Employee Engagement Strategies Part 2 I Have a High IQ, Why Do You Care About EQ?

Note: Be sure to check out Christine’s new blog, EMSED Tips, tips and tricks for EMS Educators!

Prior to reviewing this segment, I encourage readers to refer back to part 1 of this series, “That’s Gonna Be a No From Me: Employee Engagement Strategies”.

For readers who do not understand emotional intelligence (EQ) and the dramatic impact it has on our personal and professional relationships, I highly recommend reading Emotional Intelligence 2.0 written by Dr. Travis Bradberry and Dr. Jean Graves. Their work provides excellent descriptions of EQ, how dramatic an impact high EQ has on work performance, and tips on how to increase one’s EQ.

Emotional intelligence is a measure of how well you can identify your own emotions and manage your responses to them in personal and social situations. That sounds easy enough; however, when you factor in that all of our environmental clues pass through the limbic system (emotional center of the brain) before they reach the cerebral cortex (rational part of the brain), you begin to understand that we are designed to have emotional responses to stimuli before we rationalize the stimuli and decide how to react. What we decide to DO about our emotional reactions is how emotional intelligence is measured. IF we REACT before we RATIONALIZE emotionally charged situations, we may indeed act in a manner which could damage the relationship leading to strained working conditions and future regrets.

Contrary to popular belief, intelligence (IQ) is not the biggest predictor of success—EQ is. In fact, EQ is such a powerful predictor of success that Dr. Bradberry and Dr. Greaves state that EQ accounts for about 58% of overall job performance! If what the good doctors say is true, then why do most organizations still hire, promote, and pay based on accolades, degrees, and experience but we fire based on EQ? If we change the hiring culture to quality over quantity (quality of emotional intelligence vs quantity of achievements), how would that change the culture of the organization over time? We must also consider that people can improve their EQ, but IQ is stagnant throughout one’s lifetime. Studies have shown that people with high EQ and lower IQ outperform those with High IQ and low EQ.

When pondering the significance of EQ in the workplace, I am reminded of the wise words of one of my personal mentors, the great Maya Angelou who said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel”. I have repeated this quote countless times to my students over the past 20 years. Life really comes down to those impressions we leave on people, the stories they create about us in their heads, and how they relay their interactions with us to others. If we take away everything else related to work performance, the emotional interactions and rational reactions we have with others has a tremendous impact on organizational culture. I often have to remind myself to take a pause before reacting to stimuli or information. I have learned that I tend to react emotionally before I have the opportunity to rationalize the information and decide on the best balance of emotion and logic to handle the situation. Learning more about my EQ has empowered me to self-reflect and take actionable steps to improving my responses. Personal and professional relationships are very important to me. I dare say that I have damaged some of those during my life before I became aware of the concept of emotional intelligence. Perhaps, others have as well. In terms of employee engagement strategies, identifying baseline EQ levels can be a great starting point for building a culture of service and positive relationships within the organization. Tracking EQ levels can also help administration identify those who may be candidates for promotion or those who may be ideally suited for high-stakes/high-emotion positions. By identifying one’s strengths and providing opportunities for growth, employee engagement and satisfaction may begin to trend upward.