Career success hinges on more than education or hard skills
Photo by Victor Xok on Unsplash
To enjoy true career success means continually sharpening your skills and developing as both a professional and as a person.
Research has shown that technical skills and knowledge can only take a person so far. Your professional development journey should include attention to relationship-building and other interpersonal skills. Otherwise known as emotional quotient (EQ) or emotional intelligence, these skills allow you to connect, collaborate, inspire and lead more effectively than logic or analytics (aka IQ) alone.
The role of emotional intelligence at work
Emotional intelligence will support your success regardless of where you work or in which field. From highly analytical engineers to deeply empathetic counselors, each individual can tap into the power of EQ.
Research ranks EQ higher than other skills in measuring workplace success:
“According to a study by TalentSmart, emotional intelligence plays the biggest role in performance when compared to 33 other workplace skills. They found that emotional intelligence influences 58% of success across every type of job.”
Additional research reveals, however, that workplace EQ scores have begun to decline while IQ scores have increased. According to Entrepreneur, “Average EQ scores have dropped 25 points while average IQ scores have increased 25 points in recent years.”While business certainly benefits from brain power, it also needs people power to develop relationships and partnerships, lead innovation programs, inspire creative solutions and more. Higher levels of emotional intelligence allow professionals and business leaders to navigate the nuances of negotiation, leadership and collaboration.
In addition, as noted in the Entrepreneur article above, higher EQ scores among your staff can lead to happier employees (and less turnover), higher profits, fewer on-the-job accidents and higher salaries.
What does it mean to have emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence at work refers to a variety of interpersonal skills that includes:
Empathy. The ability to step outside your own perspective allows you to relate more authentically with those around you.
Self-awareness and self-regulation. Rather than giving in to knee-jerk reactions and outbursts, you can step back, name your emotion/reaction and choose a work-appropriate response.
Social skills. This broad term encompasses an ability to “read a room” as well as general friendliness, likability, trustworthiness and a knack for building consensus within a group.
Motivation. Motivation compels you to set and achieve goals, which has obvious advantages in a work setting.
How do you know if you have these skills or if you need to develop in any of these areas? Start with a simple EQ assessment. Harvard recommends four assessments here, but there are many tools out there that can help you better understand your own development needs.
How to develop a better EQ
Once you have zeroed in on your areas for improvement, take steps toward boosting these skills in your personal and professional life:
Begin with a positive mindset and outlook. Success begins with a growth mindset and optimistic outlook. You can’t achieve goals, or inspire others to achieve them, without first believing that they are possible.
Become aware of your words and delivery. A huge part of emotional intelligence is understanding how your word choice, and even body language, can come across to others. Take note of when your words or demeanor cause others to react negatively and course correct when you can.
Seek peaceful resolution to conflict. How you react to conflict will lay the foundation for building trust and rapport with colleagues and business associates. While conflict and disagreement are inevitable, grudges and resentment are not. Seek equitable solutions to conflict and work to address disagreements as soon as possible.
Manage your stress levels. Your EQ can wax and wane depending on your own levels of stress and fatigue. If you notice yourself snapping at others and reacting in more harmful ways than usual, start with you. Take action toward improving your own stress levels by setting a regular sleep schedule, exercising, taking breaks, practicing mindfulness, seeking out fun and eating healthy.
Find relevant training. Learning from and with others in a training environment (even online) offers a safe place to identify your weak spots and to work on them.
Work with a coach. Working one-on-one with a career coach gives you the benefit of an unbiased, expert assessment of your individual EQ strengths and weaknesses. Especially for leaders, that private coaching allows you to make mistakes and to be vulnerable away from your staff and the day-to-day pressures of work.
During these unprecedented times, professionals require an even greater level of emotional intelligence. People are on edge around the globe, and business needs emotionally intelligent leaders who can bring people and ideas together. Working on your own EQ might be the best business investment you can make in 2020 and beyond.
Ready to improve your emotional intelligence and boost your career? Reach out to me for a complimentary strategy call to learn how coaching can help.