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Online Learning Just for You

Praxis You

This Spring, More Than Sound will launch Praxis You, our new online learning platform for personal and professional development.

To help us develop useful, practical courses for you, please take a few moments to take a very short survey.

As a thank you, we’ll give you free access to module one of our first course, Thriving on Change.

Be sure to provide your email address when you’re done with the survey.

How Praxis You Works

Our one-of-a-kind learning sessions are designed to help you harness the knowledge necessary to achieve your full potential. The content includes the latest research, real-life experiences, relevant guidance, and proven-effective tools.

Praxis You is designed to enlist all of your learning faculties. Each course offers a balance of:

  • video
  • audio
  • animation
  • self-assessments
  • discussion forums
  • downloadable practices
  • reading on your own time.

Praxis You also encourages relationship building with your peers and instructor through interactive dialogue during the course, and post-course follow-ups and evaluations.

Thought Leaders

Daniel Goleman, internationally renowned psychologist and author of What Makes a Leader: Why Emotional Intelligence Matters

Joseph Grenny, bestselling author of Crucial Conversations

Elad Levinson, leadership coach and business adviser. Read Elad’s LinkedIn series, Learn to Dance on Jell-O: Part 1 and Part 2.

Mirabai Bush, co-founder of The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society and author of Working with Mindfulness: Research and Practice of Mindful Techniques in Organizations

Sylvia Boorstein, founding teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center

Monica Worline, co-founder and President of organizational development firm Vervago

Theresa Glomb, Professor of Organizational Behavior at the University of Minnesota

Jane Dutton, Professor of Business Administration and Psychology at the University of Michigan

Jutta Tobias, lecturer on Business Performance Management

Juliet Adams, Director of A Head for Work, a firm specializing in leadership and workplace productivity

Learn More

Sign up for our free email newsletter to find out when and how to register for future courses. Email mike@morethansound.net.

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4 Tips for Introducing Young People to Mindfulness

Holistic Life Foundation

Introducing mindfulness to at-risk youth poses special challenges.

Ali and Atman Smith, and Andy Gonzalez of Holistic Life Foundation help children in one of Baltimore’s toughest neighborhoods find calm and confidence through yoga and meditation. Sam Himelstein, Behavioral Health Clinician at the Alameda County Juvenile Justice Center incorporates mindfulness with his young patients’ therapy.

All four men participated in last years Bridging the Hearts and Minds of Youth conference. They offered 4 practical tips to help educators, counselors and parents effectively introduce young people to mindfulness practices.

1. Meet them where they are. They may not be ready to sit upright, or even close their eyes. Start with simple steps, such as focus on your breathing.

2. Make it practical. Let them know that they can return to their breath, or focus on their thoughts no matter where they are or what they’re doing. This will help them practice more often.

 

3. Clarify the session. For instance, tell them, “We’re going to focus on our breath and notice whatever comes in.” It helps set expectations.

4. Don’t be attached to formality. Setting strict conditions is unrealistic. It may prevent people from wanting to practice.

HLF at TedX

Holistic Life Foundation

If you’re having trouble connecting with the young people you work with, fear not. There’s hope. It works. Holistic Life Foundation gave a TedX Talk about the effectiveness of their work in the community. HLF started in 2001 with 20 fifth-grade boys. The foundation’s after-school program introduced yoga, mindfulness, urban gardening, and teamwork. In a city where the dropout rate for high school students is routinely higher than 50%, 19 of those first 20 boys graduated and the other got his GED.

Watch the 2012 and 2013 Bridging the Hearts and Minds of Youth conferences for more insights behind the research and practice of mindful techniques in educational settings.

Source: HLF’s TedX Talk video from Mindful.org.

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Why a Fluid Leadership Style Gets Results

Leaders who have mastered four or more leadership styles – especially the authoritative, democratic, affiliative, and coaching – have the very best climate and business performance. And the most effective leaders switch flexibly among the leadership styles as needed.Such leaders don’t mechanically match their style to fit a checklist of situations – they are far more fluid. They are exquisitely sensitive to the impact they are having on others and seamlessly adjust their style to get the best results.

Fluid Leadership In Action

Consider Joan, the general manager of a major division at a global food and beverage company. Joan was appointed to her job while the division was in a deep crisis. It had not made its profit targets for six years; in the most recent year, it had missed by $50 million. Morale among the top management team was miserable; mistrust and resentments were rampant.

Joan’s directive from above was clear: turn the division around. Joan did so with a nimbleness in switching among leadership styles that is rare. From the start, she realized she had a short window to demonstrate effective leadership and to establish rapport and trust. She also knew that she urgently needed to be informed about what was not working, so her first task was to listen to key people.

During her first week on the job she had lunch and dinner meetings with each member of the management team. Joan sought to get each person’s understanding of the current situation. But her focus was not so much on learning how each person diagnosed the problem as on getting to know each manager as a person. Here Joan employed the affiliative style: she explored their lives, dreams, and aspirations.

She also stepped into the coaching role, looking for ways she could help the team members achieve what they wanted in their careers. She followed the one-on-one conversations with a three-day off-site meeting. Her goal here was team building, so that everyone would own whatever solution for the business problems emerged. Her initial stance at the offsite meeting was that of a democratic leader. She encouraged everyone to express freely their frustrations and complaints.

The next day, Joan had the group focus on solutions: each person made three specific proposals about what needed to be done. As Joan clustered the suggestions, a natural consensus emerged about priorities for the business, such as cutting costs. As the group came up with specific action plans, Joan got the commitment and buy-in she sought.

With that vision in place, Joan shifted into the authoritative style, assigning accountability for each follow-up step to specific executives and holding them responsible for their accomplishment.

Over the following months, Joan’s main stance was authoritative. She continually articulated the group’s new vision in a way that reminded each member of how his or her role was crucial to achieving these goals. And, especially during the first few weeks of the plan’s implementation, Joan felt that the urgency of the business crisis justified an occasional shift into the coercive style should someone fail to meet his or her responsibility. As she put it, “I had to be brutal about this follow-up and make sure this stuff happened. It was going to take discipline and focus.”

The results? Every aspect of climate improved. People were innovating. They were talking about the division’s vision and crowing about their commitment to new, clear goals. The ultimate proof of Joan’s fluid leadership style is written in black ink: after only seven months, her division exceeded its yearly profit target by $5 million.

Expand Your Repertory

Few leaders, of course, have all six styles in their repertory, and even fewer know when and how to use them. In fact, as these findings have been shown to leaders in many organizations, the most common responses have been, “But I have only two of those!” and, “I can’t use all those styles. It wouldn’t be natural.”

Such feelings are understandable, and in some cases, the antidote is relatively simple. The leader can build a team with members who employ styles she lacks.

Take the case of a VP for manufacturing. She successfully ran a global factory system largely by using the affiliative style. She was on the road constantly, meeting with plant managers, attending to their pressing concerns, and letting them know how much she cared about them personally.”¨ She left the division’s strategy – extreme efficiency – to a trusted lieutenant with a keen understanding of technology, and she delegated its performance standards to a colleague who was adept at the authoritative approach. She also had a pacesetter on her team who always visited the plants with her.

An alternative approach is for leaders to expand their own style repertories. To do so, leaders must first understand which emotional intelligence competencies underlie the leadership styles they are lacking. They can then work assiduously to increase their quotient of them.

For instance, an affiliative leader has strengths in three emotional intelligence competencies: in empathy, in building relationships, and in communication. Empathy – sensing how people are feeling in the moment – allows the affiliative leader to respond to employees in a way that is highly congruent with that person’s emotions, thus building rapport. The affiliative leader also displays a natural ease in forming new relationships, getting to know someone as a person, and cultivating a bond.

Finally, the outstanding affiliative leader has mastered the art of interpersonal communication, particularly in saying just the right thing or making the apt symbolic gesture at just the right moment. So if you are primarily a pacesetting leader who wants to be able to use the affiliative style more often, you would need to improve your level of empathy and, perhaps, your skills at building relationships or communicating effectively.

As another example, an authoritative leader who wants to add the democratic style to his repertory might need to work on the capabilities of collaboration and communication.

Hour to hour, day to day, week to week, executives must play their leadership styles like golf clubs, the right one at just the right time and in the right measure. The payoff is in the results.

Excerpt from Daniel Goleman’s book, What Makes a Leader: Why Emotional Intelligence Matters.

 

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Admitting failure: the first step to success

Daniel Goleman spoke with Bill George in the video series Leadership: A Master Class about how to recognize and groom authentic leaders. One of the traits George looks for in leadership candidates is their capacity to own their failures and move on. Below is an excerpt from their conversation.

Q&A: Daniel Goleman and Bill George discuss Authentic Leadership

Daniel Goleman: There’s a kind of norm that you’re valued for telling a story of success about yourself, and yet you’re saying you would value, say, in an interview situation, someone who was candid about their failures.

Bill George: Right. In fact, I say, don’t promote someone to a high-level position until they’ve actually confronted themselves and said, “I failed.”

DG: What’s the lesson there?

BG: Because I now know, that when tested by limits, I know that it’s not the end of the world. I can come back. I started a company that failed. I took the lessons from that and started another company. I became successful only because I knew what caused me to fail before.

DG: Failure is an ideal opportunity to learn resilience.

BG: Absolutely. What if you don’t have resilience? What if you’re not adaptable? What if you’re just going to stay the course, and you hit a detour? You hit a block in the road? You have to adapt, but you have to have the resilience to come back and fight another day.

DG: How do you train resilience? How do you encourage that?

BG: By getting people to talk honestly and openly about the challenges they face and how they’re going to deal with them. People need to know they have the support from their family, friends or colleagues – especially their supervisor. I also encourage investigating introspection tools. When I feel pressure, I go off and meditate. I process. Over time and with practice it’s become a valuable cleansing experience. After quiet contemplation, I notice that I start to say things such as, “Well, it’s not that big a deal. We’ll just go figure out how to deal with it. It’s not the end of the world.”

DG: You get a larger picture of what’s going on, instead of that narrow, hyper focus on what’s wrong, or what you perceive to be wrong.

BG: Yes, you’re not so caught up in the moment that you’re worried about all those little things. We’ll deal with it. I won’t say it’ll pass, but we’ll deal with it. That mindset then allows you to think more clearly. You’re less reactionary. You make better decisions, such as ask for help. That’s the wave of the future, by the way. Collaboration. Teamwork. It’s not, “I can do it myself. I’ll come back with a solution by tomorrow.” It rarely works. Not in business at least.

Admitting Failure

Develop sought-after leadership traits

Leadership A Master Class Training Guide

Leadership: A Master Class video series is now offered with comprehensive, customizable training materials to cultivate superior management skills.

Publishers HRD Press and More Than Sound have partnered to develop a comprehensive trainers guide based on Daniel Goleman’s video series, Leadership: A Master Class, which examines the best practices of top-performing executives.

The collection offers more than nine hours of research findings, case studies and valuable industry expertise through in-depth interviews with respected leaders in executive management, leadership development, organizational research, workplace psychology, innovation, negotiation and senior hiring.

HRD Press crafted an extensive, detailed training guide around the video content for human resources professionals, senior managers and executive coaches. Each module offers individual and group exercises, self-assessments, discussion guides, review of major points, and key actionable takeaway plans. The materials allow for instructor-led, self-study or online learning opportunities. Order your program here.

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Building Confidence: A Pillar of Well-Being

Build Confidence

By Rick HansonWe have natural needs to feel seen, understood, recognized, included, and valued. There’s nothing wrong with this! Having these needs fulfilled, particularly during childhood has a variety of positive consequences:

  • secure attachment
  • resilience
  • self-regulation
  • optimism
  • self-worth
  • exploration.

The resources that fulfill these needs are sometimes called “healthy narcissistic supplies.”

On the other hand, not meeting our interpersonal needs can lead to insecure attachment, reactivity, poor self-control, pessimism, inadequacy, and withdrawal.

Whether positive or negative, these traits often carry over from childhood to adulthood.

There is a place for healthy remorse in a moral person. But for most people, the shame spectrum of feelings is far too prominent in their psychology – typically not so much in terms of feeling chronic shame, but in terms of how they pull back from fully expressing themselves to avoid the awful experience of a shaming attack.

Some of these feelings include:

  • Inadequacy – Sense of being unfit, useless, not up to the task, inferior, mediocre, worthlessness, less than, one down, devalued
  • Humiliation – Embarrassment, disgrace, degradation, loss of face, slap in the face, comedown
  • Guilt – I did something bad; [I know it]
  • Shame – I am something bad; [they know it]
  • Remorse – Contrition, regret over wrong-doing, feeling abashed, self-reproach, conscience-stricken

These are powerful, sometimes crippling, even lethal emotions (e.g., people killing themselves for the blots they think they placed on their family’s honor).

“Confidence” in the deepest sense is an umbrella term referring to a sense of worth in your core – that you are loved and lovable, giving and contributing, valued, and a good person. Building confidence requires us to repeatedly internalize a sense of worth. This enables us to go for the gold, knowing that there’s a goodness inside that we can rely upon in times of trouble.

Shame is a very primal emotion, it grew and evolved with us through millions of years of evolutionary history, and as such it can be a difficult feeling to combat. To fight against it we need to develop a deep reservoir of inner resources which we can draw upon in a time of need.

Cultivate Inner Allies

In effect, we grow strong “inner allies” that protect us from our “inner critics.” To function in life, we need to learn from our experiences, and that requires feedback. We have to look in the mirror and see if there’s some spinach stuck in our teeth. We need that internal evaluator continually registering: that worked and that didn’t; that helped and that hurt.

As long as the evaluator is clear-eyed and friendly, that’s a wonderful internal resource. But if it grows harsh – often through absorbing the emotional residues of the anger and contempt of others, or the meanings derived from social exclusions – it can become a terrible monkey on your back. That’s the inner critic.

The process of growing inner strengths is the focus of my new online course The Foundations of Well-Being, which covers the 12 Pillars of Well-Being including Self-Caring, Mindfulness, Learning, Vitality, Gratitude, Confidence, Calm, Motivation, Intimacy, Courage, Aspiration, and Service.

To grow inner strengths – particularly the key inner strengths that will help the most with an issue – consider the four questions below. You can use them for yourself or explore them with others. Throughout, it’s good to have an attitude of curiosity, kindness toward oneself, and resourcefulness.

  1. What’s the issue?

Pick an issue. (Maybe you’re the rare person with just one.) Try to be reasonably specific. “Life sucks” could feel unfortunately true, but it doesn’t help you focus on resources or solutions.

If the issue is located in your world or body, be mindful of how it affects you psychologically. Sometimes we just can’t do anything about a condition in the world or body, but at least we can do something about our reactions to it.

  1. What psychological resource – inner strength – if it were more present in your mind, would really help with this issue?

This is the key question. It can be interestingly difficult to answer, so an initial confusion or struggle with it is common. Clues toward an answer could come from exploring these questions:
• What – if you felt or thought it more – would make things better?
• What – if you had felt it more as a child, or whenever the issue began – would have made a big difference?
• Does the issue ever get better for you – and if so, what factors in your mind (e.g., perspectives, feelings, motivations) help it be better?
• Deep down, related to this issue, what does your heart long for?
There could be more than one resource, of course, but for simplicity and focus, it does help to zero in on just one or two key resources at a time.

Sometimes we need to grow an intermediate resource (e.g., capacity to tolerate feeling rejected, so that we are willing to risk experiencing that feeling) in order to get at the key resource we need to develop inside (e.g., inclination to ask for love).

  1. How could you have experiences of this inner strength?

In other words, how could you activate it in your mind so that you can install it in your brain? (This is the first step – Have – of the HEAL process; you can learn more about it in my book, Hardwiring Happiness, or in this video on Taking in the Good.)

It could be that the resource is already present and you just need to notice it (e.g., the feeling that the body is basically alright right now). But often, you need to deliberately create it (e.g., call up a sense of determination from the emotional/somatic memory of times you pushed through a difficulty). In Hardwiring Happiness, I go through 16 ways to have (to activate) a beneficial experience, and you could draw upon one or more of these methods.

  1. How could you help this experience of the inner strength really sink in to you?

In other words, how could you enhance the installation, the neural encoding, of this experience to grow this resource inside yourself?

This involves the second and third steps of the HEAL process: Enrich and Absorb.

If you like, you can be aware of both the resource (e.g., feeling determined) and one or more psychological aspects of the issue (e.g., feeling helpless) so that the resource starts associating with and helping with these aspects of the issue.

Build Confidence

The Foundations of Well-Being program uses the power of positive neuroplasticity to hardwire more happiness, resilience, self-worth, love, and peace into your brain and your life.

This yearlong, online program is taught by Rick Hanson, Ph.D. – a neuropsychologist and Senior Fellow of the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley, and the New York Times bestselling author of Hardwiring Happiness, Buddha’s Brain, Just One Thing, and Mother Nurture.

Sign up for the course today.

Additional resources from Rick Hanson:

Managing the Caveman Brain in the 21st Century – The human brain evolved in three stages: reptile, mammal, and primate. Each stage has a core motivation: avoid harm, approach reward, and attach to “us.” Modern life challenges these ancient neural systems with bombardments of threat messages, the endless stimulation of desire, and social disconnections and tensions of industrial, multicultural societies. This talk from the Bridging the Hearts and Minds of Youth Conference will explore brain-savvy ways to cultivate mindfulness in young people, and then use that mindfulness to internalize a greater sense of strength and safety, contentment, and being loved.

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IQ or EQ? You Need Both

IQ versus EQ

The CEO of one of the world’s largest financial companies told me, “I hire the best and brightest – but I still get a Bell Curve for performance.” Why, he wanted to know, aren’t the smartest MBAs from top schools like Stanford, Harvard, and Wharton all highly successful on the job?

The answer lies in the interplay between IQ and emotional intelligence – and explains why you need both for high performance.

More than a century of research shows IQ is the best predictor of the job you can get and hold. It takes a high ability level in handling cognitive complexity to be in a profession like medicine, a C-suite executive, or a professor at one of those prestigious business schools.

The more your job revolves around cognitive tasks, the more strongly IQ will predict success. A computer programmer, accountant, and academic will all need strong cognitive skills to do well.

Then why the dismay of that CEO?

The more your success on the job depends on relating to people – whether in sales, as a team member, or as a leader – the more emotional intelligence matters. A high-enough IQ is necessary, but not sufficient, for success.

Just as is true for IQ, there are many models of emotional intelligence. In mine there are two main parts: self-mastery and social intelligence. The purely cognitive jobs require self-mastery – e.g., cognitive control, the ability to focus on the task at hand and ignore distractions.

But the second half of emotional intelligence, social adeptness, holds the key to that CEO’s question. As long as those super-smart MBAs are working by themselves, their IQ and self-mastery makes them high performers. But the minute they have to mesh on a team, meet clients, or lead, that skill set falls short. They also need social intelligence.

Claudio Fernandez-Aroaz, former head of research at Egon Zehnder International, spent decades hiring C-level executives for global companies. When he studied why some of those executives ended up being fired, he found that while they had been hired for their intelligence and business expertise – they were fired for a lack of emotional intelligence. Though they were smart, they were bullies or otherwise inept at people management.

Along the same lines, my colleague Richard Boyatzis, a professor at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western University, has found that the vast majority of leadership competencies that predict the performance of sales leaders are based on emotional and social intelligence – not cognitive intelligence (like IQ).

Then there’s a brand new meta-analysis of 132 different research studies involving more than 27,000 people, which I heard reported on by a co-author, Ronald Humphreys, a professor at Virginia Commonwealth University. That yet-to-be published analysis concluded that emotionally intelligent leaders have the most satisfied employees – if you like your boss, you’re more likely to like your job (just contemplate the opposite, morbid reality).

And reviewing all peer-reviewed research to date, the same study says emotional intelligence has been found to boost:

And then there’s general life satisfaction and the quality of your relationships.

So even though some academic studies seem to show emotional intelligence matters little for success in a job like sales, I’m skeptical.

 

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

LMC-TG-300x

Put theory into practice with the Leadership: A Master Class Training Guide. Each module offers individual and group exercises, self-assessments, discussion guides, review of major points, and key actionable takeaway plans. The materials allow for instructor-led, self-study or online learning opportunities. Includes over 8 hours of video footage with George Kohlrieser, Bill George, Teresa Amabile and more.

What Makes a Leader

What Makes a Leader: Why Emotional Intelligence Matters presents Daniel Goleman’s groundbreaking, highly-sought Harvard Business Review and Egon Zehnder International articles compiled in one volume. This often-cited, proven-effective material has become essential reading for leaders, coaches and educators committed to fostering stellar management, increasing performance, and driving innovation.

FURTHER READING

Let’s not underrate emotional intelligence

It’s not IQ part 2

Leader spotting: 4 essential talents

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Bridge the gaps: what are your emotional intelligence strengths and limits?

How’s your emotional intelligence?

Just as for IQ, there are several theoretical models of emotional intelligence, each supported by its own set of research findings. Daniel Goleman’s model, which has fared well in predicting actual business performance, looks at a spectrum of EI-based competencies that help leaders to be more effective.

Here are some questions that will help you reflect on your own mix of strengths and limits in EI. This is not a “test” of EI, but more of a “taste” to get you thinking about your own competencies:

  1. Are you usually aware of your feelings and why you feel that way?
  2. Are you aware of your limitations as a leader, as well as your personal strengths?
  3. Can you manage your distressing emotions, such as by recovering quickly when you get upset or stressed?
  4. Can you adapt smoothly to changing realities?
  5. Do you keep your focus on your main goals, and know the steps it takes to get there?
  6. Can you usually sense the feelings of the people you interact with and understand their way of seeing things?
  7. Do you have a knack for persuasion and using your influence effectively?
  8. Can you guide a negotiation to a satisfactory agreement and help settle conflicts?
  9. Do you work well on a team, or do you prefer to work on your own?

In addition to a self-evaluation, it can be helpful to solicit honest feedback from peers, either in the form of anonymous written critiques or in a group setting with people who know you and can  give you feedback about your behavior.

You can also investigate the 360-degree Multi-Rater Assessment, a process that Daniel Goleman helped to develop. Here’s how it works: a certified coach asks your bosses, peers, direct reports, clients, and sometimes family members to critique your emotional and social intelligence abilities. Using this feedback, you can then start to understand the gaps in your EI abilities and look for ways to improve your performance.

No matter which approach you take, chances are you’ll receive some negative feedback. Try not to to focus on your EI shortcomings though; they’re just as important in order to fully understand your strengths.

emotional intelligence mattersLearn more about developing your emotional intelligence in Daniel Goleman’s book, What Makes a Leader: Why Emotional Intelligence Matters. The book presents Goleman’s groundbreaking and highly-sought after articles from the Harvard Business Review as well as his Egon Zehnder International articles compiled in one volume. This often-cited material is proven-effective and has become essential reading for leaders, coaches, and educators committed to fostering stellar management, increasing performance, and driving innovation.

Consider your “deepest values and loftiest dreams.” How would these be part of your daily life? – See more at: http://www.success.com/article/the-leadership-secret-to-supercharging-your-team#sthash.szPKo2h8.dpuf

To figure out which aspects of emotional intelligence need work, Goleman’s What Makes a Leader suggests “imagining your ideal self” five to 10 years from now. What would your typical day be like? Who would be there? What sorts of relationships would you have with them? Consider your “deepest values and loftiest dreams.” How would these be part of your daily life?

Next: Learn how your ideal self compares with your current self. Goleman recommends answering such questions as:

• Are you usually aware of your feelings and why you feel that way?
• Can you manage your distressing emotions well””e.g., recover quickly when you get upset or stressed?
• Can you usually sense the feelings of the people you interact with and understand their way of seeing things?
• Do you have a knack for persuasion and using your influence effectively?

Don’t just introspect. You also need to find out how you make others feel and how they see your leadership style. This can be tough to glean, of course, especially from employees. One possibility is to solicit anonymous written critiques. You also might form or join a support group in which peers who know you well (perhaps outside your company) give you frank opinions about your behavior.

Then there’s “360-degree Feedback,” a process Goleman helped develop. In 360, a certified coach would have bosses, peers, direct reports, clients and sometimes family members critique your “social intelligence”””the empathy and social-skills part of EI. Among other things, they would consider your sensitivity to people’s needs, your mentoring style, your interest in others’ opinions and your tendency (or lack thereof) to bring out the best in people.

Once the feedback rolls in, resist the temptation to dwell only on your EI shortcomings. It’s “just as important, maybe even more so, to understand your strengths,” Goleman writes. He finds, for instance, that most entrepreneurs are resilient and innovative. “Knowing where your real self overlaps with your ideal self will give you the positive energy you need to move forward to the next step in the process””bridging the gaps.”

– See more at: http://www.success.com/article/the-leadership-secret-to-supercharging-your-team#sthash.szPKo2h8.dp

To figure out which aspects of emotional intelligence need work, Goleman’s What Makes a Leader suggests “imagining your ideal self” five to 10 years from now. What would your typical day be like? Who would be there? What sorts of relationships would you have with them? Consider your “deepest values and loftiest dreams.” How would these be part of your daily life?

Next: Learn how your ideal self compares with your current self. Goleman recommends answering such questions as:

• Are you usually aware of your feelings and why you feel that way?
• Can you manage your distressing emotions well””e.g., recover quickly when you get upset or stressed?
• Can you usually sense the feelings of the people you interact with and understand their way of seeing things?
• Do you have a knack for persuasion and using your influence effectively?

Don’t just introspect. You also need to find out how you make others feel and how they see your leadership style. This can be tough to glean, of course, especially from employees. One possibility is to solicit anonymous written critiques. You also might form or join a support group in which peers who know you well (perhaps outside your company) give you frank opinions about your behavior.

Then there’s “360-degree Feedback,” a process Goleman helped develop. In 360, a certified coach would have bosses, peers, direct reports, clients and sometimes family members critique your “social intelligence”””the empathy and social-skills part of EI. Among other things, they would consider your sensitivity to people’s needs, your mentoring style, your interest in others’ opinions and your tendency (or lack thereof) to bring out the best in people.

Once the feedback rolls in, resist the temptation to dwell only on your EI shortcomings. It’s “just as important, maybe even more so, to understand your strengths,” Goleman writes. He finds, for instance, that most entrepreneurs are resilient and innovative. “Knowing where your real self overlaps with your ideal self will give you the positive energy you need to move forward to the next step in the process””bridging the gaps.”

– See more at: http://www.success.com/article/the-leadership-secret-to-supercharging-your-team#sthash.szPKo2h8.dpuf

To figure out which aspects of emotional intelligence need work, Goleman’s What Makes a Leader suggests “imagining your ideal self” five to 10 years from now. What would your typical day be like? Who would be there? What sorts of relationships would you have with them? Consider your “deepest values and loftiest dreams.” How would these be part of your daily life?

Next: Learn how your ideal self compares with your current self. Goleman recommends answering such questions as:

• Are you usually aware of your feelings and why you feel that way?
• Can you manage your distressing emotions well””e.g., recover quickly when you get upset or stressed?
• Can you usually sense the feelings of the people you interact with and understand their way of seeing things?
• Do you have a knack for persuasion and using your influence effectively?

Don’t just introspect. You also need to find out how you make others feel and how they see your leadership style. This can be tough to glean, of course, especially from employees. One possibility is to solicit anonymous written critiques. You also might form or join a support group in which peers who know you well (perhaps outside your company) give you frank opinions about your behavior.

Then there’s “360-degree Feedback,” a process Goleman helped develop. In 360, a certified coach would have bosses, peers, direct reports, clients and sometimes family members critique your “social intelligence”””the empathy and social-skills part of EI. Among other things, they would consider your sensitivity to people’s needs, your mentoring style, your interest in others’ opinions and your tendency (or lack thereof) to bring out the best in people.

Once the feedback rolls in, resist the temptation to dwell only on your EI shortcomings. It’s “just as important, maybe even more so, to understand your strengths,” Goleman writes. He finds, for instance, that most entrepreneurs are resilient and innovative. “Knowing where your real self overlaps with your ideal self will give you the positive energy you need to move forward to the next step in the process””bridging the gaps.”

– See more at: http://www.success.com/article/the-leadership-secret-to-supercharging-your-team#sthash.szPKo2h8.dpuf

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