Leading with Emotional Intelligence: Hands-On ... - always yours

EMOTIONAL SELF-CONTROL TOOLS AND STRATEGIES 93
“Awareness equals responsibility.” This statement was made
famous with the Gestalt Therapists. It means that being aware
helps you have to the “ability to respond” or be “responsible.” In the
EI model awareness of yourself is the starting point—awareness
of your strengths and weaknesses, your mood, your varying feelings,
your behavior, your impact on others, your patterns, and your
personal story. Once aware you are better able to manage, monitor,
regulate, and control your reactions to situations. One useful awareness
is evaluating your predictability.
A common issue with many executives is they may appear
unpredictable to their followers. Unpredictability easily leads to
feelings of distrust or a threat. Followers don’t know if they can
trust what the leader says or may do, as the leader may be impulsive
and constantly changing their thoughts. If the leader is aware
of their emotions, moods, strengths, and patterns they become
more predictable and easier to trust. Predictability is more “brain
friendly” than unpredictability. The brain and mind are free to
pursue creative endeavors rather than be on the look-out for the
next unpredictable event.
When dealing with trust issues, I often try to identify what is the
core component of the lack of trust. I ask the leader to either rate
themselves or one of their direct reports on a 1-10 rating, where 10
is high, on the following three areas:
1. Competency: Knowing their job, are they good at their technical
skill?
2. Predictability: Are they consistent and do what they say
would do?
3. Dependability: In a crisis or crunch can they be counted on
being there and doing what it takes to get the job done?
Usually the lowest score is predictability, the person is not consistent
thus it is hard to trust them. It usually comes down to the
person not doing what was expected and not communicating about
it. The unpredictability becomes the intermittent reinforcer or here