Chapter: Applying Emotional Intelligence
GROUP EXERCISES
The first group exercise is designed to stretch your sensitivity to others' reactions to your actions. The second is a comparison of your EI strengths and weaknesses as perceived by yourself and others. The third is a case discussion that demonstrated the consequences of low EI.
Group Exercise 1: Action/Reaction
Every action you take or don't take sends a message. The purpose of this exercise is to stretch your sensitivity to others' reactions to your actions. It is important to be able to predict reactions because you can alter your actions if you think it is appropriate before getting an undesirable reaction. This exercise will sensitize you to the wide range of reactions that one simple action cause. The intent isn't to determine if the action is appropriate or inappropriate but to realize that many interpretations of the same action may exist depending on who is interpreting.
Objectives
• To realize the impact of actions on others
• To recognize the need for assessing the emotional impact of actions before taking them
• To understand how actions can create an emotionally positive environment
Directions
Complete the following worksheet by reflecting on recent memos, e-mails, or verbal communications that you have initiated. For each of your actions, imagine the many possible reactions that others might have to them. Try to be very creative in your answers. Have fun and stretch your imagination with this exercise.
Individually. Recall the last 10 memos, e-mails, phone calls, or verbal instructions that you have sent to your employees, teammates, or friends. In the left-hand column write the intent of each message. In the right-hand column write down some possible interpretations the receivers could have made that would be different from your intention. Be empathetic and think about how the messages might have made the receivers feel. Several examples to a safety reminder message are provided in the first row below.
Form Groups of Three. One at a time, share your messages, intentions, and possible interpretations. After a person has shared an entry, other group members add their ideas for possible misinterpretations and resulting feelings. Then another person shares an entry and group members again share their ideas for how the receiver might react. Continue around the group until all members have shared and heard other group members' interpretations of their messages.
Debrief
As a class, answer and discuss the following questions:
a. Why is it important to give forethought to reactions to your actions?
b. What impact could this practice have on creating a desired work culture?
c. What responsibility do you have to anticipate reactions?
Group Exercise 2: Thinking It Through and Talking It Over
Daniel Goleman offers 12 questions to ask yourself to see if you work with EI. If you answer "yes" to half or more, and if other people who know you agree with your self-rating, then you are doing okay with your EI. Answer the following questions to see where you score on EI.
1. Do you understand both your strengths and weaknesses?
2. Can you be depended on to take care of every detail? Do you hate to let things slide?
3. Are you comfortable with change and open to novel ideas?
4. Are you motivated by the satisfaction of meeting your own standards of excellence?
5. Do you stay optimistic when things go wrong?
6. Do you see things from another person's point of view and sense what matters most to that person?
7. Do you let customers' needs determine how you serve them?
8. Do you enjoy helping coworkers develop their skills?
9. Do you read office politics accurately?
10. Are you able to find "win-win" solutions in negotiations and conflicts?
11. Are you the kind of person other people want on a team? Do you enjoy collaborating with others?
12. Are you usually persuasive?
Scoring and Interpretation
Add up the number of questions to which you could answer yes. How did you score? Answering yes to six or more of the EI skill items indicates that you are working well and with maturity in the workplace. Do you have more than five questions to which you answered no?
Form groups of three or four people who know you well. One at a time share your answers and receive feedback whether the others agree with your high number of negative scores. If so, what suggestions do they have to help you change and improve your EI scores?
Group Exercise 3: Head versus Heart
Read the following case. Then form groups and answer the questions following the ease,
Head versus Heart Case
Stuart is a senior manager at a well-known pharmaceutical company. He is brilliant, and everyone who knows him believes he has the potential to ac 'eve great things. His primary and strength is strategic thinking; colleagues say he has an uncanny ability to predict and plan for the future.
As Stuart has advanced in the organization, however, his dark side has become increasingly apparent: He often lashes out at people, and he is unable to build relationships based on trust.
Stuart knows he is intelligent and tends to use that knowledge to belittle or demean his coworkers. Realizing that Stuart has extraordinary skills and much to offer the company in terms or vision and strategy, some of his colleagues have tried to help him work past his flaws. But they're beginning to conclude that it's a hopeless cause; Stuart stubbornly refuses to change his style, and his arrogant modus operandi has offended so many people that Stuart's career may no longer be salvageable.
Every company probably has someone like Stuart-a senior manager whose IQ approaches the genius level but who seems clueless when it comes to dealing with other people. These types of managers may be prone to getting angry easily and verbally attacking coworkers, often come across as lacking compassion and empathy, and usually find it difficult to get others to cooperate with them and their agendas. The Stuarts of the world make you wonder how people so smart can be so incapable of understanding themselves and others.
Questions for Group Discussion
1. Using the Behavioral Checklist, what is Stuart lacking in EI?
2. Is there any hope of salvaging Stuart's career? What are the alternatives?
3. Can his EI be developed and enhanced?
APPLICATION QUESTIONS
1. Given that EI starts with self-awareness, how likely is someone with a low EI to be able to judge the level of their own EI or someone else's?
2. If men test (on average) significantly lower than women in Social Responsibility, but significantly higher than women in Stress Tolerance, how can you motivate a team consisting of both men and women to accept a volunteer project to help the community?
3. If the first rule of cross-cultural communication is to assume you've been misunderstood, what's a good way to give instructions to a subordinate?
4. If maintaining self-control is a developmental area for you, what can you do to improve in the El area?
5. If having empathy for others is a developmental area for you, what can you do to improve in the EI area?
REINFORCEMENT EXERCISES
1. Self-awareness can be developed through the practice of seeking ongoing feedback. Ask supervisors, coworkers, and friends who know you well for honest feedback on how your behavior is impacting them. Use opportunities to self-reflect upon adversity, such as relationship failures, unchallenging jobs, and personal traumas.
2. The ability to demonstrate yourself as a cooperative, contributing, and constructive member of the group is critical for long-term career success. Involve yourself in a new and inexperienced work or class team that is resisting an assignment. Think about what you can do to contribute positively to group and organizational goals. Then act on your thoughts to see if you can make a contribution.
3. If you become aware of something that you are doing that produces negative consequences, such as an annoying bad habit, start self-monitoring yourself for this behavior.
Determine a better alternative behavior that will help you perform positively. Writing down on a piece of paper each time you misbehave or misspeak can make you focus on changing behavior to a more positive alternative.
4. Another powerful aid to developing those EI skill areas that you want to reinforce is to make a commitment to another person, who in turn will put pressure on you when you don't comply with the area in need of improvement.
ACTION PLAN
1. In what areas of applying EI do I most need to improve?
2. Why? What will be my payoff?