Daniel Goleman's Blog, page 21
December 5, 2011
Going along to get along
It depends. There is much to be said for a spirit of cooperation, and getting along – top-performing teams, for example, thrive on harmony. On the other hand, when this means turning a blind eye to major ethical wrongs, then avoiding action is unethical. We need people willing to speak the truth, even to power.
November 28, 2011
Leaders, followers and EI
A: Getting followers' reports on a leader is one of the best ways to guage her performance. Even if objective metrics like hitting quarterly numbers look good, how a leader hits the target matters enormously in the long run: a tyrannical boss may reach short-term objectives, but the attrition of talent and drop in morale will hurt longer term. There are, for example "kiss-up-kick-down" types who are charming to their own boss but hell to work for. The best tool for getter followers to rate a boss is a confidential 360-degree questionnaire, one they can fill our anonymously, and with the data from everyone aggregated so no one can be identified. With that kind of honesty, you can get a more accurate picture of how a boss operates in human terms.
November 20, 2011
"Design emotional maturity"
A: The answer is in your question: fear itself, in all its forms, is the enemy of great performance – not just in design, but in any domain. The fundamental reason: when the brain's circuitry for fear, worry, and anxiety takes over, it paralyzes the executive functions of the brain, the parts we use for thinking, creating, and execution of our plans. So the key lies in managing fear. For this, the EE self-management competencies are the answer, particularly emotional self-control.
October 27, 2011
What motivates you, Dr. Goleman?
A: I credit much of my motivating drive to my parents, both college professors. My mother was inspired early in her life by the example of Jane Adams, who founded one of the first "settlement houses," dedicated to help impoverished immigrants make their way in fulfilling their dreams. As my mother was growing up in Chicago in the early years of the 20th century, herself the child of immigrants, she decided to follow in the footsteps of Adams, and so became a social worker in the early years of that profession. Over the years she did much to bring mental health services to communities throughout California – and her motto was, "Make the world a better place." My father was a professor and a humanist who studied the wisdom of world literature and shared it with his students. He was an inspiring teacher – his student jazz musician Dave Brubeck was moved enough to dedicate an oratio he composed to my father (for a biographical sketch of my mother and father: http://danielgoleman.info/biography/). In my own work I have tried to make the world a better place through the tools I use: writing that inspires people to action.
October 20, 2011
Howard Gardner & multiple intelligences
A: Yes. When I wrote Emotional Intelligence, I was building on Howard Gardner's model of multiple intelligence. As I noted in the book, my model of emotional intelligence unpacks what Gardner calls the "intrapersonal" and "interpersonal" intelligences. In my theory, self-awareness and self-regulation are the intrapersonal abilities, and empathy and social skill the interpersonal.
October 13, 2011
Is there such a thing as too young for SEL?
A: No danger, if done well – but great benefits. The best programs for young children in social and emotional learning, or SEL, are designed by child development specialists who know what is appropriate for each age. So during the 4-to-7 years, for instance, learning to delay gratification and not give in to every impulse (like hitting when you're angry) is an essential lesson, particularly because the brain's circuitry for managing impulse is going through a growth spurt just about then. And giving kids repeated lessons in what their brain is trying to master helps them strengthen that brain circuitry. Other key lessons for kids of that age include understanding how your own actions make other kids feel – that is, empathy; comprehending what your feelings are and what makes you feel that way; and how to work out disagreements in a positive way. All these lessons are invaluable for any child. But it's important that they be given in a way that fits the child's ability to understand at that age. So these same basic lessons need to be repeated in later years as a child's cognitive abilities grow, in ways that fit their enhance understanding. The best guide to such well-designed SEL programs is at www.casel.org.
October 6, 2011
Emotional response levels: low vs. high
A: One place way psychology categorizes people who have inappropriately high levels of emotional response is in terms of the "affective disorders," like depression and anxiety. Both diagnoses refer to people who have distressing emotions too strong, too long-lasting, and too out-of-place. From the EI perspective, these problems are with emotional self-regulation. While psychiatry tends to treat these too-high emotional response conditions with drugs, an alternative approach is to teach people to enhance their emotional self-management skills themselves, without medication. The most fruitful such approach is mindfulness-based cognitive therapy.
September 29, 2011
EI & education: where to begin?
A: The movement in social/emotional learning is flourishing, with more and more schools, both public and private, implementing these programs. The main clearinghouse for information on this approach to education is the Consortium for Research on Academic, Social and Emotional Learning, www.casel.org. I'd recommend you look at the programs and schools applying SEL, and affiliate with one of those. Your background sounds as if you would be well-suited for this already, withough needing additional certification. Good luck!
EI & education: where to begin?
A: The movement in social/emotional learning is flourishing, with more and more schools, both public and private, implementing these programs. The main clearinghouse for information on this approach to education is the Consortium for Research on Academic, Social and Emotional Learning, www.casel.org. I'd recommend you look at the programs and schools applying SEL, and affiliate with one of those. Your background sounds as if you would be well-suited for this already, without needing additional certification. Good luck!
September 22, 2011
EI as a job performance predictor
A: That criticism was made early in the history of EI, but has been weakened by new findings. EI is a young concept – it was proposed first just two decades ago, by Yale psychologists Peter Salovey and John Mayer, in an obscure psychological journal. I wrote Emotional Intelligence 15 years ago, calling wider attention to the concept. It's only in the last decade that sound research on EI has accelerated – including good studies on how well EI predicts job performance. Early reviews of the question did not have that much data to base their answers on.
Now, though, the picture is coming into better focus. A new meta-analysis finds, for instance, that EI definitely adds a significant increment to job performance over and above intelligence or the "Five Factor Model" of personality. (That analysis was published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior in 2010; lead author Ernest O'Boyle, School of Business, Virginia Commonwealth University.)
The very best answer to this question, though, is years away. That would be based on a longitudinal study following a large group from childhood into their adult years, with sound measures done at baseline and repeated regularly, with job performance as an outcome measure in the later rounds of data collection.
As for me, I feel the most interesting data would also make a distinction between the ability of EI and IQ to predict 1) what job someone ends up in (here my money would be on IQ as the stronger predictor of whether, say, you ended up slinging burgers or a surgeon), and 2) who is most successful in their job once they get it (I'd look to EI as the stronger predictor here).
