As we know, Leadership is defined as “a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal.” (Northouse,pg. 5) We also know that leadership can be a trait or a process. If one would think deep into leadership, they would see that using the traits, the process of leadership can be easy and even second nature. Many of the best leaders like Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Churchill are said to have charm and it was that charm that helped to make them a great leader. I think the “charm” was really emotional and social intelligence.
Being intelligent just isn’t scoring high on an IQ exam, we all know many “book smart” people who have no common sense. We also know people who are “street smart” who did poorly in school. An intelligent leader will be able to have analytical intelligence and practical intelligence as well as creative intelligence. (PSU WC, 2014). Analytical intelligence is the ability to solve problems quickly, think fast and perhaps think outside the box when the first attempt at solving a problem doesn’t work.
Practical Intelligence is when a leader knows the fix to a problem or a stressful situation, yet isn’t stressed out by the problem itself, for example a poor performing employee. (PSU WC, 2014) Creative Intelligence is used when a problem exists and thinking outside the box leads to producing a new solution that was never thought of before, for example my team has had our man hours cut by 25% and we had to keep the same quality work, I decided to combine a few tasks together that normally were individual tasks, now they are one big job that one person can do while the others can accomplish other important tasks.
These three intelligence theories are known as Triarchic Theory of Intelligence and using all three leads to emotional and social intelligence.(PSU WC, 2014) This is where a leader gets to know their employees, their psychology, what makes them tick, so to speak. Motivating employees is difficult enough, especially when paying them minimum wage. Not all employees have the same qualities as us leaders. While there are levels of integrity, intelligence, self confidence, drive and determination and sociability in our employees, they are not the same levels. Nor do all employees have all of these “good” traits. I am sure we can mention a few employees to have narcissism, or are argumentative. Perhaps we have an employee who is too much of a perfectionist and can’t accomplish much of anything because of this.
Looking at leading from the follower point of view, you see the importance of being emotionally and socially “connected” to our employees. It would make for motivation easier, decrease the coercive leader tendencies, and show that we actually care for our employees. That is if you really care! Having emotional intelligence means that you can recognize your own feelings and thoughts as well as the feelings and thoughts of others, all that is is selflessness. In other words, “putting yourself in other people shoes” as my mother used to say. We are not the only person an this planet and we sure aren’t the only one with problems to solve, empathizing I believe is the word.
There is a fine line however of being too emotional, you can’t let your followers tell you what they are doing or goading you into doing less work because of a small physical ailment, like a headache. It also means that getting caught up in their life drama, trying to solve their problems outside of work would be a bad way to lead. Our goal of leading is to motivate our employees to get the most tasks accomplishes at the cost of “the best bang for the buck” as I understand it. My thought on this topic are assuming you have employees who want to be model employees, who can think on the job, communicate when needed to, be on time, stay late when required to, look to solve problems, not add to them and be a team player.
Social intelligence is just a way to recognize the emotions in all of us and those interactions with people in our environments while be able to interpret situations surrounding those emotions so that we as leaders can solve problems before getting too big. (Northouse, 2013) For example, it is easier for me to train my employees when I know something small, like what are their interests? Expressing the cost of new piece of equipment to express the need for safe operation is best done by comparing it to an automobile similar in cost. Our new fairway mower cost $45,000, I tell them that they are operating a Cadillac Escalade or than new hand mower is more than their own vehicle. I use military jargon with my veterans, like using military time instead of civilian time to get on their level. I do this because I believe it helps me show respect and not talk at them, rather to them, perhaps get my point across in a timely fashion.
So far, what I am learning about leadership is on the leader end and not the follower end. I think understanding our employees and knowing their psychological details and their emotions helps us put the right person on the job so that the job can get done right and in a timely fashion. I also am learning that we don’t always have the best employees and we may not be able to keep hiring until we find the best, sometimes we have have to do the best with what we have. Knowing and understanding our employees is looking at leadership from the follower point of view. Whether we are leaders or followers, we just want to be respected and treated as human beings. Utilizing our emotional and social intelligence, and assuming we leaders have all the “good” traits, we as leaders might be able to motivate our followers and accomplish our jobs on time, without mistakes while having fun at work. Simple, right?
References:
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice, 6th Ed. Los Angeles: Sage Publications
PSU World Campus, (2014). PSYCH 485 Lesson 2 Trait Approach.