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Book of the Month
In this issue we bring you an overview of Daniel Goleman's classic text Emotional Intellgience - Why it matters more than IQ and the impact that it had on the business world.
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Coming up in our next issue:
- Behavioural Change - Making it stick!
- The Classics: Understanding Organisations - How Charles Handy gave a new perspective on how organisaitons work and on the role of management in making them work better
- PLUS - more topical articles on business issues.
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With the summer now behind us and the Autumn looming, it's not only the nights that are closing in, but the end of the third quarter. Its a great time to take stock and to really think through the priorities for the remaining year.
We have compiled an eclectic mix of information on business performance and how to positively influence it for better business results.
In this issue we look at what the Olympics can tell us about performance management in the workplace.
We also bring you perspectives on another classic text. This time from Daniel Goleman - Emotional Intelligence.
There are also highlights from the recent CEO study from IBM and what it tells us about managing change in organisations.
We also explore some of the practical issues you may face in your business around holding difficult conversations.
If you would like more inspiration about how to manage your business change, visit our blog, which posts regular updates and ideas from the Agents2Change team.
Mary McGuire
Founder | |
Olympic Performance - Why competition is good for all of us
 Its hard not to get caught up in the excitement of the Olympics. The best British performance in modern times, surpassing medal targets set for the 2012 Olympics - four years early. It just goes to show what the power of setting some stretching goals and putting effort and belief behind them, can do for performance. There are a number of things that made this Olympic games special. Not only has there been unprecedented investment in some sports, but there has been a much higher emphasis on performance management through the use of performance directors in all main sporting areas. However, the investment focus and target setting started much earlier. Take the The Cycling Experience. .. Read More .... |
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Books that Changed the Business World: Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman
When Daniel Goleman first published his book 'Emotional Intelligence - Why It matters more than IQ' in 1995, it caused a sensation. It spent more than one-and-a-half years on the New York Times Best Seller list . Aimed at the general population rather than as a business text, it soon gained credibility as a concept across education, health and of course business.
Nowadays of course if you google Emotional Intelligence you will get millions of responses (2.2m), but we might easily forget that this was far from true before this book was published. Not that Goleman invented the concept or even coined the phrase - for that we can go back to Thorndike in the 1920's who introduced the concept of multiple intelligences (including Social Intelligence ).
Goleman expanded that concept , married it with practical examples and linked it to extensive research on brain function.
Goleman's model outlines four main facets of Emotional Intelligence:
- Self-awareness - the ability to read one's emotions and recognize their impact while using gut feelings to guide decisions.
- Self-management - involves controlling one's emotions and impulses and adapting to changing circumstances.
- Social awareness - the ability to sense, understand, and react to other's emotions while comprehending social networks.
- Relationship management - the ability to inspire, influence, and develop others while managing conflict.
Emotional intelligence is now a commonplace phrase and the concept has gained considerable ground in the fields of leadership and organizational development, together with a plethora of tools that can be used to measure and develop the requisite skills.
Goleman was not especially original or new in the concept that he presented, but what he did achieve was the breakthrough from niche psychology text to mainstream concept and for that he deserves recognition. |
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The IBM 2008 CEO Study: Enterprise of the future
 The bi-annual IBM CEO study has recently being launched The Study shows some interesting trends in the challenges facing the modern CEO and how these have changed over the last decade. Based on the opinions of over 1100 CEOs and Senior leaders around the world, the study benchmarked top quartile performance and how this was demonstrated in the organisatons response to change and innovation to determine the enterprise of the future. The gap between those organisations that thrive on change and those that do not appears to be widening. The high performing companies 'The Outperformers' as they are referred to, manage to respond and adapt to the change, whilst many companies report limited or no success. "CEO's forsee significant change ahead but their confidence in their ability to manage that change is not nearly as high." Read More .... |
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Holding Difficult Conversations
In one of our recent team discussions the subject of how to engage a person in a difficult conversation emerged. Our debate focused on the whole notion of 'dificult conversations'. The main points that we concluded in our debate was thus:
Difficult conversations are often around some source of conflict or differing expectations. What makes these conversations difficult, is often the huge emotional charge that the instigator feels when broaching a tricky subject. Conversations, by their very nature are about communication and reaching a shared understanding. The difficulty is therefore in the execution.
How best to prepare for these events and what skills are required is often under-appreciated by many managers, and thus the classic avoidance technique is often employed. Applying the knowledge from models such as the Ladder of Inference can help .... Read More ..... | |
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We hope that you have enjoyed reading 'Smart Business Thinking'.
One of the purposes of our communication is to provoke conversation. So if you have a comment or a reaction, share it with us at:
We look forward to hearing from you. |
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Sincerely,
Mary McGuire
Agents2change |
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