The Pathway To Great Leadership: Awareness – Assessment – Practice & Feedback – Measured Progress

Emotional intelligence is an umbrella term for that intangible variable quality within each of us. It is the skill that defines how we manage our social lives. All our experiences are processed first and foremost by the limbic system within our brains. The limbic part of the brain is the emotion-processing part, and it physically comes first, ahead of the rational, logical parts of our brain.
In Emotional Intelligence 2.0, the authors describe all of the skills that add up to peak performance in social and emotional life. Bradberry and Greaves “found that 90% of top performers are also high in emotional intelligence. On the flip side, just 20% of bottom performers are high in emotional intelligence. You can be a top performer without emotional intelligence, but the chances are slim.”
They describe 4 skills and the component strategies (behaviors) that you need to bring to your business and your life. They are…
  1. Self-awareness is about perceiving your behavior and understanding the full range of your own emotional repertoire.
  2. Self-management means choosing to behave in the way that is most effective in any given situation.
  3. Social awareness is perceiving and understanding the emotional and practical needs of the people you are interacting with.
  4. Relationship management is all about adjusting your behaviors and words to work most effectively with your team, your employees, your customers, and your suppliers.
We own only 50% of any relationship but we are 100% responsible for our personal behavior and the messages we send. Every business leader has some strengths and some areas that need improvement when it comes to the numerous strategies they employ (there are some 15 to 17 for each EQ skill).

6 Milestones Along The Pathway To Great Leadership

At PBC, we value this book’s assessment tool and practice exercises called the EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE APPRAISAL® because emotional intelligence can be enhanced by learning what it is, how it works, then assessing your present EQ levels. Then practicing building those behaviors that need strengthening. Then reassessing those areas to see your progress along the pathway to great leadership.
There are six milestones.
Assess how your leadership skills rank1.  Assess how your leadership skills rank in the large and growing database of business leaders by taking the first of two EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE APPRAISALS®. Write down your areas for improvement. Reflect upon them. Allow them to incubate. This is a fascinating process. Neuroscience informs us of the brain’s “plasticity,” its ability to learn and adapt.
So, the first question for each EQ strategy is: How often, on a scale of 1 to 6, do you use these behaviors to implement this strategy, 1 being “never” through 3 “sometimes when I think of it” to 6 “always, because it’s automatic for me”?

The second question is: How do your peers and other team members rate your performance on this scale?
 Pick leadership skill area to work upon in detail
 2.  Pick a leadership skill area to work upon in detail by turning your scoresheet into a learning action plan. The scoresheet describes in detail your strengths to capitalize on AND concerns you must address.
Pick 3 behaviors from lowest scoring concern3.  Pick 3 behaviors from your lowest scoring concern. For example, in my own case, my biggest concern is in the “social awareness” skill area. I am currently practicing to “greet people by name.” Please remind me of this if we meet at an event!
 

4.  Get yourself a leadership mentor willing and able to help you. Review your

Get yourself a leadership mentor

contact list to find someone who is strong in the skills you need to build upon. Then ask them for their insights, feedback, and coaching on your behavior. Or speak with a coach. Remember that at PBC, coaching is what we do best.

5.  Remember that learning is all about the long haul. Demand and expect success from yourself of course, but Remember that learning is all about the long hauldo not be disappointed when perfection isn’t reached overnight. Leadership skills are like muscles; they develop over time. You will see significant improvement after some months of practice, practice, practice.
6.  Repeat the process from milestone 3 with your next lowest scoring concern.Repeat from milestone 3 with next lowest scoring concern
We value the fact that you can take the assessment TWICE, the first time to fully understand your EQ starting position and the second time to measure your improvement after a period of practice and refinement. We enjoy showing clients the progress they are making through the action strategies that directly relate to individual EQ skills.

At PBC we aim to coach clients through the four stages of learning:

  1. Unawareness of poor performance to
  2. Awareness of your own weaknesses to
  3. Conscious improvement to
  4. Automatic peak performance.