Relevance of this tool in today’s milieu
Much of the business literature on leadership, unlike the broader literature on the subject, starts with the assumption that leaders are rational beings. Leaders use these business books for advice, so they get suggestions on how to imitate the conscious motivations, behaviors and choices of role models. Such books are hardly likely to focus on the leader’s irrational side and less likely to suggest that the role models successes may even stem from other dynamics of the psyche.
If one were asked to define the ideal leader, one is likely to emphasise traits such as intelligence, determination, vision, analytical skills which are traditionally associated with leadership but is proving to be a minimum for success. These are threshold capabilities. They are necessary but insufficient for today. There are other essential ones which are left out.
Daniel Goleman asserted 16 years ago that nearly 90% of the difference between outstanding and average leaders is attributable to emotional factors, the right brain, and not just the intellectual acumen. Indeed today many professionals are intrigued by the role emotions play in their careers and they aspire to become more aware of their own emotional states and their ability to manage, understand and use them appropriately.
Self application
I was asked once “ So where is your logos?” which I did not comprehend. Subsequently, I realised with the help of others that for much of my life I had operated from the right brain more naturally than the left. I would be more emotional and sociable than be objective and rational. The inclination to use one polarity did not help in all situations. Some situations needed me to be objective and rational whereas others required that I applied heart and mind. With this new awareness and the outcomes I attained with the somewhat habitual use of a single polarity encouraged me to look into unhelpful behaviours and patterns of social relationships. Initially, there was a distinct conflict between discipline and control on one pole and disorder and impulse on the other. With consciousness, I worked at establishing a balance or an oscillation from one polarity to the other and back again. It continues to be a challenging as there is a tendency for me to identify with one pole more easily than the other.
Coaching Application- case study
A not so uncommon dilemma that many face is their reluctance to share their ideas or perspectives in a larger forum although they are not short of them. They come away feeling disappointed at themselves for this fairly consistent behaviour and do chastise themselves for their silence. Their feelings are exacerbated when someone else is more forthcoming to share the identical idea in the same forum and it is well received. This disposition has caused them to miss many opportunities in the past to make a contribution to discussions and to benefit from the visibility that comes with it. When questioned about their reluctance to speak up, their explanation or justification for this tendency is to say
It’s in my nature. This is who I am.
This rational elucidation holds no water when it is noted that they are far more forthcoming to share their thoughts in smaller and familiar groups.
However, if this person takes a deep dive into his psyche with the help of an experienced and knowledgeable facilitator to unearth material that is unconscious to him, the true irrational driver of his behaviour is unveiled. The gravitational force underlying the reluctance not to speak up is actually self-preservation or self-protection from the unconscious threat of criticism or judgment. To put it simply, fear holds him back. Further unveiling reveals an age old belief that says
I am not good enough.
Of course, there are further layers beyond this revelation. This ‘peeling of the onion’ or ever increasing self-awareness can be quite transformative.
Too often, the rational explanation is accepted with no interest in the irrational forces that are the true drivers of behaviours, decisions and choices in life. And yet, the latter cannot be unearthed without the former which is usually the starting point. Though they are opposites, they complement each other in the quest for a deeper truth.
Research on the Imperative of Eros
I want to share with you three very compelling and converging studies that were done by very prominent people who are all experts in their fields.
There was a 35 year longitudinal study done of people who graduated from the so called Ivy League Schools such as Princeton, MIT, Stanford and Harvard. Students, who got into these universities, had to be the ‘brightest of the bright’. They had to demonstrate that they had the intelligence, the analytical skills and, of course the grades before they could get into these schools.
The researchers found that after 35 years, those who graduated were not all successful and, in this instance, success was measured by professional and personal benchmarks. They found that many had hit a glass ceiling in their careers when it was expected that they should have climbed further up the career ladder; they were inept at sustaining good relationships and, consequently, were divorced, estranged from their children and led isolated lives; many had become addicts. The researchers were intrigued about the factors, traits, skills and/or capabilities that differentiated the successful bunch from the unsuccessful bunch.
Another study was done where competency models were analysed from 188 companies which included large and global companies such British Airways, Credit Suisse, Lucent Technologies. These competency models looked at technical skills such as accounting and business planning and cognitive abilities like analytical reasoning amongst many others.
Using these competency models, star performers in all companies were compared with average ones in senior leadership positions. Intellect was a requisite driver of outstanding performance. Cognitive skills such as big picture thinking and long term vision were particularly important. However, nearly 90% of the difference in the profiles of star performers and average performers was attributable to the same set of factors discovered in the earlier study and it had nothing to do with cognitive abilities. This set of factors proved to be twice as important as the other capabilities for jobs at all levels. It played an increasingly important role at the highest levels of the company. This study showed that the higher the rank of a person who was considered to be a star performer, this set of capabilities show up as the differentiator.
The late David McClelland, the renowned researcher in human and organisational behaviour studied a global food and beverage company. He, too, found that when senior managers had a critical mass of the same set of capabilities, their divisions out performed yearly earning goals by 20%. Meanwhile, division leaders who were without that critical mass under performed by almost the same amount. This finding held true in the US divisions as much as in the Asian divisions. He, not unlike the other researchers, discovered that there is a strong link between factors other than the rational/cognitive intellect or IQ and the individual’s and company’s success.
All three studies discovered highly intelligent, highly skilled executives who did not make the cut. Then, there were others with solid but not extraordinary intellectual abilities and technical skills who soared. Of course, this latter group possessed what the former group were not sufficiently equipped with.
A person can have the best training in the world, great cognitive abilities or an incisive analytical mind, an endless supply of smart ideas, incredible technical skills such as accounting and business planning but without many aspects of the Yang of Eros, he or she still won’t make the cut as a great leader.
I am not asserting that good old-fashion IQ and technical ability are not important ingredients in strong leadership. But the recipe would not be complete without empathy, intuition, relatedness, inclusiveness, values etc. The best leaders are somewhat complete because rationality is combined with intuition, IQ is complemented by EQ, decision making with empathy etc.
Closing reflections
Nature is a whole which does not discriminate between polarities and but embraces all. Inadvertently or otherwise, man unlike nature tends to discriminate between polarities and excludes one in favour of the other and, consequently, falls short of taking a more holistic approach to most things in life.
The brain is one such example; there are the right and left brains or two polarities to it. The right brain, the part responsible for intuition, expressing emotions, empathy, creativity, thoughtfulness etc. is not particularly stimulated or cultivated in most organisations or environments, perhaps, because these qualities are not rated highly. The faculties of the left brain such as logic, critical thinking, reasoning, manipulating numbers etc. are more valued. It is fairly obvious there will be a tremendous leap in capability if the right and left brains are effectively combined. Leaders will become more effective when they are able to approach decision making and take actions in a more holistic manner. Coaches can become more effective if they too take a more holistic approach of combining logos and eros.