It sure is interesting seeing how many things are noted as the 7 of whatever.  The 7 Habits, the 7 Wonders, the 7^th Heaven, and so the list goes on... It´s also interesting to note that Psychologist Howard Gardner identified 7 distinct types of intelligence.  Even more interesting is that "The 8^th Habit" followed the 7 Habits, and so, without further adieu, please welcome the 8^th Type of intelligence in business specifically, but also in general life.

Now, let´s just put all of ourselves in the picture.  Below is the list of the 7 Types of Intelligence identified by Howard Gardner, with a short explanation (text amended from text by Bill Allen):

1. Linguistic

These people most probably enjoy writing, reading, telling stories or doing crossword puzzles.

2. Logical-Mathematical

These kinds of people are most probably blessed with lots of logical intelligence and are interested in patterns, categories and relationships. They are drawn to arithmetic problems, strategy games and experiments.

3. Bodily-Kinaesthetic

These folks process knowledge through bodily sensations. They are most probably athletic, dancers or good at crafts such as sewing or woodworking.

4. Spatial

Images and pictures, that´s how these people think. They may be fascinated with mazes or jigsaw puzzles, or spend free time drawing, building with mechanical sets or daydreaming.

5. Musical

It´s kind of self-explanatory, but they are always singing or drumming to themselves. They are usually quite aware of sounds others may miss. These people are also often discriminating listeners.

6. Interpersonal

These are leaders among their peers, who are good at communicating and who seem to understand others' feelings and motives.  They possess interpersonal intelligence.

7. Intrapersonal

They may be shy. They are very aware of their own feelings and are self-motivated.

These are all very well known and taught by most tertiary institutions, however, whilst working in the corporate environment for a number of years, spending long hours behind textbooks, spending equally long hours with friends, family, colleagues, and the like discussing studies, corporate strategy, policies and procedures, and so on; and simply sometimes sitting quietly observing, it is pretty clear that this list is kind of incomplete.

You may also find yourself asking at this point: "Uhm, cool, it´s really nice to know this, but what the heck does this have to do with business?"

I could make this exercise quite exciting by telling you to go and find out what kind of intelligence could possibly be missing from this comprehensive list, or I could just give you the odds.  Take a stab at the list above again and then ask yourself: "What can possibly be left out?"

Assuming that Howard Gardner assumed that these 7 Types of Intelligence are based on people´s natural talents (and not taking anything away from the amazing work Howard Gardner has done and the invaluable information he provided), I have to assume that the 8^th Type of Intelligence must be something that is not so obvious.  I have to also assume that this type of intelligence will be something either holistic in nature or something that must be learnt by the individual through either trail-and-error or sticking enough pride in his or her pockets in order to become a master at this type of intelligence.

Yes, OK, I´ll get on with it.  Have you ever... no, let´s rather put it this way: spend some time and listen to the countless instances people you work with, live with, etc make the following comments or any derivatives of it:

"But how am I supposed to know this!?"

"I can´t do it!?"

"I didn´t know... I had some idea, but I really didn´t know..."

"This stupid machine..."

"This damn software..."

"These idiotic policies and procedures..."

"What is it with these flippen templates..."

Just from the minimal examples above you could probably already identify the apologetic-passive type and the attacking-passive type (don´t quote these terms in any textbook or thesis if you thought they are recognised psychological terms).

So what the heck is it?  What is this 8^th Type of Intelligence?  Take a wild guess and I´m almost certain you´ll guess it right.

Here goes:

The ability to not only ask when you don´t know, but also the ability to recognise when you should be asking a question and when you should stop complaining and try to figure your job out.

I´ve had countless silent smiles, at myself as much I´ve grinned because of other people, because of pure hard headedness or my own inability to have the balls to ask when I don´t know... or simply don´t want to look like the class idiot in the department/company (commonly referred to as an id-10-t in the IT world, or a PEBKAC fault: Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair, as my brother so amicably pointed out the other day).  How often have you heard that there is no such thing as a dumb question.  Fair enough, there are some really dumb questions... but when your company´s performance or the success of a job and project depends on a dumb question, then best you ask before you put your foot in it, followed by a label and possibly a disciplinary or even worse, final warning and retrenchment.

There is one more question I´d like to get answered, but the variables at play seems far too great to even consider researching unless you have a). A lot of time and b). Unlimited funds.  That is the question of WHY?  Why are we prepared to rather look stupid when a job is completed incompletely, rather than to look stupid by asking HOW?  But then again, I have also learned that you will never get an answer that will satisfy you when you ask why... so why ask why in the first place?

The 8^th Type of Intelligence goes far and beyond mere "asking when you don´t know, or know better."  It stretches as far as making a recommendation to the way things are done.  For example: If the CEO decides he wants to implement some new policy, and procedure that goes with it, there is obviously more often than not huge complaining going on, in part because the CEO neglected to let his Executive Board know about the new Corporate Governance Strategy he wants to put in place, and also in part because people simply detest change in any way.

This whole situation trickles down and escalates exponentially when the Executive Directors hand orders over to their Divisional Managers, who in turn divide tasks and new policies and procedures to their Departmental Managers, until it goes right down to the piles of new paperwork the tea lady has to fill in whenever they break a cup and saucer.

Mmm, so now you may think to yourself: "Well, in that case it´s the CEO´s fault.  He should´ve let us know."  Whereupon I may say something in the lines of: "If your outrage because of this new policy and procedure is so justified and such a big concern, uhm, ASK what the reason is for this new policy and procedure before you go on a tangent - you are really just disempowering yourself and creating unnecessary stress in your life."

Upon that you may say: "Well, surely it´s my superior´s responsibility to ask the CEO and to them inform us..."  Whereupon I may say something in the lines of: "Cool, but also keep in mind that most companies and businesses, institutions and the like more often than not work on the basis of ASSUMPTION - they all assume you know, understand and also read your memo´s and e-mails... if you do, in fact read those countless memo´s that get sent out... If you don´t know or if you´re not sure, then ASK."

There are obviously countless examples I can think of, in countless different industries and types of hierarchies in different environments, and so on, but the bottom-line remains: it doesn´t matter how clever you are; how clever you think you are; how much you know or don´t know; what type of intelligence you possess and whatever experience you have, what you know or don´t know: If you don´t ask, you´re pretty dumb.  OK, please accept my apology.  Maybe that was a tad harsh, so let´s be more diplomatic: If you don´t ask, maybe you should consider asking as a viable option and substitute for feeling worthless, left in the dark, incompetent and overwhelmed with a job you´re not sure you can do