Emotional intelligence
And, how to get away if you're trapped on an island.
Before we dive in …
Do we happen to have any estate planning attorneys among the readers of Understandably?
I’ve built an innovative marketing tool for estate planning lawyers that might interest you, and I’d love to share it. Just reply to this newsletter if you’d like to hear about it — or else send me a message at bill@understandably.com. Thanks!
Emotional intelligence
If you ever find yourself trapped on an island and a genie offers you a way out, but only if you can name a two-word leadership topic that has consumed the business world for the past three decades or so, I’ve got the answer for you.
The two words? Emotional intelligence.
Granted, the scenario I described is unlikely, but the odds that you’ll find yourself trying to identify what emotional intelligence entails are much higher.
That’s why I got sucked into a recent article in The Harvard Gazette in which Ronald Siegel, a Harvard Medical School psychology professor, outlined some of the keys to emotional intelligence.
As someone who has read an awful lot of these over the years, I found his perspective instructive. I recommend the whole thing, but here are my five biggest takeaways:
Get a handle on what’s going on inside you
Let’s start with the easy one, right? But don’t worry, you don’t have to overcome deep webs of psychosis. It’s more about building an objective awareness of your emotions and recognizing that other people have the same stuff going on.
“The first component is self-awareness, which means being conscious of our own thoughts, feelings, and what’s happening inside of us,” Siegel said.
One of my favorite examples of someone learning from not doing this comes from Warren Buffett, who spoke many times about how he originally bought control of Berkshire Hathaway — at the time, a struggling textile firm — purely because he was offended by the CEO and wanted to fire him.
“I had now committed a major amount of money to a terrible business,” he explained. “This is $200 billion because the genius here thought he could run a textile business.”
Don’t let your emotions run the show
Having recognized your emotions, separate them from your reaction — or at least, if you’re going to react emotionally, do so in a constructive way.
Putting in extra effort to achieve a worthwhile goal, and inspiring yourself by thinking about how disappointed and embarrassed you’ll be if you fail? Good.
Allowing that same fear of failure to push you to keep pursuing a goal after you’ve reassessed how valuable it actually is? Maybe not so good.
“Emotional intelligence is a particular skill of recognizing one’s own feelings, working with those feelings, and not just reacting in ways that are going to be problematic,” Siegel said.
Pay attention to other people’s feelings
This takeaway is one of my favorites because it’s easy to misinterpret. When we were children, we were told to pay attention to others’ feelings so that we wouldn’t hurt them — basically, so that we’d be nicer to people and get along better.
Sometimes that’s enough.
But emotional intelligence requires more. It’s a morally neutral awareness of how other people react emotionally, so that you can use that information to improve the odds that you’ll achieve your goals.
Fantastic example: The CEO who offended Buffett so much that he convinced him to overpay for a struggling textile business.
Was it intentional? I don’t know. But if it was, it was also a highly emotionally intelligent move.
Learn to work well with teams
We’re going to get a bit Socratic with this one — namely, the Euthyphro dilemma.
It’s OK if you don’t remember this from philosophy class, and in fact, I had to look it up to be sure. But it comes down to the question of whether, in the Greek pantheon:
Do the gods love things that are pious because they are pious, or do things become pious because they are loved by the gods?
I think we have a similar dilemma here, in questioning whether people who have highly developed senses of emotional intelligence are more likely to work well in teams, or whether the ability to work well with teams is itself a component of emotional intelligence.
As Siegel put it, we’re talking about “social skills, which is the ability to work well in teams, to be able to solve conflicts and help the team to cooperate.”
Beware of drama
This might be the most on-point possible advice of our time, since we live in an era of instant communication, virality — and drama.
And it gets in the way of getting things done.
“We humans are grossly inefficient in trying to get things done because most of our energy is spent on trying to make sure we look good, or on making sure that people think of us in a certain way, or on getting triggered by one another,” Siegel said.
Emotional intelligence directly tackles this waste of resources.
“I suspect that business leaders have realized that it’s relatively easy to get technical expertise in almost anything, but to get people who can understand and get along with one another, that is a challenge,” he said. “In many projects, there is a growing awareness that this skill is going to be the one that carries the day.”
A good place to start
I find the whole concept of emotional intelligence fascinating.
But like you, I’m most interested in practical, actionable strategies: how to choose the right words, how to see things through other people’s eyes, and how to use things like silence and humor to communicate more effectively.
These five simple habits are a pretty good place to start.
7 other things
The Supreme Court appeared poised on Wednesday to upend a key provision of a landmark civil rights law by prohibiting lawmakers from using race as a factor in drawing voting maps. The repercussions for the country’s political balance could be sweeping, allowing Republican state legislatures to eliminate at least a dozen Democratic-held House districts across the South. (The New York Times)
How inflatable frog suits became the protest fashion statement of the year: Costumes have been worn as political symbols for decades, but animal outfits have become especially popular at anti-ICE demonstrations in Portland. (The Washington Post)
OpenAI will soon allow “erotica” for ChatGPT users who verify their age on the platform. In an X post on Tuesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the company will add support for mature conversations when it launches age-gating in December. OpenAI isn’t the only company dipping into erotica, as Elon Musk’s xAI previously launched flirty AI companions, which appear as 3D anime models in the Grok app. (The Verge)
Instagram says it will overhaul its approach to teenagers’ accounts and try to crack down on their access to objectionable content after a firestorm of bad publicity over how teens use the social media app. Instagram, which is owned by Meta, announced a series of changes that it said were aimed at making teens’ experience on Instagram similar to viewing PG-13 movies, with equivalent restrictions on sexualized content and other adult material. (NBC News)
Grocery Prices Keep Rising. Frustrated Consumers Are Trying to Adapt: Record beef prices and coffee that costs $1 more per pound since May have shoppers cutting back on some foods, stockpiling others. (WSJ)
U.S. regulators have approved the launch of a bank backed by a group of high-profile tech billionaires with ties to Donald Trump’s administration, seeking to fill a gap left by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank. The bank, Erebor, was founded this year by Palmer Luckey, co-founder of military contractor Anduril, and Joe Lonsdale, head of venture capital firm 8VC and a co-founder of data analytics firm Palantir. Its early backers also include Peter Thiel’s venture firm Founders Fund and Haun Ventures, a crypto-focused investor. Like Anduril and Palantir, Erebor’s name is a reference to JRR Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Erebor is the “lonely mountain” whose treasures are reclaimed from the dragon Smaug. (The Financial Times)
Two teenagers at the center of the 3 a.m. assault on a DOGE employee known as “Big Balls,” which triggered President Trump’s federalization of DC’s police the deployment of the National Guard were sentenced to probation. A 15-year-old boy was sentenced to 12 months probation, and a 15-year-old girl received nine months after they pleaded guilty to simple assault. The judge emphasized that the purpose of juvenile court is to rehabilitate, not to punish. (WUSA)
Thanks for reading. Photo by Олег Мороз on Unsplash. I wrote about some of this Inc.com. See you in the comments!
Part of EI is owning your shadow. Not denying it or shaming it, but, gaining mastery over it.
The collective shadow of our nation has long been denied. Our history of slavery, racism, displacement of Native Americans, abuse of immigrants and economic injustice are examples of our shadow misaligned with our higher purpose.
Our shadow is there to protect us, but, it is only a tool, it can never be master. Instead of honestly confronting that shadow and gaining mastery over it, we’re now watching in horror as it takes control of our nation and destroys what we cherish.
Today we have a choice, either heal these deep emotional wounds and gain mastery over our shadow or watch it destroy all we value.
I have a bit of an advantage w/ Bill's topic today, as the following will support. In my professional & personal experience, I have learned a great deal about Emotional Intelligence.
Based on my experience, comments I might receive from those w/ healthy EI could include any of the following:
...That sounds really interesting/fun, to have been in such a study
...To be in on the 'ground floor' of such research years before it broke on the national scene was probably very interesting for all of those involved!
...Thank you for being so brave to share your results. I've found it intimidating to share successes due to someone thinking I'm bragging
Emotional Intelligence was something I studied in my undergraduate work in my dual majors of psychology & sociology. Also, for my masters degree in Social Work in the late 1970's. While I was in the master's program, another university's students studying for their psychology PHD recruited us as test subjects for research for emotional intelligence. There were numerous tests given thru-out the year. I know what I'm about to say won't be believed by one particular reader, but that's ok. My test results showed I have a very high EI
eta: I googled about admitting to my test results & this is what I found:
A person with healthy emotional intelligence (EI) would be more likely to admit to receiving a high score on an EI test, as this requires self-awareness and self-acceptance. Healthy emotional intelligence incorporates humility, which helps a person to realistically assess their abilities and admit both strengths and weaknesses.
However, the manner and context in which they admit their high score would reflect their healthy emotional intelligence. They wouldn't announce it boastfully but would use the information to reflect on their own growth and to help others ------->So, I added that information only for additional clarification that, yes, I did have full understanding of what the topic of the day is.