The 4 C Approach To Applying Emotional Intelligence At Work

Here’s what is crucial for leadership success in today’s changing world

The pandemic has opened the pandora’s box around mental health in the workplace. There is a steep increase in employees reporting burnout. Chronic stress due to Covid-19 is real. Parents of children report that their mental health has taken a toll. Some people, especially black women are reluctant to return to the workplace. 97% of black knowledge workers would prefer hybrid or remote work. They do not want to see their colleagues, work with them in close physical proximity and deal with the microaggressions, tokenization, and bias that plagues their everyday life at work. Millions of Americans have quit their jobs in what is called the Great Resignation. It is a privilege to be able to quit a job, but the great resignation is also a great wake-up call to all of us and particularly employers and leaders.

While traditional management skills are still necessary, emotional, and social intelligence skills and more prosocial orientation are crucial for leadership success in today’s changing world. Our organizational leaders must seriously take the ‘human’ element into consideration and be adept at dealing with the collective or mass trauma effect due to the pandemic and help organizations and their followers cultivate resilience.

Empathetic leadership has shown to be more powerful in addressing the pandemic than the 20th century hierarchical and patriarchal models of leadership. The most important aspects of leadership are going to involve climate intelligence, sustainability orientation, emotional and social intelligence, digital fluency including virtual leadership, and health intelligence or what some refer to as health quotient.  

How can a leader utilize their emotional and social intelligence effectively in the new era? Grounded in my decades-long research and practice in mindfulness and emotional intelligence in the context of leadership development, I provide some guidelines.

Empathy is understanding how others feel and about their motivations. Research reports that without self-awareness, it is next to impossible to be other-aware which is a cornerstone of empathy. The first step then is to cultivate self-awareness. Self-awareness is being able to identify and name your own feelings at a given moment and your underlying motivations. You can cultivate self-awareness through various activities such as observation, mindfulness or meditation practice, the practice of humanities – arts, literature, poetry, journaling, etc. Emotions meditation, for example, is an excellent tool to practice and cultivate self-awareness. The most important thing is intention, structure, and practice. Put time on your calendar to get to know yourself better.

When we begin to observe ourselves closely and honestly, we are going to be faced with parts of us that we don’t like about ourselves very much. Usually, it is easier to ignore them or pretend they don’t exist than to deal with them. Maybe you get envious of your colleagues and friends and about their accomplishments, family, fun travel, whatever else you get to see on their social media feeds or your organizational newsletter. At the same time, we have been told that it is bad to feel envy or anger or sadness or any such negative emotions or impulses. Curb that impulse to suppress or negate these pesky emotions and instead try and practice self-compassion.

Allow yourself to acknowledge and own the feelings. Experience through mindfulness practice that these feelings are transient and they are separate from you. Say, “Yes, I feel insecure or small or jealous or angry or whatever.” Because our capacity to be compassionate, joyous, and noble unfortunately co-exists with our capacity for not so noble feelings and thoughts as well. It is a package deal. What we choose to grow depends on what we choose to feed. Self-compassion and self-acceptance are not merely self-indulgence when combined with a sense of connection with others and responsibility to the collective well-being.

The cornerstone of empathy is a sense of connection and moral imagination. Not everyone feels, thinks, acts, or makes decisions the same way we do. Can I understand someone else’s feelings, thoughts, and motivations? How do you think they may be feeling? If I were in their shoes, what would I feel? How would I act? Moral imagination is an important quality to transcend differences in backgrounds, contexts, personality, etc. to empathize with someone else.

Engage in authentic and open conversations with a curious mind. If you have practiced non-judgmental awareness, kindness, and curiosity to your own emotional states and feelings, bring the same sensibility while interacting with others. Ask questions: What do you think? How does it make you feel? Use what they tell you to connect with them. “I am sorry you feel anxious. That must be difficult.” or “I can only imagine the anxiety you may feel because I am an extrovert and a ham.” Share your feelings. Not inappropriately but in context-sensitive ways. Do not look away from others’ feelings or suffering. Strive to create oases of connection in your organization regardless of the larger context and culture. Connection depends on trust and benevolence.

Go beyond empathy and move towards cultivating and nurturing joy. Cultivate joy for yourself and others. For example, how do you relate to work? Is your work joyful? Is it meaningful? Do you derive visceral pleasure from your work? Or is your dream to quit or retire or become your own boss? How do your own mental models and meaning around work shape how you lead and manage? What gives you joy? What responsibility and efforts do you take to create and grab moments of joy in your own life? Do you know what brings joy to your team or organization? As a leader, how important do you think is your role in creating joy and creating spaces for joy for your team members? It may be as simple as a smile or a kind word. It is definitely creating inclusivity and reducing the gap between in-group and out-group members, so everyone feels a sense of belonging at the workplace.

Try these and let me know!