Written by: Dr. Wendy Norfleet, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
An emotionally intelligent leader is often considered a master of their emotions, including the ability to recognize, understand, and manage one's own emotions, as well as to recognize the feelings of others. Emotionally intelligent leaders possess self-awareness, self-management, relationship management, and social awareness skills used to lead and inspire their teams.
Emotionally intelligent leaders can create a positive and productive work environment by understanding and responding to the emotions and perspectives of their team members. They can build strong relationships, resolve conflicts, and inspire and motivate the teams to achieve their goals.
Additionally, emotionally intelligent leaders can manage their emotions and reactions, which allows them to remain calm and composed under pressure and make decisions based on reason and logic rather than emotions.
What Are The 4 Pillars of an Emotionally Intelligent Leader?
The four pillars of emotionally intelligent leadership are:
Self-Awareness
Self-awareness is knowing who you are as a person and a leader and how you connect with others and show up in the world. If you don't understand your motivations and behaviors, it's almost impossible to understand others. A lack of self-awareness can make it difficult for you to think logically.
A thorough understanding of yourself helps you understand others. Before learning self-control, you must first know yourself. Knowledge of self will help you understand how to get along with others. You can't rely on your gut feelings to tell you what to do during hard times.
People who know themselves well know their strengths and weaknesses and how to deal with them. They understand the power of emotions and how they affect behavior and can spot those emotions in other people.
Self-Management
Self-management is being able to keep your reactions and urges in check. It includes your ability to control emotions, be honest, change, take the lead, and be optimistic. Leaders who can keep their reactions in check can think more clearly and act without being held back by fear. Self-management is essential in calmly leading teams through times of change or chaos.
Social-Awareness
Social awareness is an awareness of what's happening with other people and connecting with them through empathy. Socially aware leaders consider other people's needs, concerns, points of view, and feelings. These leaders can pick up on nonverbal cues and figure out what they mean, which gives them the power to respond correctly.
Relationship Management
Relationship management involves:
Helping others grow
Starting and managing change
Dealing with conflicts
Using influence to reach goals
Managing how a team works together
Teams stay together because of the people on them. Leaders can affect how well their teams do by building and managing relationships with care. Relationship management is how leaders get their teams to work together, solve problems, and commit to a plan of action.
Conclusion
Emotionally intelligent leaders must be aware of the four pillars and utilize the concepts to create a positive and productive work environment. These concepts will allow leaders to lead their team members to success.
Reach out to Norfleet Integrated Solutions and let us help you develop your leadership team into emotionally intelligent leaders. Contact us today!
Dr. Wendy Norfleet, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Dr. Wendy Norfleet is an engineer turned CEO, author, certified coach, and community advocate. Leveraging her business knowledge, leadership skills, community engagement, and desire to help others, she works with individuals and organizations to identify challenges, execute solutions, and achieve results. In recognition of her service, Wendy has been honored with numerous leadership awards, recognized as a Women of Influence by the Jacksonville Business Journal, selected as a 2021 Small Business Leader of the Year, and helped her company achieve the 2021 Corporate Vision Award for Best Business Consulting and Coaching Company ‒ North Florida.
