3.2 - Your results (breakdown and explanation)

3.2 Your results (assessment and breakdown)

As you’ve probably figured out in the test results, there are four building Blocks[1] that you need to work on if you want to learn and develop emotional intelligence:

1.   Being aware of what you are feeling exactly and what causes you to feel that way;

2.   Being able to control and influence your precise emotional state,

3.   Being able to read well the emotional state of the people around you;

4.   Using emotional intelligence skills in practice, to communicate better and interact at a deeper level with your team.

The four clusters of questions you just answered and scored yourself on correspond exactly to those four Blocks, and seeing your results you should have a pretty clear idea of where your strengths and weaknesses are, and of where you should work on the most.

Ideally, you should score high in all Blocks.

Realistically, you will be scoring high in some and low in others.

Here is what each Block means - along with your score

 

Block 1 - Recognizing what you are feeling exactly, and why

We’ve seen that most of our emotional life is unconscious and that we don't spend much time thinking about what we feel.

Being emotionally intelligent means diving deeper. It means being able to pinpoint precisely both what you are feeling and knowing exactly why you are feeling it.

The reason you need this Block is that before you try to influence your emotional state, you need to know what you are dealing with - you wouldn't try to repair a car knowing nothing about engines, would you?

Block 2 - Controlling and influencing your own emotional state

Being emotionally intelligent means being aware of the impacts negative emotions have on you and being able to limit it and react to it.

We’ve seen that if our emotional life is unconscious, we often let negative emotions manage our life - when we do that, though, we know we won't be as focused, balanced, sociable, energetic - and that takes a toll on ourselves and on people around us.

If instead we know how to recognize what is happening (Block 1), we can react to it. We can follow specific pathways and techniques to put a positive spin on our state.

Reality won't change, but our approach to it will and we will be able to use our energy in a much more constructive and controlled way. 

Block 3 - Reading the emotional state of people around you

A key aspect of emotionally intelligent people is being able to communicate at an emotional level with others, influence them, inspire and uplift them.

As it was the case for Block 1, though, before we fiddle with something we need to know what that “something” is.

The more precise we are in recognising what someone else is going through, the better we can empathize with that person, relate to them and establish a link.

Your score in this Block indicates how able you are to recognize emotions in others: the better you are at it, the more effectively you will be able to use your emotional intelligence skills in practice (Block 4). Key aspect here, there is a link between Block 1 and Block 3: the better you can recognize your own emotions, the better you can recognize the ones of other people.

Block 4 - Using emotional intelligence skills in practice: 

This Block measures your ability to interact with others at an emotional level.

Simply put: we all have emotions, whether we like it or not - and for some reason we have been taught to limit them, or repress them in our professional environment.

That is just wrong.

What we should be doing instead - and even more so if you are in a leadership position - is learn how to use them appropriately to interact with others, communicate with our team, drive others and be a source of inspiration for people around us.

There are ways of doing it, and very precise triggers that elicit emotions.

If you follow them, and are already solid enough in the other three Blocks, you will see the effects on your leadership persona and on your team dynamics in no time.

Next steps

Now, all these four areas are tightly connected, and even though you may be proficient in one or more already, I still suggest you follow the course and keep on working on them in order.

The reason is that working on each area will automatically improve your competence in the ones that follow it, and even if you’re already skilled on one area, doing some extra work to frame it within a structure can’t hurt, and it will help you for what follows next.

The next four chapters go through each Block in detail, always using the same structure:

·     What this area of emotional intelligence is and what it does

·     Why it is relevant to develop this area

·     How to do it – this includes both the theory behind it and exercises or templates to aid you in your learning process and give you a structure to follow to work on it.


SOURCES

Goleman, Daniel. 1995. Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam Books.



[1] Adapted from Goleman (1995)


3.2 your results (assessment and breakdown).pdf
Complete and Continue