always like

to share some top tips and I don't want to overdo it, but the

judgement piece I think is really important as a leader,

trying your very best to be non judgmental, and I know everyone

comes with their own judgments and their own biases around

certain situations. But I think as a leader, you really have to

try and put those judgments aside and be very open minded

about the conversations that you're having with people, what

you're hearing and and the potential actions you might need

to take that yeah, it was a really important point that you

made there Lee around the judgement.

I think that was one of my biggest learning areas

as a leader as I was going up for my kind of career ladder. It

was about that judgement. Because I was using my

experience and my context, which was someone who's very driven,

very focused, completer finisher wants to get stuff done,

obviously then progressed at quite a young age to quite a

senior position, and then had junior members of staff and I

would sometimes have that view of I've done your job I

understand it and therefore I poo pooed almost sometimes when

they couldn't do something or and I don't just mean that from

a skill set if they were generally didn't want to make a

phone call or something because or couldn't connect with someone

and I and I did that and so I had to learn that lesson around

putting myself or putting them in my shoes. I needed to turn it

the other way around.

Absolutely. It's something I've had quite a

lot of conversations about throughout my both my management

and my leadership career, I would say around also the sort

of expectations that you have of your own self can't always be

the expectations that you have of other people because other

people, as you say have very different drivers, very

different experiences. And just because something might make me

really driven in the workplace doesn't mean that that's what's

what's driving and motivating someone else. So again, I think

that's another way as a leader that you really need to sort of

demonstrate and act on your emotional intelligence by habit

that kind of insight into the way that other people operate as

well as the way that you that you operate yourself. So that's

a good segway Lee, we're starting now to talk about other

people and how we're supporting other people as leaders. But I

guess my question to you is and I'm not entirely convinced

there's a one size fits all answer here and we're going to

get this right but how is leaders can we start to think

about building emotionally intelligent teams and how can we

potentially I guess, actively start recruiting for emotional

intelligence?

It's an interesting one. And I think if

I if I tackle the first part of it, I think it goes back to that

previous point around the standard that you set so you

build your team, only to be emotionally intelligent if

you're showing that yourself. But I think and it goes back to

one of our previous episodes, where we were talking about

strengths becoming weaknesses or superpowers can become your

weakness and I think the same is said of emotional intelligence.

So if you overuse one type of EQ, then that can become a

weakness. So if you overemphasise for someone, you

might not take the tough calls and needed in the team, for

example. So you've got to find a balance and that's a really

important skill to demonstrate in your team, I would say and I

think the other thing for leaders these days is to make

sure that they're seeking that feedback and receiving honest

feedback. And so that isn't about just genuinely how things

are going but that feedback that can help them understand their

impact as a leader, including their emotional intelligence,

and I've seen this work really well in organisations where they

might have, I don't know a CEO advisory group or something like

that, where they'll get a really small number of people together,

who just tells it like it is and how it's feeling for people and

and that can then give you as a leader quite a bit of

reflection, and it's a different voice to perhaps the ones that

you're surrounding yourself with every day.

I really like that actually. And it's funny

you should mention that in terms of seeking feedback because I

think there is something for me about how you work with your

team or your teams or your wider organisation about understanding

what it feels like and I think that's what we're talking about

here, isn't it? What does it feel like to be part of this

team? What does it feel like to be part of this organisation?

And actually, if what you're hearing back is that, it doesn't

actually feel that great, then you move on to like, what do we

need to do? What do we need to act on? To make that positive

impact and make the change. So for me, I think yeah, that's a

really important point that you make. And I think there is

something for me and I don't think this is the be all and the

end all. But I do think that when I have worked with teams

and in organisations that I would consider to have a fairly

high EQ, that they have generally tended to be in places

where the recruitment processes have been very much more values

based, rather than skills based. And I think that does have an

impact on how you start to build and recruit for emotionally

intelligent teams because you are testing and asking people to

demonstrate something quite different if you go through a

values based recruitment process, thanif you're going

through a process, but you have to demonstrate you're the best

accountant or the best, whatever. So, for me, I think

that that could be one opportunity to start to think

differently about how you recruit into teams.

I think that that goes back to that point around

EQ and IQ and absolutely plays in on the recruitment process

because I think EQ Trumps IQ when you're recruiting so I

completely agree.

I love that I feel like that's gonna be the

quote of the episode EQ trumps IQ 100% agree with you. So I

feel like we could probably talk about this topic for much

longer, but I'm conscious of people's time listening to us

and so I'm just gonna try to round us up with some top tips

as we always like to to share those top tips and how tos so

Lee, what would your how to be?

I would say my number one thing would be

remembered that you set the standard as a leader, you're the

person who holds the power, your juniors are not going to be open

and share their feelings if you don't go there first. So I think

for me that's the top takeaway could also make a recommendation

because I just finished a book I was reading, absolutely love

Go for it.

And it's called Connect by David Bradford and

Carol Robin, and it's about building exceptional

relationships with people, but they're completely bringing

together emotional intelligence and the IQ part of as well so

much around interpersonal dynamics in this book, lots of

different scenarios and case studies that you could work

through as a leader and some really great self reflection

questions in there. I've got like 100 pages turned down with

this book here. So it just struck me so I will put it in

the show notes, but I just wanted to give that book a shout

out.

Brilliant. I love the top tip that's also a

recommendation. So thank you so much, Lee, and as always, don't

disagree with your top tips. I guess for me, I would just maybe

add in there something around taking the time to reflect and

understand your own perspective, your own reactions to certain

things, possibly even some of your triggers, so that you can

be more aware of how you might manage some of that as a leader

in the workplace. And I definitely think just being

aware of that judgement piece once you said that that really

resonated with me. So really trying to try your absolute best

to be as non judgmental as possible in that space as a

leader I think is really important if you want to build

those relationships

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