"Emotional Intelligence 2.0" by Travis Bradberry, Jean Greaves

EQ is so critical to success that it accounts for 58% of performance in all types of jobs

 
Emotional Quotient/Intelligence (EQ) is more important than one’s intelligence (IQ) in attaining success in their lives and careers. As individuals our success and the success of the profession today depend on our ability to read other people’s signals and react appropriately to them. Therefore, each one of us must develop the mature emotional intelligence skills required to better understand, empathize and negotiate with other people - particularly as the economy has become more global. Otherwise, success will elude us in our lives and careers.

“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. Four core EQ skills (i.e., self-awareness, self-management, social-awareness and relationship-management) pair up under two key competencies (i.e., personal and social).

Self-awareness is to know yourself as you really are !!

 Stop and Ask yourself, 'Why you do the things You do'

The only way to genuinely understand your emotions is to spend enough time thinking through them to figure out where they come from and why they are there. Emotions always serve a purpose, Self-awareness is all about what makes you tick. People with high self-awareness are remarkably clear in their understanding of what they do well, what motivates and satisfies them and which people and situations push their buttons.

Quit treating your feelings good or bad, do not ever label them. Stop judging your emotions, an emotion is there to help you understand something important. Observe ripple effect of your emotions, spend sometime reflecting on your behavior. Rather avoiding your feeling, your goal should be to move toward the emotion, into it, and eventually through it. After the first few times you lean into your discomfort, you will quickly find that the discomfort is not so bad, it does not ruin you, and it reaps rewards. To better understand the physical effects of your emotions, try closing your eyes the next time and have a few moments alone. Discover the source of your emotion's triggers, Watch yourself like a Hawk(big-picture).

Get to know how you behave under stress. Your self-awareness in times of stress should serve as your third ear to listen to your body's cries for help. Your body speaks volumes when you push it too hard. Take the time to recognize these signals and recharge your emotional battery before your stress causes permanent damage to your system.

Self-awareness Strategies:

1. Quit treating your emotion as good or bad
2. Observe the ripple effect from your emotions
3. Lean into your discomfort
4. Know who you are and what pushes your buttons
5. Don’t be fooled by a bad mood
6. Don’t be fooled by a good mood, either
7. Stop and ask yourself why you do the things you do
8. Visit your values
9. Check Yourself
10. Spot your emotions in books, movies, tv, and music
11. Seek feedback
12. Get to know yourself under stress 

Self-management Strategies:

1. Breathe right Create an emotion vs reason list
2. Make your goals public
3. Count to 10
4. Sleep on it
5. Talk to a skilled Self-Manager
6. Visualize yourself succeeding
7. Clean up your sleep hygiene
8. Focus your attention on your freedoms, rather than your limitations
9. Speak to someone who is not emotionally invested to your problem
10. Learn a valuable lesson from everyone you encounter
11. Put a mental recharge into your schedule
12. Accept that change is just around the corner

Social Awareness Strategies:

1. Greet people by name
2. Make timing everything
3. Develop a Back-pocket question
4. Clear away the clutter
5. Live in the moment
6. Go on a 15-minute tour
7. Practice the art of listening
8. Go People Watching
9. Understand the rule of the culture game
10. Test for accuracy
11. Step into their shoes
12. Seek the whole picture
13. Catch the mood of the room

Relationship Management Strategies:

1. Enhance your natural communication style
2. Avoid giving mixed signals
3. Take feedback well
4. Build trust
5. Don’t get mad on purpose
6. Don’t avoid the inevitable
7. Complement the person’s emotions or situation
8. When you care, show it
9. Explain your decisions, don’t just make them
10. Make your feedback direct and constructive
11. Align your intention with your impact
12. Offer a “fix-it” statement during a broken conversation
13. Tackle a tough conversation
14. When stoplights aren’t working, it’s every man for himself – avoiding giving mixed signals.

Self-awareness is so important for job performance that 83% of people high on EQ are Top-Performers