This article has conveniently crossed my path. My millennial child and I were comparing notes from our respective early career experiences, hers from the present and mine from 30 years ago. Some facets of work life are profoundly different now, as would be expected from advances in technology the global economy. Yet when we talked about work relationships and personal interactions I heard many of the same challenges I remember, albeit experienced in somewhat different forms with the prevalence of social media.
Our discussion led to ways to understand and navigate the organizational hierarchy without compromising our individual tenets. It can be hard to accept that we cannot control what other people think, how they act or how they react, but this is reality. Instead, we can only control those things in ourselves. However, there is the potential to influence others and situations through our actions and reactions by employing a high emotional intelligence, which was new to her. Stated simply in this article, utilizing our emotional intelligence can allow us to ‘….make personal decisions that achieve positive results.’
How can this be done? First, you must focus on yourself and develop a strong self-awareness to understand your own emotions and manage them in a positive way. Next you need to be able to pick up on emotions of others, combine with your own and manage the confluence of all. Obviously not an easy set of tasks!
There is good news. Like so many other habits, you can learn to increase your emotional intelligence. Granted that it does take time with much of it being experiential learning, but awareness of the situations when you can learn can expedite the process. That millennial child of mine was far along in this process for her age on her own accord, but it did make me feel good that be able to share information that was new and appreciated.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/travisbradberry/2014/01/09/emotional-intelligence/#6109641a3ecb
