Emotional intelligence
“Your EQ is the level of your ability to understand other people, what motivates them and how to work cooperatively with them,” says Howard Gardner, the influential Harvard theorist. This is an important part of your life due to the fact the we interact with people all the time and understanding them is crucial to have a better communication. But for us to understand people better first we need to understand ourselves, to do that we need to have some skills.
Emotional
intelligence begins with what is called self- and social awareness, the ability to
recognize emotions and their impact, in both yourself and others. You first start with
yourself and then you reflect it in others. You need to press pause, pause is as simple as
taking a moment to stop and think before you speak or act. Easy in theory, difficult
in practice. This can help save you from embarrassing moments or from making
commitments too quickly. In other words, pausing helps you refrain from making a
permanent decision based on a temporary emotion.
You don't have
much control over the emotion you experience in a given moment. But you can
control your reaction to those emotions by focusing on your thoughts. By getting to control
your thoughts, you resist becoming a slave to your emotions, allowing yourself
to live in a way that's in harmony with your goals and values.
Every day we make
emotionally charged decisions. We feel plan A is better than plan B and we
sometimes make choices based on our emotions or gut feelings. When we understand
the origin of these emotions, especially when working in a team, we are more
at attuned to each other. With globalization, emotional intelligence is
more significant than ever when teams are cross-cultural and global, increasing the
complexity of interactions of emotions and how they are expressed.
Essentially,
emotional intelligence in the workplaces comes down to understanding, expressing and
managing, good relationships and solving problems under pressure. At school, at
work, at home, emotional intelligence it’s important in every aspect of your life.
“Self-awareness
makes it easier to understand one’s own needs and likely reactions
if certain events
occurred, thereby facilitating evaluation of alternative
solutions.”-Gary
Yuk
For emotional
intelligence to be effective, it must start with yourself. You cannot increase other
people’s well-being, improvement, and sense of self without first understanding how
you operate on an emotional level. What distinguishes leaders is usually their
level of emotional intelligence and it is those skills which help to develop a more effective workplace
because this emotional intelligence makes them more mature.
By Brandon Afanador and
Andrés Argel, Step 10
