Emotional Intelligence 4

(Supplemental)

 

No man (or woman) is an island.

While in the current educational system you can work on your own without any regard for the thoughts, feelings, and concerns of your classmates, once you enter the workplace, that will not be the case.

In this final lesson we’ll see the relationship between group dynamics and effectiveness and emotional intelligence.

Primer Questions:

Do you think it would be easier to agree or cooperate if everyone in a group or team at work (or in school) all had higher Emotional intelligence? ​

What do you think would happen if some group or team members had little to no emotional intelligence, and only one or two people had high emotional intelligence?

Write your thoughts in your journal, then watch the video below.

Mob mentality

Have you heard that term before, Mob mentality? What do you think it means?

One could say it means that everyone in the group is cooperating and collaborating with each other, and that would be true.

But in this case, this term infers that the group is united in doing something negative, problematic, or even dangerous.

How can you contribute to a group’s emotional intelligence? Does it matter?

NOTE: These videos are designed to explain basic principles. To enhance your learning experience, try to teach the points made in the video to someone else.

Group EI: If you can identify the EI of each member in the group, and help all achieve a high level, you will have achieved a group dynamic that performs at the highest level.

A group with high EI builds:

  • TRUST

  • IDENTITY

  • PURPOSE

Mob mentality. What about the individuals?

If the majority of people in a group have low EI, that is, they care very little about what others feel or why, and don’t see the need to feel or show empathy, the results can be harmful and dangerous.

A group with low EI builds:

  • IDENTITY

  • EMOTIONAL REACTION

Why it’s so powerful.

As you can see, having EI or not having EI can have consequences for the group. Whether it’s something as simple group project in school or something more complex like a product development team in a company or a group of protesters, eventually a group takes on its own collective EI.

It is therefore important to be able to help others in any group level up and develop their EI. Note the following from Harvard Business Journal

“Our research tells us that three conditions are essential to a group’s effectiveness: trust among members, a sense of group identity, and a sense of group efficacy. When these conditions are absent, going through the motions of cooperating and participating is still possible. But the team will not be as effective as it could be, because members will choose to hold back rather than fully engage. To be most effective, the team needs to create emotionally intelligent norms—the attitudes and behaviors that eventually become habits—that support behaviors for building trust, group identity, and group efficacy.”

Building the Emotional Intelligence of Groups by Vanessa Urch Druskat and Steven B. Wolff, Harvard Business Journal Magazine (March 2001)

READ THE ARTICLE HERE.

“A team, like any social group, takes on its own character. So creating an upward, self-reinforcing spiral of trust, group identity, and group efficacy requires more than a few members who exhibit emotionally intelligent behavior. It requires a team atmosphere in which the norms build emotional capacity (the ability to respond constructively in emotionally uncomfortable situations) and influence emotions in constructive ways.”

-Building the Emotional Intelligence of Groups, Harvard Business Journal Magazine (March 2001)

Secrets to Success

Whereas little attention is given to understanding your classmates in school, and what they’re thinking, feeling, or going through, here at MindSage, we emphasize the importance of developing emotional intelligence.

If you are accepted into any one of our project-based programs, EI will play a key role in your ability to benefit, contribute and get the most out of our professional skills program. Moving forward in life, keep these key points in mind. Emotional Intelligence will allow you to:

1) Better understand and anticipate the needs of people around you.

2) More clearly understand how you and your actions and words affect others.

3) Be better at understanding nonverbal cues.

4) Be better equipped to deal with possible interpersonal conflict.

6) More accurately predict people’s behavior and be able to plan accordingly.

7) Be better at understanding how to motivate the people around you.

8) Be able to build stronger, lasting relationships.