What? Having an emotionally intelligent team is very important. Emotionally intelligent teams have self-awareness, self-management, and social awareness. Just focusing on these three things can help create an emotionally intelligent team that helps team members focus on themselves as well as their team members. Self-awareness according to Hughes & Terrell is: “You can understand the emotions, needs, and concerns of other people, pick up on emotional cues, feel comfortable socially, and recognize the power dynamics in a group or organization.”. This simply means that you as a team member know how to emotionally navigate your team members and help them when they need it. Self-management according to Hughes & Terrell is: “You’re able to control impulsive feelings and behaviors, manage your emotions in healthy ways, take initiative, follow through on commitments, and adapt to changing circumstances.”. This means that you can control yourself with your emotions, you don’t lash out, and adapt to new point in the team. And lastly, social awareness: “You recognize your own emotions and how they affect your thoughts and behavior, know your strengths and weaknesses, and have self-confidence.”. With social awareness you know how your emotions work, and you know your strengths and weaknesses as a team member and know when and when not to input on specific things. (Hughes & Terrell). According to Psychology Today: “These skills are the building blocks necessary for teams to be high performing.”. Which is true! Having basic building blocks to a team to make them even better than they already were is necessary when trying to build on to the team.
So What? If a team member has self-awareness, self-management, and social awareness, they can just break the ice with having an emotionally intelligent team. Of course, if an emotionally intelligent team is wanted, there are many more steps to it like emotional awareness and nonverbal communication for example, but the main points are to have self-awareness, self-management, and social awareness. According to The Economist, there are seven different ways to have an emotionally intelligent team. Having a ringleader, identifying team members’ strengths and weaknesses, having a spark of passion, building team norms, developing creative ways to manage stress, allowing team members to have a voice, and encouraging employees to work and play together. Being aware of the seven types of emotionally intelligent teams is necessary when it comes to figuring out what kind of team you want to have.
Now What? When you finally think you have your emotionally intelligent team, The Enterprises Project will tell when to know you have one. Your emotionally intelligent team show empathy, emotionally intelligent teams learn from the process, emotionally intelligent teams ask instead of tell, emotionally intelligent teams inspire people, emotionally intelligent teams give feedback, emotionally intelligent teams seek external viewpoints, emotionally intelligent teams don’t create drama, emotionally intelligent teams regulate emotions, emotionally intelligent teams practice flexibility, and lastly Emotionally intelligent teams care about each other. The Enterprises Project lists all the signs perfectly, emotionally intelligent teams are simple! They are emotionally intelligent! They know how to self-regulate and give each other afloat.
Refrences:
10 Reasons Why Teams Need Emotional Intelligence. http://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/leading-emotional-intelligence/201707/10-reasons-why-teams-need-emotional-intelligence. Accessed 5 Mar. 2020.Rampton, John.
7 Ways to Create Emotionally Intelligent Teams. execed.economist.com/blog/guest-post/7-ways-create-emotionally-intelligent-teams. Accessed 5 Mar. 2020.Smith, DeBorah Sunni.
10 Signs of Emotionally Intelligent Teams. enterprisersproject.com/article/2019/4/emotional-intelligence-teams-signs.
Hughes, M. & Terrell, J. (2007). The Emotionally Intelligent Team: Understating and Developing the Behaviors of Success. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass
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