IQ or EQ - Why Can't We Have Both?

SUMMARY

We've all heard that age-old question, "Which is most important? Is it IQ or is it EQ?" My experience is that it's neither. So, stick with me in this episode because I'm going to help you to answer that question so that you know exactly what to do and what to focus on so that you can develop your Social and Emotional Intelligence.

There are 3 Key Principles that I teach that will help you to become more emotionally intelligent, to take on this area of learning and enable you to get value that you can then implement.

Number one is it's not a dichotomy. Not everything is black and white, sad or happy. Nothing that we look at as a dichotomy will give us the full value.

The second principle I want to talk about is focus on agreement. Right now, there are so many opportunities in the world for us to have an opinion that's different to other people. We're either this or we're that. If you look at the underlying teaching that I do around Emotional Intelligence, moving past that roadblock of needing it to be this or that will allow you to have the results that you want.

The third principle is it's all about taking small steps. When we realise that Emotional Intelligence or any other skill that we're learning is all about incrementally making changes on a daily basis, we will actually go from where we are now to where we want to go.

TRANSCRIPT

We've all heard that age-old question, "Which is most important? Is it IQ or is it EQ?" My experience is that it's neither. So, stick with me in this episode because I'm going to help you to answer that question so that you know exactly what to do and what to focus on so that you can develop your Social and Emotional Intelligence.

Hi, this is Grant Herbert, Emotional Intelligence Speaker and Trainer of the Year and Master Coach Trainer, and today, I want to have a conversation with you, and I want to answer the question around IQ versus EQ with, "Why can't we have both?" Wherever I go in social media or around the world, where people are having a conversation around Emotional Intelligence, I hear those questions all the time that really are stopping the value that can come out of the conversation. And those questions are things like, "Which is most important? Which comes first?" And these are what I believe to be the biggest roadblocks for you to be able to become more emotionally intelligent.

There are three key principles that I teach that will help you to become more emotionally intelligent, to take on this area of learning and enable you to get value that you can then implement. Social and Emotional Intelligence is the ability to be aware of your own emotions and the emotions of others in the moment and then to use that information to manage your responses and therefore have better relationships. However, when we focus on the wrong thing, we miss out on the true value. So, let's have a look at these three key principles in any sort of learning that we can employ to get the most out of it.

Number one is it's not a dichotomy. Not everything is black and white, sad or happy. Nothing that we look at as a dichotomy will give us the full value. So, if we take the question, "Which one's most important IQ or EQ?", we have to make a choice and therefore we decide which one we're going to put our focus on. A dichotomy says that it's got to be either this or that, and there's no middle ground. Well, in answering that question, "Which one is more important, IQ or EQ?", by the way, E is your Emotional Intelligence Quotient, I would say, "Well, why can't we have both?" And the reason I say that is that they are equally important. It's not a competition.

The second area I want to talk about is focus on agreement. Right now, there are so many opportunities in the world for us to have an opinion that's different to other people. We're either this or we're that. And the challenge with that is that that's where conflict can come in. What I like to do in the area of Emotional Intelligence is have a look at what we agree on. So, by realising and agreeing on the point that the scientists agree on that emotions happen physiologically, when we look for those cues, and that's what they are, we will look for feelings in our body. We will look for changes in our physiology that give us those clues. When we find that point of agreement, we can work on that. It doesn't matter whether or not you call an emotion an emotion or a feeling. If you look at the underlying teaching that I do around Emotional Intelligence, moving past that roadblock of needing it to be this or that will allow you to have the results that you want.

And the third principle, now that we realise it's not a dichotomy, it's looking for agreement, is that as we take on this journey of learning to become more emotionally intelligent and more socially intelligent, it's all about taking small steps. When we take away the dichotomy, when we look for that middle ground, when we give ourselves space to grow, when we realise that Emotional Intelligence or any other skill that we're learning is all about incrementally making changes on a daily basis, we will actually go from where we are now to where we want to go. We'll actually become more emotionally intelligent as we take on and develop more of the strategies.

To become more socially and emotionally intelligent, we have to shift from mindsets that we've already got. We have to prepare ourselves and unlearn some of the things that we've already learned. We have to stop looking for exact science in a dichotomous sort of way, and we need to look at what we can do right now. We look at what it is that we agree on, and we take that thing, whatever it is, that learning, we look at a strategy around it and then we implement that into our life on a daily basis.

Well, that's it from me for another week. Make sure that you subscribe, you hit the notifications, and you join me again next week as I continue this conversation and incrementally take you through the 26 competencies of Social and Emotional Intelligence so that you can remove those fears and anxieties and the things that are holding you back and navigate your emotions in a positive and healthy way. I'll see you then.