The 6 Core Skills of Emotional Intelligence

What's the real difference between a manager and a leader? While technical skills and industry knowledge matter, emotional intelligence often makes or breaks leadership effectiveness. In this episode, Kristen breaks down the Genos six key competencies of emotional intelligence and how they show up in leadership, while Mike adds his perspective (using an enlightening feelings wheel). Through practical examples and even a few Star Trek references, they explore how emotional intelligence impacts everything from decision-making to team performance. Whether you've heard of EI before or this is all new territory, you'll walk away understanding exactly what emotional intelligence looks like in action and how to start improving yours today.

Download your free PDF companion to this episode, featuring the Genos emotional intelligence model and 18 tips for boosting your EI: https://llpod.link/ei

Highlights:

• The history of emotional intelligence and how it became such an important leadership skill
• Why emotional intelligence can be learned (with the right approach) 
• The research-backed benefits of emotional intelligence for leadership effectiveness
• A breakdown of the six Genos emotional intelligence competencies: self-awareness, awareness of others, authenticity, emotional reasoning, self-management, and inspiring performance
• How to actually improve your emotional intelligence through reflection, feedback, and intentional habit formation
• The balance between showing authenticity and managing emotions as a leader
• The critical importance of understanding both emotional and logical information in decision-making

Links & Resources Mentioned

• Free PDF: 18 Ways to Boost Your Emotional Intelligence
• Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman
• Harvard Business Review: What Makes a Leader by Daniel Goleman
• Genos International
• Iron Sharpened Leadership by John Gronski
• Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss
• Feelings Wheel 2 Pack (from Amazon)

Podcast Website: www.loveandleadershippod.com
Instagram: @loveleaderpod

Follow us on LinkedIn!
Kristen: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristenbsharkey/
Mike: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-s-364970111/

Learn more about Kristen's leadership coaching and facilitation services: http://www.emboldify.com

Transcript

Kristen: Welcome to Love and Leadership, the podcast that helps you lead with both your head and your heart, plus a bit of humor. I'm Kristen Brun Sharkey, a leadership coach and facilitator.

Mike: And I'm Mike Sharkey, a senior living and hospitality executive. We're a couple of leadership nerds who also happen to be a couple.

Kristen: Join us each week as we share our unfiltered opinions, break down influential books, and interview inspiring guests.

Mike: Whether you're a seasoned executive or a rising star, we're here to help you level up your leadership game and amplify your impact.

Kristen: Hello, and welcome back to Love and Leadership. I'm Kristen 

Mike: and I'm Mike.

Kristen: and today we are talking about emotional intelligence, something we have

Mike: Absolutely none of.

Kristen: And I would just like to say that Mike has us ready with these lovely Amazon feelings wheels.

Mike: This one is giant. 

Kristen: Well, that's what's hilarious. 

Mike: It's so big.

Kristen: They were like you, they were a two pack

Mike: I thought it was the same size.

Kristen: Well, one of them is tiny. 

Mike: Well, one of them is appropriately sized for, like, taking into a therapy session and be like, I feel Sure. Vulnerable. Inferior. Empty. Okay, let's try a different one is massive.

Fulfilled. Respect. 

Kristen: The other one is massive.

Mike: Worthless, Insignificant, Adequate, Alienated, Disrespected, Ridiculed, Embarrassed, Holy, this is very depressing.

Kristen: Well, on that side of the feelings wheel is depressing.

Mike: is the good side? Okay, Optimistic, Inspired, Open, Playful, Sensitive, Hopeful, Loving, Provocative, Courageous,There are so many feelings.

Kristen: But yeah, so emotional intelligence is going to be the topic of today. So we are feelings wheel prepared. But before we get into that, we haven't done leadership moments in a while.

It's been a while since we recorded a topic discussion podcast episode. So Mike, what's yours?

Mike: Mine's easy. I got to promote somebody. Yeah. I kinda, I almost cried when I did it at our meeting.Yeah. I have a director who, She's in my square. What did we call that?

The square squad? Yeah. She's just, she's so intelligent and she's, she's erudite, she's educated and probably nobody ever told her that, you could be a leader or you could be the boss or anything like that. And she just was a follower. And I was like, Oh, you're awesome.

Let's work on this for a year. And, we just promoted her to a more senior leadership position. 

Kristen: And it's my favorite thing to get to see people grow.

Mike: I, something I really took away from Gianna is, she really looked for something that gave her, energy at work rather than, costing her energy. And that's definitely I think for sure my number one thing. 

Kristen: Yeah. Promoting people feels amazing, for sure.

Mike: Congratulations, unnamed colleague.

Kristen: Yes. Who won't know who she is at all. 

Mike: Well, she should be listening to this, but she's probably not.

Kristen: Probably not.

Mike: When I go into new positions, I always come in with, my lexicon of books that I want to share with everybody, and it's a library.

And if I can get anybody to read anything. It's an accomplishment. But this person is,

She's read I don't know, 25 books that I've handed her. Uh, yeah, everything I've, Extreme ownership, boundaries for leaders,Excellence Wins, Unreasonable hospitality, It's Your Ship, and now she's starting to like, having digested it and really putting it into practice.

And I can definitely go into a tangential soliloquy about, jujitsu.



Kristen: We have a lot to talk about.

Mike: Okay, fine. I'm sure I'm going to get edited on this. Yeah.

Kristen: Yeah. Sometimes when you're talking, I'm like, I'm gonna edit this.

Mike: She's like, you can talk as long as you want. Cut.

Cut. Cut. Strike. Strike.

Kristen: Yeah. Anyway, so my leadership moment, I guess, was just not like a particular moment, but I just wanted to briefly talk about this program that I'm in the middle of, it is a team coaching credential program through Brown University, and I'm absolutely loving it.

Team coaching as a service is very new still. So,the International Coaching Federation, which is like the main organization that does credentials for coaching in the U S, just added a credential for it, like I think a year and a half ago. And so it's all like, it's a really new field, but it's really interesting.

And it's really, it's all about like team dynamics and, there's a lot about, listening on what they, my program calls, an L4 level. So it's if there's three levels of listening, like, when you're talking one on one with somebody, there's a fourth level that's really the group, where you're really listening to the dynamics of the group, what the group is feeling.

This is something I do, a lot with facilitating, like if I'm facilitating a workshop, I'm sensing for like, okay, do people need a break? What's the, do we need to spend longer on activities, etc. You're sensing for what the group needs, but articulating it that way is really cool.

And then I'm also, just starting to read a book on senior leadership teams, and the makings of an effective senior leadership team based on all this research. So I will probably share some more insights from that on a separate episode, but I'm enjoying it. So I wanted to talk about it briefly.

Mike: That's cool. So you're sensing the vibe.

Kristen: Yeah, a lot of that. Yes. 

Mike: interesting, like there's a, I'm sure that,there's an individual psychology and then there's a group psychology too, and I think that's probably studied in like riots and mobs and things like that, how normal people might be normal, but when you put them together with enough people, they, their behavior changes.

Kristen: Yes. And as a practice, team coaching is interesting because the team is your client. Not the leader of the team. Not like any individuals on the team. It's really like the team as a whole is who you're coaching. So, it's very different. And you definitely pull in a lot of skills from one on one coaching, but there's like a whole other set of skills.

Mike: That's fascinating. That's smart.

Kristen: Yeah I'm excited to talk more about it in the future. 

Mike: I'm excited to hear more about it in the future. 

Kristen: But for today, our topic is emotional intelligence. So we, this is something we've mentioned a lot. I think, I'd be surprised if you're listening to this podcast and haven't heard of it at this point, but, I wanted to give a brief overview of like, what's the history of emotional intelligence?

What actually is it? And then get into the model that I use from a company called Genos for emotional intelligence, both for the assessments that I do and also for coaching. It's the model that I use for how to explain like, what is emotional intelligence? What are the different competencies involved?

And then how can you actually improve it? So we're going to get all into that today.but for the history of it, starting off there. Emotional intelligence, which you may also see referred to as EQ, like instead of IQ, EQ, or EI. I will abbreviate it a lot on this episode as EI, so just know that going forward, because it's a mouthful,But yeah, so it was first introduced by Howard Gardner in 1983, and that was when he was basically talking about how there's different types of intelligence.

Because IQ in itself doesn't really fully explain cognitive ability. And he introduced the concept of multiple intelligences. So that was in 1983. And then what we really know is emotional intelligence got introduced and widely known with the book Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman who was known as a lot of people as like the father of emotional intelligence.

And he also published a very famous Harvard Business Review article called What Makes a Leader that broke down his whole idea of emotional intelligence as well. And I'll link to that in the show notes. I think it was updated in 2004. It's very much an HBR classic, I would say.But yeah. So it's really, it's really only been around for a little under 30 years, and I feel like it's been very talked about in the past, 10 to 15 years, I would say, what I've seen in my career, at least, in my, in the tech industry, I think it might be a little slower. Some other industries. 

Mike: That's interesting because tech is usually at the forefront. But they're also probably on the higher, IQ side. Those don't always go together. 

Yeah. both can definitely be true. But I think you can learn it, right? Emotional intelligence is something that you should be able to study and learn even though it's these amorphic things called the feelings.

Kristen: That's a great segue, Mike.

Mike: Oh, is it?

Kristen: Because the next thing I was going to talk about is,what is emotional intelligence and can it be learned?

Which you can guess probably what the answer to that is for the latter question, but.

Mike: So do you need a feelings wheel? 



Kristen: We should do like love and leadership branded, feelings wheels, please go to our website and,We'll, um, add that to our currently non existent but will exist in the future

Mike: merch.

We need some merch, get the merch.

Kristen: We do have some unofficial, Love and Leadership merchandise, but just the mugs. But, We'll get a site out there eventually. 

So emotional intelligence, or EI, is the capacity to perceive, understand, and manage emotions in ourselves and in others. And Daniel Goleman, in that same Harvard Business Review article, he has a sidebar on, can it be learned? And his points on it are basically, there definitely is a strong genetic component to EI.

Nurture plays into it as well. So we definitely have our tendencies.

Mike: Hold on, let's go back to that. When you say genetic, that first of all to me says, nature versus nurture.

Kristen: Mm 

Mike: Those are very hard things to definitively observe because they are always interdependent with each other.

Kristen: I don't know that much about the specific studies, but, but there are a lot of studies on like personality traits, and breaking that through. And I think I might be flipping it, but I think they, have concluded that personality is like 60 percent

nature, 40 percent nurture. It could be the other way around, but it's a combination.

I mean, I certainly believe that 

Mike: But I think that,it bears discussion that you are going to grow up with,things that you came with.The nature, right?

Things that you came with. So you may have to work harder in some areas to learn different things. And some things make more come more naturally. And definitely your upbringing plays a big part in it. 

Kristen: For for sure. Yeah, no, they're both factors. I think that's what

Mike: That's what they're saying.

Kristen: The field of psychology has concluded is that both nature and nurture have major effects on personality traits and also on emotional intelligence.

Now the relationship between emotional intelligence and personality traits is a whole debate within the field of psychology that I'm not gonna get into here. But yeah, I think we can generally, I, from what I have seen, not that I would know more than Daniel Goleman, but that what I have generally seen on like personality research and such has lined up with that so that those both play a role for sure.But there's also a lot of research that demonstrates that it can be learned in addition to what you have going into adulthood with both the nature and the nurture, right? EI also increases naturally with age with most people, like maturity, We tend to get higher in emotional intelligence than when, especially compared to, if you think about, your prefrontal cortex isn't really done developing until you're 25.

especially comparing to that, but even But there's definitely tendencies in that as people mature, but it can be developed just beyond that like that aging process as well. But but what he talks about in this sidebar is that the well it can be learned The most important thing is like how you're learning it because EI is basically born in the neurotransmitters of the brain's limbic system.

And this is a system that governs our feelings, impulses, and drives. And that part of the brain learns best through motivation, extended practice, and feedback. Whereas traditional training, is much more focused on like the analytical and technical sides of things and that is really not effective for EI.

So while it can be learned, you need to make sure that it's being learned in a way that works well with that part of the brain. And really, that fundamentally comes down to habits, right? Like breaking old behavioral habits and establishing new ones. That is the foundation of how you improve EI.

And It's also not going to happen without actual sincere desire and concerted effort because it's not something you would just learn in one workshop. It really takes consistent applied effort over time. So it can be learned if you're willing to put in the work, basically.

Mike: I feel like almost everything can be learned to some degree like you're never going to become as I'm unfortunately discovering Van Gogh.You can maximize your genetics, but I could train for a hundred years in this current body.

I would never be an Olympic weightlifter.,or an Olympic swimmer like they're 

Yeah. But I think as far as like we're talking about for leaders. Right?Like, you're always going to be working with some of your inherent tendencies and some things are going to drain you more than others.

Kristen: Like we, we are always working with what we are given, right? But if you're willing to put in that concerted effort over time 

Mike: Well, you can improve for sure.

Kristen: yeah, you can definitely improve

Mike: A lot more than you think. Yeah, for sure.

Kristen: Yep, forAnd then why would we want to improve our emotional intelligence. I'm not going to get into all of the research around this, but there, there is so much research out there around EI and leadership effectiveness. Workplace results and everything, but just to give a brief overview as some of the, what research has shown.

So basically leaders who have high EI are, make more effective decisions. Because they're both able to integrate the logical and the emotional information when making decisions and also just regulating your stress and emotions helps you make clear minded decisions as well. 

Mike: I think that's the crux of everything right there is like logical and emotional and, head and heart. Isn't that in our tagline or right? 

Kristen: We'll get into like decisions a little bit when we break down the model too, a little more, but yes. And the leaders with high EI, have better team engagement and collaboration because the empathy, active listening really makes team members feel more valued, increases trust, they have higher employee retention due to the increased engagement, they navigate conflict more effectively.

Because being tuned into the emotions of others and perspectives of others really helps when it comes down to conflict. They're better at coping with change and encouraging others to embrace it. And they overall create a more inclusive, innovative, and supportive organizational culture.

Both because that kind of empathy, positivity, create a culture of trust and psychological safety. And people feel safer and they feel safe to take risks and experiment as a result of that. So those are just some of the many research backed benefits of being a leader with high emotional intelligence. 

Mike: The thing I think about emotional intelligence, right? It's what are we talking about? Are we talking about understanding other people's emotions? Understanding your emotions?

All of these things. We have regulation in here. This is heavy, deep psychological topics.

Yeah. There's a lot. Well, and I think that's also a good segue into breaking down, like what are, I mentioned some of the things here like empathy and self-regulation, but what actually are the components. of emotional intelligence.

Hold on. I'm rumbling with vulnerability. I did think about that a few times this week. 

Kristen: Rumbling with vulnerability?

Mike: Yeah. I was just like, okay, I feel uneasy. I was in some different situations. I feel uneasy inside. I feel not queasy, but like your body producing adrenaline to help you deal with some sort of situation.

It doesn't register whether that's a life or death decision. It just sends you adrenaline and that kicks your system up a notch. I'm like, all right, I'm just going to sit there and like, this is okay. This is normal. This is not just me. I'm not the only one that ever feels like this. This is a normal response to the situation.

It kind of helped. Kind of helped to just like accept that's how,my body's reacting to it and it's pretty natural. And if I want to be successful, I just have to, rumble, allow it to rumble.

Kristen: Nice. This is, by the way, a reference. If you did not listen to our

Mike: They all listened.

Kristen: Two part series on Brene Brown's Dare to Lead, this is a reference to those. So yeah, I mean, getting into, what is this, right? Because I think, with anything, it really helps to break it down into pieces and then talk about, like, how do you actually improve those?

So Daniel Goleman's model has 12 different competencies across four areas. Like his four main domains are self awareness, self management, social awareness, and relationship management.

Mike: That tracks.

Kristen: Yeah. And those are like the general categories, right? I actually use the, a model from, like I mentioned, by a company called Genos.

It has six competencies, which I really like because that's just the amount that you can remember. Beyond that, it gets harder to remember things. I think six or seven is like the amount that the brain can remember well. So I think it's, it's, it's easy to understand and I actually started just using it with my clients just because I liked it as a way to explain emotional intelligence and then I ended up getting certified with them.

So I also conduct their assessments and do trainings, with them as well. So that is how much I like this model. But basically, so the six competencies is. within this model are Self-Awareness, Awareness of others, Authenticity, emotional reasoning, Self Management, and Inspiring performance. And we're going to break down each of these one by one.

But each competency is on a continuum. So it ranges from like the unproductive state to the productive state for that competency. But like another way to think of it is that using these six competencies, a leader with high emotional intelligence is self aware, empathetic, genuine, expansive, resilient, and empowering. So those are the six areas that we're looking at. So, starting with self awareness, which, I don't think I've seen an emotional intelligence model that does not list this first because it really is the foundation for everything we're talking about, right? But this is being aware of the behavior you demonstrate, your own strengths and limitations and also the impact that you have on others. So when we're talking about like, what does it look like to be a, self aware leader. Like some of the behaviors that you would see with that are asking other people for feedback on your leadership skills. Responding effectively to the feedback you get. Behaving consistently with how you expect others to behave.

Which requires having awareness of your own behavior, right? And showing awareness of your moods and emotions, which might require a feelings wheel.

Mike: Is that under anger, hurt, threatened, hateful, met.

Kristen: So it's like emotional literacy, which we talked a lot about with the Brene Brown two part series, is really fits in heavily into self awareness because a lot of it is about like being able to name and identify your emotions. And this is so important and so foundational for leaders because your behavior can as, I think, we've all seen with leaders we've had your behavior can positively impact the performance and engagement of your team, and it can also negatively impact it.

And you also need to understand what your own strengths and limitations are in order to continuously improve and maintain your success. And then I think also just most importantly, the thing to understand is that for all of us, like our perception of something that has happened is going to be limited by our intelligence, our personality traits, our values, our beliefs.

Mike: Mike is spinning the feelings wheel on the table right next to the microphone. 

I'm really just, I'm dismayed that the happy part of this makes up maybe 80 degrees, not even 80 degrees of the So the 80 out of 360 degrees are really positive Even the surprise one starts out alright. It's like excited, amazed, then it goes to confused and startled. So it goes from energetic, eager, awe, astonished, perplexed, and then disillusioned, dismayed, and shocked. So fully, 280, 90 degrees of this is, negative emotions.

Oh, being human is such a racket.

Kristen: I feel like I'm going to need to link to this feelings wheel Amazon link in our show notes because we've talked about it so much already.

Mike: already. We are not getting a kickback from this particular,

Kristen: Yeah, we're also not endorsing this particular feelings wheel. I don't know if it's 

Mike: I bought the less expensive one, maybe I should have kicked in for the extra 10 bucks.

Maybe if you spend 

Kristen: They're probably all the same.

Mike: They give you another 10 or 15 degrees of positive emotions. 

Kristen: I also don't know, I mean, I feel like feelings wheels are like typically used in situations like therapy. So I don't know if that's why they're so. wheel

Mike: This feelings wheel is giving me despair.

Kristen: Despair, 

Mike: I feel I'm not really victimized. Hold on.

Kristen: Oh my 

Mike: Disappointed. It's just kind of helpful, to be honest.

Kristen: I mean, maybe we are endorsing feelings wheels in general, but

Mike: It's good to identify them, right? Like Brene said, your emotional literacy is like being able to name and identify 30 emotions,I guess in yourself and others.

Kristen: Yes. I think for one thing this is a prerequisite for self management, which we'll talk about a little bit later because it's harder to regulate your emotions if you don't know what they are.

But also, understanding your own perspectives on things, like where you're coming from on things, having the curiosity to ask, like, oh, why, why am I activated by that? What's happening? What's that bringing up for me? Really helps you to be able to, like, objectively evaluate situations, because we're coming into everything with our own biases.Because it's all influenced by our values, our beliefs, our experiences, our personality traits, etc.

So the more you know yourself, the easier it is to be able to evaluate situations from like a more objective place. 

Mike: Yeah, I thought that was great in Dare to Lead. She really talks about that part of like regulation is like the, shitty first draft. What am I telling myself and why? And honestly, that's decades of therapy right there. 

I thought what you just said was very poignant, actually, events definitely shape us a lot. And they're the thing we're often unaware of, have shaped us, especially in our formative years, they shaped us a certain way, a certain thought pattern, a certain emotional pattern.

And, but values is something else. It's something like in the middle of all that, it's a line, if you will, through all of your experiences and all the noise of life. And that's why they're so useful because they're an anchoring direction. And that's, I. I do agree with Brene for the most part is like finding a couple of them, maybe not two, but finding a couple of them or a single one even could really, in certain instances, it shines a light through everything else, through the noise.

And I think that's super powerful. 

Yeah. Thank you, Brene.

Kristen: So that is, so yeah, self awareness is the first of the six competencies.And by the way, I'll mention at the end as well, but there is in the show notes, if you want to see this model, I also have some specific, tips that you can use to, to improve in these areas.

There's a link to a PDF you can download that if you want to actually see all this visually. So, just as an FYI. But, so the second competency is awareness of others. Which is really, we're talking about empathy here, right? So noticing and acknowledging others, ensuring that others feel valued, and adjusting your leadership style to fit best with others.

So like some of the behaviors that you would see in this sort of things like making others feel appreciated, noticing when somebody needs support and responding to it in an effective way, acknowledging the views and opinions of others. Accurately anticipating what others might be feeling or like how they might respond or react to something.

And like balancing achieving results with the needs of individuals, which is always a leadership challenge. 

Mike: It's not challenging

Kristen: Yes, And I think we've talked a lot about empathy. Empathy is so important. But fundamentally, like, why does this matter as a leader, right?

Well, the way that somebody performs at work is directly linked to how they feel, right? So you fundamentally need to have that awareness of others in order to fully influence and facilitate their performance. Especially beyond just the basic checkbox like, here's what you need to do to get this done.

And if you want people to go above and beyond for you, if you want to like truly motivate them, you need to start by understanding their feelings and their perspectives. And you also need to be able to adjust your leadership style to the people and the situation as well. So that's why I like empathy really matters a lot.

And a lot of it really comes down to listening and listening at an immersive level. When we've talked about like the three levels of listenings and in past episodes.

Mike: Don't look at me. I'm learning from all of this. I, you know, I thought about it this morning as we were doing thiswe're 15 podcasts deep and that's over 15 hours now of content and I'm like, what are we going to do now? And I guess I'm going to listen and learn the rest of the time because I'm kind of tapped out.

I've reached the limits of my lexicon of, of information.

Kristen: I mean, that is absolutely not true for one thing, We have, I think you're just, you know, with being real and vulnerable, I think you're just, you're a little tired and worn out and

Mike: I am 

A little emotionally raw. am. And I'm, it's like, how do we do a podcast and be human?

But also I have, it's for me as a former performer too, this is a, an adjustment because, when I, my first iteration of performances needed to be perfect and they were perfect. They were very good. I made very few mistakes. On stage. Very few. 

Kristen: I'm still traumatized by the mistakes that I did make on stage.

Mike: I can't remember, like. I don't know. I can't imagine what it'd be like now. 

And, and, you know, a computer is going to play the snare drum better than I do. If you can, you know, create the fine dexterous motions. Do we want that? 

Kristen: Yeah. Well, that's a tangent. 

Mike: That's a huge tangent. Oh, well, you know what though? It's not because we're talking about emotional intelligence and that's the difference between a computer and a human is, is actual emotions. And what are those?

Where does that come from? Can AI have emotions or are they just simulated emotions?

Those of you that watched Star Trek The Next Generation for the last 20 years, like I have, will know Commander Data's, lifelong quest to be human. And at some point, they gave him an emotion chip. And I think that was a long exploration of what kind of humanity is. That was an iteration of, Spock, who was a Vulcan.

But they had, Vulcans have emotions. They have the most powerful emotions. They just, You know, they go through training and rituals to suppress or purge. But the android was very different. So we're not androids, we're humans. And we feel, and that's what makes us human.

Kristen: us human. Yeah, being human is having messy emotions.

Mike: Let it be said, let it be written. 

Kristen: But yes, so that kind of moves into how do we express our feelings authentically, right? 

Authenticity is ultimately about like openly and effectively expressing yourself. Honoring the commitments you make and encouraging this behavior in others. And we've talked a good amount about authenticity in the last few episodes.

A lot of this is like boundaried vulnerability, right? But appropriately expressing your thoughts, feelings, and opinions,to the right people, to the right degree, at the right time, facilitating open debate, like healthy conflict, right?

Like a place where people can speak up safely. Being open and honest about your mistakes. Honoring your commitments, keeping your promises, and encouraging others to share their feelings and thoughts as well. And this matters because authenticity really helps us create, understanding, openness, and feelings of trust in others.

And when you're guarded, when you avoid conflict, or when you're also, the other end of that, being inappropriately blunt, it, it helps. can create mistrust, artificial harmony, or misunderstandings within your team. And ultimately, you want your people to be open with you as a leader, right? So that means you, need to role model this behavior first.

Mike: I do love the boundaried vulnerability part. I've been thinking about that a lot.

Kristen: It's very 

Mike: it's so useful. And I don't know that I was transgressing it, but I was like, this is a really powerful concept. You have to, show emotion like a human being or no one will believe in you and no one will follow you.

But at the same time, you can't get too personal.

Kristen: Yeah, like doing so in like a boundaried way.

Mike: For sure. I think that's a genius way of talking about it.

Kristen: I agree.So yeah, that's the first three competencies. The next one is emotional reasoning, which I actually really like is included in here. And I think it's one that people don't necessarily think of as much with emotional intelligence. But this is really about decision making.

So using emotional information, both from yourself and from other people, and then combining it with facts and information when you're making decisions. The whole idea of this is to make more like expansive decisions versus making like limited decisions based on just the facts, right? Because what happens, I think, in business, we tend to make decisions based on facts and data and technical information, right?

But if you make decisions without considering emotions. It, for one thing, is often going to lead to you missing information about how you feel about it. And especially in situations like in so many workplaces, right? Like we have to make decisions very quickly without all the data that we might want to have when we make that decision.

So being able to kind of understand how you feel about it and like what your gut feel in your intuition around it is, is a really powerful tool. But also understanding how other people feel is going to give you a clue as to how easy it is going to be to implement that. Because if you're not considering people's feelings, you might find a lot of challenge in getting buy in for the decision when you actually go to make it.

So, what behaviors that looks like. It's things like involving the people on your team in decisions that affect their work wherever you can. Explaining not just what the decision was, but really getting into the rationale behind that decision. Like considering issues from multiple perspectives.

Incorporating both emotional clues into it instead of just the facts and data. Reflecting your own feelings when you're making decisions and ultimately making ethical decisions really fits within here as well and like really this comes down to like people are very influenced by emotion And if you just try to take that out of the decision making process, which so many companies do all the time, there is going to be an effect of it. And sometimes you have to make decisions that are hard and you know it's going to have an effect on the emotions, but if you know that you can be prepared for that, you can communicate accordingly to that as opposed to being blindsided by it.

Mike: Totally agree.

Kristen: So yeah, that brings us to the last two competencies, which the next one is self management, which is one we've referenced a lot. We talked about this a lot in our episode with Megan Romano when we talked about the election, and how as a leader, regulating yourself is so important. And this comes down to managing your own mood, emotions, behavior.

Time also fits in with it within this and continuously improving yourself is all part of this and this matters a lot.

Mike: I think self management is a natural extension of self-awareness. I believe to some degree we're biologically programmed to look for improvement, to try and improve.

We have to be biologically That's how we survive. So, once you become aware of something, truly aware of it, I, mostly you're going to start taking some type of action to, to correct it. I

Kristen: I think that's generally true.

I think what people don't necessarily understand and can take them by surprise as a leader is just how much your reactions to things affect the people around you. 

Mike: You're very much always on stage. Everyone's look, despite the everyone you are truly being looked at 24/7 when you're a leader. And we've talked about this, the tone of your voice, your mood, fleeting glance, things that you didn't think twice about is definitely being magnified and read by your direct reports 

I think Nicole had a really good comment about that where she said, once your team gets to really know and trust you and know you on a longer timeframe, they'll forgive the, perceived slights of, geniality or, that kind of thing.

but you're very much on stage. 

Kristen: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And I think that's important with all of these, this isn't about perfection. Like we're all gonna spend time in both like the productive and unproductive sides of these competencies.

But aiming to, to be on the productive side as much as possible. Yeah. And when you're a leader, you're. Your mood is very infectious. So especially when it comes to how you manage stress, that, that can be really important for how it shows up with your team.

So what like behaviors look like for somebody who's really embodying this, it's managing your emotions effectively in like challenging situations, particularly like keeping like a pretty positive, energizing demeanor overall, 

Mike: I think that's super important. I'm literally, I'm looking up the book that I, that this really hit home from. 

Iron Sharpened Leadership, Transforming Hard Fought Lessons into Action by General John Gronsky. He is well, you know, but if you listen to him, he's super humble. He talked about an example when he was I can't remember if it was in Afghanistan or Iraq and again, we'll suspend all you know political judgment of any of these things and just learn the lessons that we can.He's had a fellow I think it was a general or a colonel who got blown up in front of everybody's eyes like they hit an IED or something and and he he was hurt but he, he knew everybody was watching him and he got up and just waved.

He's I'm all right. I'm okay. And gave everybody the thumbs up, and later they talked about it and he's like, yeah, I didn't want them to see me, beaten down or like to, like I had to go to the hospital, And get my arm reattached or something. But he knew that in, in his position as a leader, he needed to,It's not always put on a brave face, but a lot of times, yeah.

If you walk around, skulking all the time. Actually, I'm watching one of the new Star Treks. And I remember Spock at one point, I think his planet just got destroyed. And I'm sorry, I'm a Trekkie. Like,

Kristen: So many Star

Mike: Star Trek reference. Well, your mom likes Star Trek. Okay. And his planet was just blown up and, his girlfriend was like, are you okay?

do you need to rest or something? And he was like, if crew morale would be better served by me, skulking around the enterprise looking beaten up or looking sad, I will certainly do that. And, I thought that was kind of like, I thought it was, it was kind of good. Yeah. And I do think about that.

Like when I have a tough day, it's like, well, if the team will be better served by me,wailing into my coffee, then I will absolutely do that. But I don't think that's actually going to help. So yeah, you gotta, you have to know that people are watching you and. I saw inspiring performance in here and I was trying to figure out whether it meant giving an inspiring performance or inspiring other people's performance.

Kristen: But a little bit it's the same thing, Well, and this is a balance with authenticity, right?

Because they're both important. You want your team to see you as a human, but particularly when it comes to managing negative emotions, there's like the boundaries are at play, right? Like I think a lot of this is the boundaries side of that. So yeah, it's like, okay, let's say like, yeah, you know what?

I'm having, a crazy week. I slept terribly last night. I'm a little off today. But getting into like, oh my God, I had a meeting today and I'm so worried about the future of this company. 

Mike: Yeah, You're going to, you're going to tank the stock,

Kristen: Yeah, right. Like, so, um,

so getting into the last competency, which is funny. I hadn't thought about it.

Like, is it inspiring performance as in giving an inspiring performance? I'm

Mike: I'm surprised as a musician you didn't think that. I was like, I

Kristen: I'm

Mike: They're related though, aren't they?

Like,

Kristen: They are, yeah, and I think, the version of this model we're talking about is the leadership one. There's also a workplace one that's where it's called positive influence.

But, but yeah, it is, they are related. That's how it relates to self management, right?

Mike: Honestly, I want to say, like, when I don't know what to do, I have, a triple espresso and I go in there and I just be really positive with everybody. And I feel like that's not bad. just walk around and I give a lot of I hope positive feedback and appreciation.

Kristen: I'm like, I don't know what to do. I don't say that. I go around going, you're amazing. Thank you for being here. And, triple espresso definitely helps. Uh, but, you know, that's kind of the foundation, right? Yeah. And it can be something that feels really weird at first.

I think especially, you know, a lot of it comes down to how you were brought up, right? How like were positive emotions expressed in your household? 

Mike: It also is your personality type, like from Never Split the Difference, right? He breaks down like different archetypes. Like I'm an analytical personality type. So it's hard for me to be positive when I'm like the data doesn't support that.

Kristen: Right.

Yeah. 

Mike: I'm not being negative. I'm just like, we have to address these facts and figures, but you don't need that necessarily. It's good to have that, but then you gotta go out there and go, We've got this! Charge! So that was an adaptation I had to make. Yeah.

Kristen: Yeah. And it does

Mike: It comes back to knowing yourself. 

Kristen: And knowing your people,

your people. Yeah. But yeah, inspiring performance is fundamentally about facilitating high performance in others.

So 

Mike: facilitating high performance in other people through problem solving and then by promoting, recognizing, and supporting their work.

Kristen: And this comes down to empowerment. Empowerment. Which empower is one of my favorite words to use when I'm talking about leadership, but this really comes down to as a leader your number one job is facilitating the performance of others, right? that's what leadership comes down to and yes, you can do this to some degree with like with rules and key performance indicators and expectations and fear and, you know, but that's compliance.

Mike: Yeah. If you want people to do more than just meet expectations, if you want them to go above and beyond, there is more to it. And that is ultimately what this is about. So this is everything from providing useful support and guidance, helping people understand like what their contribution and what their purpose is within the larger organization, maintaining a positive, upbeat work environment, recognizing the achievements of others, and All of that really fits in within this competency. Totally agree, I mean, that's what is a leader? Leadership is fundamentally about facilitating the performance of others. And that's a big step for anybody. You go from being a high performer to now being a leader. It's like you can micromanage yourself into high performance.

You can't micromanage a team. You know,, one person on the team, two people on the team that are underperforming, but you can't micromanage 10 people. No one can. And so how do you facilitate, how do you support, other people to reach excellence?

Kristen: Yeah, no, that's what it fundamentally comes down to.

Mike: Fundamentally, absolutely. 

Kristen: Yeah.So that wraps up the six competencies of emotional intelligence. So I hope this has been helpful in better understanding like what is emotional intelligence when we're talking about it. As far as improving it goes,this is ultimately about habits, like breaking bad habits, putting new habits in place. And so I, when I think about what are the things you can do to increase your emotional intelligence? I think there's three kind of fundamental practices that you need in place, right?

And these are cyclical, these are ongoing, these are things that you're going to keep doing. But one is reflection practices, so whether that's journaling, whether that's having a walk where you dedicate to thinking about what was happening that day, like what emotions were you feeling, what, how did like a conversation go, having like that kind of reflection time. Having a mechanism or multiple mechanisms for getting feedback.

I am a huge fan of 360 assessments, especially the ones I do for coaching clients are usually verbal 360s. So I will actually interview people that they work with and that's my favorite way to do it. But there's a lot of ways to do 360s your company might have a tool or a process for it already. Also if you do have the ability to bring in certain assessments, the Genos assessment and other, I know there's other emotional intelligence assessments out there to have the, ability to get 360 feedback on emotional intelligence in particular.

And I think that is so powerful for really seeing where are you falling on these because your own self assessment of your emotional intelligence is only so valuable, right? You really need that feedback part of this. but if you don't, even if it's not a formal assessment, like having regular ways that you're getting feedback from the people you work with.

And then the last piece of it is really the intentional habit forming part. So identifying like one thing at a time, because you can't change 30 things at once, right? Um, but

Mike: I feel personally attacked. 

Kristen: No, I say this as someone who struggles with that too, but,

using that feedback mechanism and reflection practice to figure out like what habits do you want to focus on at one time, putting it into practice over time with a consistent practice, and then the cycle starts all over, right?

Like you're still, you're doing reflection, you're getting feedback, you're identifying the next thing to work on, you're cleaning up anything that you may have slipped on, and so forth. It is an ongoing process. It is not a one time thing.

Mike: I'm sorry. Can I add one thing? It's back to the book, Iron Sharpened Leadership. As a public service announcement. I need to, dispel the very popular saying that iron sharpens iron.

Iron does, in fact, not sharpen iron. It dulls, like, iron, metal against metal dulls.

So let it be known, let it be written.

Kristen: see

Mike: Let me see if I have enough emotional intelligence to figure out what my wife is feeling.

Kristen: It's okay.

Mike: It's not, it's not excited.

Kristen: not, it's

Mike: It's definitely not proud! Hold on, let me go to a different part.

Kristen: Oh, God.

Mike: Under anger. Uh, frustrated. Irritated. Infuriated. I think we're enraged.

Wow, now furious. 

Kristen: I'm not, okay. This

Mike: This wheel is amazing. I did, I did add the link

Kristen: Nice. Okay, well, we'll put the link in our, in the show notes to where you can buy the Feeling Wheel.

Um, there will also be the link to download, the PDF that accompanies this. If you want to see the model, if you want to see 18 tips for split across the six competencies, for how you can improve your emotional intelligence. You can, get in the show notes, or you can actually also just go to llpod.link/ei. 

And otherwise, we're going to be doing kind of another quarter podcast content planning soon. So if there are any particular topics that you would like to request, for these kind of episodes, let us know. And, that wraps it. We will be back next week. 

Mike: Thank you everyone. Thanks for joining. We appreciate it.

Kristen: Thank you everybody for listening. 

The Love and Leadership Podcast is produced and co-hosted by me, Kristen Brun Sharkey and co-hosted by Mike Sharkey. Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. We can't stress enough just how much these reviews help. You can follow us on LinkedIn under Kristen Brun Sharkey and Michael Sharkey, and on Instagram as loveleaderpod.

You can also find more information on our website, loveandleadershippod.com. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you again next week.