Emotional Intelligence Coaching for Leaders | Does It Really Help?

Much is written about the need for and value of senior leaders in organisations possessing and demonstrating healthy emotional intelligence in the workplace. But how quickly can a senior leader who is often time poor, under pressure, or feeling stressed with multiple stakeholders to satisfy, multiple projects to oversee and ensure they are delivered so value is created for the business, how do you help them want to get engaged with and then develop their emotional intelligence. This briefcase study, with permission granted to share it with you, with the person's name removed, is a senior leader in a global organisation brought in from an external company to turn around an underperforming division in that business. So let's take a look at the EQI 2.0 assessment results before the coaching. What you can see is the person's self-awareness is in the low range, so they're not aware of what's going on between their ears, what they're thinking. They may not notice things such as stress. They may not be aware of the impact they're having on others. You can also see that their level of empathy is in the low range, so the value placed on relationships, it appears more transactional, and also partnered with a higher level of assertiveness. Higher level of assertiveness, low-range empathy. This can lead to, especially for a senior leader, being seen as commanding, controlling, and demanding rather than collaborative and occasionally kind and working together. What you also see is this person's stress tolerance is really high. It's in the high range, so they can cope with prolonged periods of stress. The potential risk here is that just because they can, they may expect the same of others. Crazy deadlines to achieve, um, and milestone projects to, uh, deliver on time. But also, there's a well-being potential challenge here as well. Just because they can cope with prolonged periods of stress doesn't mean it's not worth exploring what the trigger is for them. It could be environmental, it could be relationship-based, it could be their own high standards and expectations. But you also see that this person's preference for problem solving is in the high range too. They love solving problems. The potential challenge is they're not being objective with reality testing and seeing in advance what the potential problems could be in future and protecting against them and safeguarding against them. So, as you can see, it's pretty much, er, in some areas there are low levels of emotional intelligence. There are others where they are higher. Assertiveness and independence. An independent leader. Isn't that a great thing? But there is a time for collaborating too. Now, this is just the start point. If you look at the next result after 8 hours of coaching over 8 weeks, so basically an hour a week, this person's level of emotional intelligence is far more balanced. What you can see, their self-regard has improved, that inner confidence, self-actualisation, the value they place on contributing, delivering something meaningful rather than just a means to an end. That's significantly improved. Emotional self-awareness is still in the low range, but it has improved. This person's more aware of the impact situations, relationships, deadlines have on them, and also the impact they have on others. You can also see the emotional expression is beginning to partner this higher level of assertiveness, finding ways to help the medicine taste good. Even if a tough message, you can help the medicine taste good if you collaborate with people and engage with them and help them engage with you. The independence is still in the high range, but look at what's happened to interpersonal relationships. This person is now more focused on developing and maintaining and nurturing high-trust, win-win relationships. And high-trust, win-win relationships, along with greater levels of empathy, help people communicate with you. Speaking truth to power can sometimes come at a cost, you know, but this is where developing these relationships is helping rather than hurting team and divisional performance. They still love to solve problems, but look at what's happened to reality testing. They're seeing things more objectively as they are rather than as they would wish them to be. Now, you can see there's still high on flex— sorry, they're still high on stress tolerance, but they now have coping mechanisms in place to spot these stressful situations in advance and guard against them. There are bumps in the road, they always happen, but they're fewer and far between, and they're far more optimistic too. But what's the point of all this? Well, an optimistic outlook in a more collaborative, transparent, open and honest team really helps the journey be smoother, less bumpy. So you can see here, the before coaching results are here. The after coaching results are here. 8 hours over 8 weeks, an hour at a time. What leader cannot find an hour of learning so they can benefit personally, benefit professionally, and also help the organisation deliver even more value too. So this is just a very brief example of what can be achieved in such a short period of time when a senior leader finds a little bit of time to invest in themselves, invest in their personal professional development, and still be able to function— well, be able to function even more effectively with more choices. The key thing is with leaders, often they're the people that need the feedback the most, but they tend to get it the least because speaking truth to power has a consequence. If it's not a high-trust relationship, it can be seen as condescending or just not how you speak to your manager or leader. So I invite you to consider what value would you be able to potentially deliver for your organisation if you had more emotionally intelligent leaders who partnered deeply human skills with their technical brilliance too? If you'd like to find out more, there's a link below and I'm happy to guide you.