GWIM55 - Abuja, Nigeria - Week 1, Day 3 & 4: Leadership and Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

Leadership is one topic that touches most people who are in authority in one way or the other.

The list of great leaders, African leaders to be specific is large and there are a lot of people out there who have done amazing things to inspire others through their work and leadership skills.

Day 3 reflected more about Leadership, who a good leader is and the traits of being a good leader. There are a lot of things we normally take for granted as leaders and as such neglect the important aspects of our work that would have made our organisations / businesses much better.

A leader is not only a title, a leader carries a lot more weight than just sitting in an office and commanding people on what to do. It takes knowing your team and being a part of it, motivating members, complimenting them, accepting feedback et el.



My best part was the Emotional Intelligence part.

Take time to reflect in your place of work, country etc, look at some of the great minds in business, or other companies, most of the people that make top managers are not the smartest kids in class... the guys whose IQ is high up there!

I remember in school we thought these guys had it all, but what happens to them when we throw them in a real life scenario? Most of the business heads, CEOs, etc are the people who were actually average students in class! The ones who passed, maybe not excelled but did just enough, and in some circumstances, actually most cases, some of these great minds in businesses did not even make it to high school!

So what is it about them that gives them the edge? That is when Emotional Intelligence comes in.
Research has found out that IQ, or being only intelligent is not good enough, you need to know how to deal with people and their emotions, and once you have these, then we see people excelling in different businesses, work etc.

I loved this quote "We are being judged by a new yardstick/criteria, not just how smart we are, or by our training and expertise, but also how well we handle ourselves and each other". - Daniel Goleman, PH.D - Working with Emotional Intelligence.



I learned a lot from this beautiful concept and will research it deeper. Once we are able to know how to deal with people's emotions in our homes, places of work, there is a lot that we accomplish and it definitely gives us an edge in our working environments.

Lovely 2 days of Leadership, and Emotional Intelligence!