Emotional Intelligence: EQ vs. EI vs. IQ

Emotional Intelligence: EI vs. EQ vs. IQ

In the early 1900s people searching for a predictor of success settled on Intelligence Quotient or IQ.  It seemed reasonable that more intelligence would: 1) open doors such as advanced education required for certain high prestige careers and 2) provide a means to figure out the secrets of success.  Throughout the century, better tests and a wider variety of tests were created to more accurately predict success.  The SAT was created to predict success in college, MSAT in management curriculum and LSAT in law school.  Some tests were designed to differentiate between IQs of 70 and 80, others between 90 and 110 and others between 135 and 145.  Each test had its special purpose, its supporters and its detractors.

But it became clear that while IQ was important, there were other factors that were perhaps even more important.  Studies in the 1980s and 1990s showed that there was less than a 25% correlation between IQ and career success.  We have all heard of taxi drivers with Ph.D.s and company presidents who cannot create coherent sentences.  Stories abound that show wasted capability such as a person who scored very high on IQ tests, worked as a bouncer in a bar, parked his Harley motorcycle in his kitchen and read Greek and Latin classics in their original language.

We now know that there are many factors that affect success.  The one I wish to focus on is emotional quotient (EQ).  Today’s literature calls it “emotional intelligence” and abbreviates it “EQ.”  For two reasons, I believe the term Emotional Quotient is more appropriate than Emotional Intelligence.  First, the discussions center around the difference between intelligence (ability to reason) and emotion so I believe combining the terms emotional and intelligence may lead to confusion.  Second, if we see emotional as an adjective and intelligence as a noun, it means a cognitive understanding of emotions, while the literature usually refers to the identifying, feeling and using emotions.

For example:  In the past, we may have bought products based on the characteristic of the product.  Today, with so many variations on products that can satisfy our need – frequently manufactured by the same company and packaged differently for different resellers – we have moved to relationship buying.  We do not buy from someone we do not trust or like.  We are much more likely to buy from someone we trust and like.  Thus a person who has a high ability to recognize, identify and feel emotions in him/herself and others (high EQ) will become a more successful salesperson.

People with high EQ will have more friends and mentors in companies and thus advance faster than a person of equal (or perhaps greater) IQ.

Likewise, people with high EQ will be better liked and more appreciated in the community or in politics and be able to solicit more backers for their proposals.

Some careers require a high IQ just to get into the career.  A study was done of 80 scientists with Ph.D. degrees and it was found that an IQ of about 120 was required to get into their program in college, but ten of fifteen more points of IQ did not predict their eventual success compared to others.  Those with a higher EQ enjoyed more success.  A conclusion from this study was that IQ set a floor or threshold for entry into the career, but that once that threshold was met, EQ determined the eventual success.

The benefit, if EQ a greater indicator of life success than IQ, is that EQ can be modified through a program of directed learning.  Regardless of your IQ or current level of success, you can increase your EQ and thus increase your life success.  You truly are the master of your destiny.

What is Emotional Intelligence?

What is Emotional Intelligence?

Several different definitions have been suggested for emotional intelligence, and a few authors have suggested different names, stating that the name “Emotional Intelligence” is not what we really mean.  The definition I use is, “Our ability to recognize, feel, control and use our emotions, and to recognize and respond to others’ emotions in a mutually beneficial relationship.”  “Control” does not mean to eliminate or suppress emotions, but to express them in healthy, socially acceptable ways.

Further, much of the literature contrasts Emotional Intelligence with Intelligence Quotient.  For that reason, I prefer the term Emotional Quotient, recognizing that intelligence and emotion are two different functions, both of which can help us or hinder us in reaching success as we define it.

There seems to be three camps on emotional intelligence: ability-based, trait-based and popularized.  Ability-based, first defined by Salovey and Mayer in 1990, uses standardized tests and compares your results with that of others who have taken the tests.  This seems to be the camp most educational institutions favor.  They define four areas of abilities:

The ability to accurately perceive emotions,

The ability or use emotions to facilitate thinking,

The ability to understand emotional meaning and

The ability to manage emotions.

The second “ability” listed seems to place emotions in a subservient position to thinking where I believe emotion and thinking must separate but equal.

The trait-based, defined by Petrides, uses self-reporting to measure an individual’s self-perception of their emotional abilities.  This method recognizes that emotion lies outside a person’s cognitive ability.

The popularized model, from Goleman in 1995, is also called the mixed model.  It recognizes four constructs:

Self-awareness,

Self-management,

Social awareness and

Relationship management.

There are many tests on the internet for self-assessment in each of these four areas.  Some of these tests report your strengths in each tested area as a percentile of all people who have taken the test.  These tests are subject to “faking it” and on the ones I have taken, the instructions are inadequate such as the time range to consider to answer a question (the past hour, month, year, decade, since a significant emotional event in my life, etc).

The better you understand your emotions and can manage them, and the better you can recognize others’ emotions and properly respond to them, the better your chances of career or life success.  Helping you achieve that understanding and ability is my goal and the definition of Emotional Intelligence.

Goal Achieving: Discovering Your Passion

Goal Achieving:  Discovering Your Passion

It is much easier to continuing working toward your goal, even in the face of obstacles, if your goal is one of your passions.  But how do you know your passions?

Method 1:  What you talk about.

For a week or two, keep track of what you talk about with your friends and what you do with your free time.  Do not include conversations of activities in which you have little or no control, such as activities at work or conversations dictated by your school.  At the end of the time, review your lists and rank activities and conversations for frequency.  Those items that have scored the highest are probably passions.

Method 2:  Your 100^th birthday speech.

Pretend you are now 100 years old.  Give a speech to your friends and neighbors about what you learned in life and what events or activities have given you the greatest pride.  Those events or activities are probably passions.

Method 3:  Your eulogy.

Pretend you have just passed away and you are listening to your best friends giving your eulogy.  What do you want them to say?  It may be something that you have not yet accomplished but want to be remembered for having done.  That what you wish to be remembered for is probably a passion.

Method 4:  Your epitaph.

Pretend you have passed away.  What do you want on your headstone as your epitaph?  This one is “get to the point with a few words.”  What you want to be remembered for with your epitaph is probably a passion.

It may be necessary to change the method used after you start, and it may be necessary to work on one method for several days or weeks.  Keep at it until you are satisfied that you are honest and complete in your answer.

Which ever method or methods you use, you now have an idea of what is important to you and have an idea of your passion or several of them.  Write a S.M.A.R.T. objective to support each passion.

If your passion is to be a good family man, your objective may be a process objective such as, “Spend 20 minutes with each child each day.”  An outcome objective may be, “Ensure son Jim reaches his objective of achieving the Eagle Scout award.”

If your passion is to own a large house on 160 acres, your objective may be, “By December, 2012, I will own a 4000 square foot or larger house on 160 acres.”  A subordinate goal may be, “By January 31, 2010, I will have a plan in place to achieve the house goal.”

Knowing what is important to you (your passion) and building your goals and objectives to support that passion will go a long way in achieving your goals.

Good luck in 2010 and beyond.

Business and Personal Development: Setting Goals

To achieve your goals you must first set the proper goals.  If you have set goals or objectives in the past, only to have them slip away unachieved, please continue reading this.

Of course our goals must be S.M.A.R.T. for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely.  This is the subject of a future blog.

Discover Your Passion

To start, you must identify your passion.  This is what you:

• talk about when you have the opportunity,

• read about or study on your own or

• do on your free time.

To discover your passion, for about two weeks record the subject of your conversations, books or magazines read and activities.   Do not record conversations, reading and activities in which you engage because you must such as school assignments, employment or legal requirements.  At the end of the two weeks, you should have a good idea of how you spend your discretionary time and efforts.

Some people have many passions and bounce from project to project.  If this describes you, choose one or two passions that have a high importance to you for the coming year and work with them.

Set Your Goals

With your passion discovered, write goals to support that passion.  For instance, if your passion is to work with disadvantaged people, your goal may be to get a degree in social work or to volunteer at the homeless shelter.  If you passion is travel, your goal may be to visit three new countries in the coming year or to visit all 50 states.  If your passion is flying, your goal may be to get a pilot’s license or to purchase an airplane.  If your passion is earning money your goal may be to make your current annual income a monthly income.

Discover Your Governing Values

Make a list of your governing values.  These would be things like Truth, Freedom, Family, Spirituality, Health, Wealth, Obedience.  Prioritize the list by comparing the first two items and moving the higher priority to be above the other item.  Then do this for the next two.  Keep doing this, going through the list several times until all the items are in proper order.  As an example if the first two items on your list are truth and freedom, you may ask, “Would I lie to keep from going to jail?”  If “Yes,” then freedom is a higher priority, if “No,” then truth is a higher priority.

Apply Your Governing Values

Now compare your goals to your governing values.  Where there is a conflict, the goal will lose.  If necessary, adjust your goal to eliminate the conflict.  An example would be that if your goals require that you work 80 hours per week and a high priority value is family, you will need to adjust your goal or get your family’s acceptance of that goal for you.

Keep the three lists (passions, goals, governing values) together where you can see them daily or more frequently.  Your goals are where you are going because of your passion, but controlled by your governing values.

Develop Your Action Plan

Many of the example goals and the goals you may choose will require sub-goals.  For example, to make your annual income your monthly income may require sub-goals of: 1) research alternative methods of getting income and select the best one or two for me, 2) get the education or training necessary to become successful in my new endeavors, 3) create a business plan and 4) execute the business plan.  As you write each of your sub-goals, be sure to make them    S.M.A.R.T. goals

For each of your goals or sub-goals create an action plan that will take you from where you are to where you need to be, including milestone checkpoints to track your progress and adjust your action plan as necessary.

Goal achieving is the subject of a future blog.

Good Luck on setting ACHIEVABLE goals.

I Cannot Do It All Myself

I Cannot Do It All Myself

Monday a.m. – Make a list of things to do; put the items into three groups A (critical), B (important) and C (nice to get done); prioritize the “A’s”, and start with the A1 task. Monday evening, I know that I worked on the most important things – but I did not come close to accomplishing what was necessary. Tuesday, it will be the same thing all over again with more items on my to-do-list.

I would hire someone to share my workload except for three reasons: 1) no budget for another person on staff, 2) it takes a lot of time (which I do not have) to hire someone and 3) it takes a lot of time (which I do not have) to train someone.

It is a good thing I am a man because when I pull all of my hair out in frustration, I can attribute it to male pattern baldness.

But there is a better way. After you prioritize your tasks, start at the top and decide who should do each one. Remember to do what you do best and hire out the rest.

If you are a consultant or coach, any task that is not consulting, coaching or client contact should be delegated to outside experts. That means that you should let: 1) a real estate agent find that new office for you after you give her your requirements, 2) an accounting firm do your books and billing, 3) a web design expert design and run your web site and 4) a sales professional make your cold calls.

If you are a speaker anything that is not speaking, content creation or reputation building should be delegated to outside experts. Let someone else who knows how and has the professional equipment duplicate your CDs.

Even outside your business the principle applies equally. I used to repair my own car – to the extent of rebuilding the engine; now I take it to the dealer. We have a cleaning service clean our house monthly (kids are married). Hire a lawn care service to take care of your yard so you have the time to have fun. If you enjoy the task and have time, do it. If you do not enjoy it, hire it done.

Please remember that “delegate” does not mean you abdicate your responsibility in the areas of timeliness and quality. It is your business so be sure your outside experts are aware of your schedule and quality requirements. If they do not meet your expectations – do not micromanage them (remember, you do not have enough time) – replace them. As you move forward in your business building, you will create more and more solid business relationships with the outside experts and can focus on doing what you do best and like the most.

7 Negative Emotions, 7 Positive Emotions

7 Negative Emotions / 7 Positive Emotions

Napoleon Hill, in his book Think and Grow Rich, published in 1937, listed seven negative emotions to avoid if you want to achieve success. The emotions are:
Jealousy,
Anger,
Greed,
Fear,
Hatred,
Revenge and
Superstition.

I have studied this list, written about the emotions, discussed them in study groups and reflected at length on them. On the question of which is most important, most powerful, or the worst in terms of business success, I have heard powerful arguments for each one. The selection seems to be determined by which emotion a person has recently experienced, either internally or he or she has been the recipient of acts caused by the emotion in another person. Careful reflection will reveal that any one, alone or in conjunction with others, will be fatal to business success or personal success.

We need to eliminate all of those negative emotions, but if we just eliminate them, there will be a vacuum. We must fill that vacuum with the seven positive emotions. Again, Napoleon Hill gives us his list.
Desire
Faith
Love
Sex
Enthusiasm
Romance
Hope

He states that there are other positive emotions but they could be classified under the above list.

If we do not use the positive emotions, the vacuum will be filled by the negative emotions because we are constantly bombarded by them from news, society, entertainment, friends, family and co-workers.

As with a muscle, using emotions strengthens them. The more we feel an emotion, the stronger it becomes.

To take control of your emotions and build the positive emotions, focus on a positive emotion such as desire. What do you desire? How will you feel when you have the object? Feel good about it. Hold that desire and feeling for at least 30 seconds. Do this for the same emotion for 21 days then move to another positive emotion.

When you feel any negative emotion, stop, acknowledge it, and dismiss the emotion. Do not bury it, just let it go. For example if you get angry at other people, it causes you to feel bad, waste time and mental power thinking about that anger, develop stomach acid and make poor decisions – but all the anger you direct at other people does nothing to them. They probably do not even know you are angry at them, and if they did know, probably do not care. Your anger at other people hurts you and does not affect them at all.

Developing the positive emotions is very good for two reasons: 1) they replace the negative emotions, but more important, 2) they are the path to success.

Develop your positive emotions and have a successful 2010!

Hugh Curley

How to Beat Jet Lag

Jet lag is a very real problem that saps you of your strength and alertness necessary in today’s fast moving, high pressure, world.  If you fly long distance for business or pleasure, here are some proven methods to reduce the problems of jet lag and get you up to prime shape as quickly as possible.

1)      Get into the new time zone as quickly as possible.  Even before you leave on the trip, if possible.  Stay awake and active during the new daytime, and sleep (or at least rest) during the new nighttime.  Once you arrive, try to be in the sunlight to help you adjusts to the new daily rhythm.

2)      Some experienced travelers recommend a small dose of Melatonin to help you sleep; I do not recommend any drugs.  Wear eye covers while sleeping if the plane cabin is bright.

3)      Avoid, or at least reduce your intake of, alcohol and stimulants like coffee and tea.  You want your body to adjust to the new time zone, not be adjusted to it.

4)      If you have a layover of 5 or more hours at an airport when the people in your new time zone are asleep, get a room at the airport or check into a hotel for some sleep.  Some airports have beds available (CHANGi in Singapore for example) and many airports have hotels on the airport (Logan in Boston for example).  A hot, brisk shower when you wake up will refresh you and help you adjust.

5)      If possible, arrange your arrival time for late afternoon or early evening.  Then by the time you check into your hotel and get unpacked, it is time to sleep so you will be fresh for the next day.  When flying from San Francisco to Tokyo, I arrived at Narita about 3:30 p.m. and was checked into the hotel at about 6:00 p.m.  After an hour relaxing, I was ready to sleep and the next morning I awoke ready for a full day.

6)      Drink much more water than normal, for two reasons.  The air on the airplane is dry and it will dehydrate your body, and it forces you to move around to get rid of it.

7)      If possible, arrive a day before your business begins.  It will give you one more day to adjust, and also to take care of contingencies such as delayed luggage, snafus at immigration or customs and to verify the proper room setup and equipment operation.

8)      Tell yourself, with conviction and emotion, that you are no longer affected by jet lag – that is a thing of the past.  If you think you will have problems, you will.

Please add your own favorite method to help reduce jet lag.

Bon Voyage!

Hugh Curley