Competitive Intelligence

What is Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence (often abbreviated to either EI or EQ) is generally used to describe a person who is in charge of their emotions. Although it is much more complicated than this (naturally!) it basically does mean the understanding and hence controlling of emotions. If you are in charge of your EI and are keeping it in check, then you are generally in a “good place” emotionally, however, if you feel unhappy, unsettled or anxious for some reason, then your EI is pretty low. We are constantly surrounded by people with very high and very low emotional intelligence – can you think of any off the top of your head?

Emotional Intelligence is certainly something which can be learned, and potential top young executives are busy developing their EI as we speak, in an effort to climb the corporate ladder to the top.  If you think about it, the guys at the top of the ladder are generally the ones with high leadership skills and emotional intelligence – anyone who is able to remain in control of their emotions is potentially a very valuable member of any team.

Five Areas of Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence can be broken down into 5 sub-categories:

Self -Awareness relates to the ability to focus on your personal emotional state during any situation and act accordingly. If, for example, a person with high self-awareness is feeling angry, but knows that he/she is feeling angry and why, then they are in a good place to make decisions based on those facts.

Self-Motivation means that a person is able to motivate themselves towards their own personal goals, no matter what gets in their way. This means that they need to remain optimistic, driven, confident and persistent in pursuit of those goals. Negative emotions are certainly not conducive to self motivation.

Self-Regulation is another important factor for emotional intelligence. This calls for lots of self control, but can be mastered with practice and when you achieve complete self-regulation it allows you to take complete ownership of your emotions, stops you from becoming a victim of some other persons emotions (someone who has low emotional intelligence) and allows you to really focus on the positive.

Empathy is important too, it means that you can see life from another person’s perspective, thereby putting you in a good place to guide them towards a state of optimism and positivity, effectively increasing their emotional intelligence.

Nurturing Relationships is a vital characteristic of any successful leader. It means that you can be sincere in your compassion and genuine interest in others, whilst leading your team towards their goal with respect.