Applied EI – The Importance of Attitudes in Developing Emotional Intelligence
by Tim Sparrow and Amanda Knight

Publishers: Jossey-Bass (Wiley)
ISBN: 0470032731
RRP: £24.99
Publication date: Friday 15 September 2006
Pre-order on www.amazon.co.uk - Amazon price £14.99 (40% discount!)

Copies will be on sale at the AppliedEI Conference Wednesday 20 September

Yet Another Book on EI?

Emotional intelligence is no longer a new subject matter. Dan Goleman’s bestseller “Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ” launched EI onto the global development map in 1995. There was so much immediate short term interest that many saw it as a fad and expected EI not to stay the course. Others jumped on the bandwagon and misrepresented it or oversold it.

However, in the ensuing decade a lot of research, theoretical development and widespread application in a number of fields has taken place. A wide range of books written by a variety of EI experts and practitioners has been published since the late ‘90s. Prior to 2004, the market did subside somewhat, but there was an undercurrent of activity from those who remained serious about EI.

Significantly though in the last couple of years or so, as more and more case studies have evolved, and as benefits have been experienced by organisations and individuals, EI seems to have attained a degree of respect from a number of quarters. A second wave of activity from a more mature market is now evolving, demonstrating a robustness and sustainability that was not visible before. Ten years on from Dan Goleman’s first book, EI is coming into its own.

The market needs a fresh, and practical, perspective on this subject. – and this book provides just that.


So What’s New?

The book Applied EI is about developing emotionally intelligent attitudes, something that is not tackled by previous publications on emotional intelligence, and it explains the link these have with the related EI skills that are required to manage and lead effectively in today’s world. Whilst exploring the crucial role of EI in individual, team and leadership development, and what it means to be an EI practitioner, it also takes a bigger picture look at EI in general, considering other EI approaches and its links to other constructs.

Applied EI also introduces the latest research into Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) - the psycho-biological aspects of EI – or in other words the impact our thinking and emotions have on our bodies in terms of health and stress. These are matters of serious consideration in today’s climate of burn-out and stress-related sickness, and in achieving the work/life balance we are all striving for.

Crucially, the book explains how all aspects of EI are changeable and developable. This approach is valid, innovative, and transformational in terms of EI development, and plugs a large gap in the arena of emotional intelligence – the concept that we all have the propensity to act with emotional intelligence …so why don’t we?


Endorsements for the book

Given the biology of the human being, there is only one way to use EI to reduce stress while increasing workplace productivity – and this is it! This is a must read for all business professionals and industry leaders.
Dr Alexandra Concorde,
leading authority on stress and creator of Perform-Well™ Organisational Systems

Although there are other emotional intelligence books on the market, Applied EI is the first text that has enabled me to fully understand and integrate the principles of emotional intelligence into every aspect of my life. What separates this text from similar books on the market is the level of detail included but presented in a clear logical format together with practical exercises to apply. This combined with a different approach to emotional intelligence – attitude is everything – makes this a “must read” for anyone involved in field of personal development.

This book not only provides the information to develop and manage the relationship with yourself but to enhance and create positive relationships with others – the two cornerstones of emotional intelligence.
Julie Want – EI Practitioner and Personal Coach

Failure to communicate effectively with staff, customers and other key stakeholders is one of the prime causes for low business performance and failure in western business.

This failure has profound implications for human resource and marketing management theory and practice, yet there has been little attempt to deal with the underlying dynamics of attitudes or feelings as a means of helping people engage empathetically with colleagues or customers. Marketing in particular, including ‘relationship marketing’, is often perceived as a mechanistic process involving concepts such as advertising, branding and segmentation without the all-important intra-personal and inter-personal communication that should underpin it.

Applied EI draws on proven models of team working, leadership and communication to provide tools with which readers can undertake individual or group self-analysis and understand their own potential and capabilities in emotional intelligence. This understanding can be used to change the way we relate to ourselves and to others, enabling a different engagement model to be developed. It takes the reader through the steps needed to begin a transformational journey that changes the way we do business.
Mike Wilman
Senior Lecturer in Marketing, Southampton Business School and the Solent University

Having taken my study of EI further in recent months, I found the content of this book very helpful, well presented for easy reading in busy times, and written in a jargon free way that made it easier to understand.

Critically, in these rapidly changing times, leaders have to delve deeply into their own capabilities and resilience to do a good job and succeed. Applied EI describes how taking a moment to think about how you are feeling, and how you feel about what you are thinking, can help you improve your performance and achieve better results.

I look forward to the publication of this book to help and support not only me, but other colleagues and leaders as they aspire to become world class.
Elaine Latham
Associate Director of Development, South West Peninsula Strategic Health Authority.

Did you know that there is a World Database of Happiness?

Well there is, and it is gathered by researchers at Erasmus University in Rotterdam who record a variety of scores on satisfaction with life.

These measures are expressed on a ten point scale and in rank order, along with the year of study:

For the purposes of this world study, ‘happiness’ is defined as `the degree to which an individual judges the overall quality of his life-as-a-whole positively', in short: how well we like the life we live.

Within this overall definition, two 'components' of happiness are distinguished:

These components represent respectively 'affective' (or feelings-based) and 'cognitive' (or thinking-based) appraisals of life.

So immediately we can see how EI fits in with happiness – our level of happiness is an outcome of how we think and how we feel about our lives.

This is different to other schools of EI thought who see happiness as a part of being emotionally intelligent. For example, there is a Happiness scale on the BarOn EQi profile.

Not only is there a World Database on how happy each country is, but the country of Bhutan is actually doing something about making itself a happier place! Bhutan has been commended for its progress in measuring and enhancing its ‘Gross National Happiness’ by Meiko Nishimizu, the former vice president of the World Bank. In her view, country-wide happiness has a significant impact on how secure the populus feels within the country, which is particularly significant perhaps for such a small nation.

Happiness has also recently leapt up the political agenda here in the UK, with both Tony Blair and David Cameron giving the subject significant airtime – particularly in light of the results of another recent survey that suggests we are not as happy as a nation as we were in the 1950s.

Conference Keynote – The Importance of Happiness

We’re delighted to announce that Dr Richard Stevens of the ‘Make Slough Happy’ project is returning to the town where the AppliedEI conference is being held to deliver a keynote speech on ‘The Importance of Happiness’.

Happiness at work is also a subject that has enjoyed much debate in recent years under the label of ‘Human Capital’. Dr Stevens, who is Chair of Social Psychology with the Open University, explains “The real and sustained effectiveness of organisations depends crucially on the wellbeing of their members. The happiness of employees is not just a bonus but the crucial oil that can turn a good organisation into great one.”

His keynote will discuss how happiness and wellbeing are core to effective work and personal life. He will briefly review the psychology of happiness and the factors which enhance or impede our sense of wellbeing, and will also cover his experience as the psychologist on the BBC team which 'made Slough happy', discussing the techniques they used and the principles underlying them. Dr Stevens explains, “These methods have been found to work powerfully not only in everyday but in working life. They can be used to great effect in organisations. They ensure that employees utilize their strengths and potential and also improve creativity and relationships at work.”


‘Making Slough Happy’

50 local volunteers, aged from 17 to 78, spanning the racial spectrum, and with occupations from housewives to local councillors and university tutors, were recruited to the project by Dr Stevens and his team.

To measure the success of the project, the experts selected two established tests of life satisfaction and constructed three further tests of happiness and mood especially for the project. The happiness levels of the Slough volunteers were measured before, during and after the end of the project to assess whether the team's methods had been effective.

At the start of the experiment, Dr Richard Stevens revealed the findings of the first questionnaire, which showed that the Slough 50s’ happiness level was close to the UK average.

However, the volunteers were also asked to respond to a comparable question: How satisfied are you with your life? - a question for which data has been collated from around the world through the World Database of Happiness.

On this key question the group returned an average rating of 6.4 – well below the UK average and just below the level for China. Significantly, most of the countries that have lower ratings are former Soviet bloc countries so the experts had their work cut out to improve the life satisfaction levels of people in Slough.

The volunteers were given a “happiness manifesto” of lifestyle changes to adopt, and then they attended workshops over the ensuing ten weeks to explore which worked.

Dr Stevens’ 10 steps to happiness
1. Plant something and nurture it
2. Count your blessings - at least five - at the end of each day
3. Take time to talk - have an hour-long conversation with a loved one each week
4. Phone a friend whom you have not spoken to for a while and arrange to meet up
5. Give yourself a treat every day and take the time to really enjoy it
6. Have a good laugh at least once a day
7. Get physical - exercise for half an hour three times a week
8. Smile at and/or say hello to a stranger at least once each day
9. Cut your TV viewing by half
10. Spread some kindness - do a good turn for someone every day

Some of these are great activities to do as 21-day habit changers that we recommend to kick-start any personal EI development programme.


Happiness and EI

Dr Stevens and his team identified key components of happiness which became the focus of individual development in the project.

Here are examples describing those key components, and what we see as being the correlating AppliedEI™ developments.

And at the end of the experiment, did Dr Stevens’s project work?

“We designed a complex assessment survey and the results showed a significant overall effect on the volunteers’ reported levels of happiness in areas such as work and relationships,” he reports. “We produced more change than we expected. Generally, people misjudge what makes them happy, particularly in relation to materialism. The pursuit of money is not the way to wellbeing or joy. The take-home message is that you, yourself, can make so much difference to your happiness.”

EI = Happiness!

If you remember from the very top of this article, our happiness is made up of how we think and feel about our lives. Happiness then requires emotionally intelligent attitudes and behaviours. As happiness is made up of personal thoughts and feelings about our individual lives, it also follows that happiness is ultimately the responsibility of the individual, as Dr Stevens has summarised. This is also true of our EI development.

If we want to improve our work situation for example, we need to think about how we can bring more of ourself to our work, to be more authentic, more real. This means matching up what we truly want for ourselves deep down inside with what we are actually creating in our world. This needs us to really understand our thinking and our feeling, and how these thoughts and feelings are impacting on the choices we are making every day, in every moment.

As Dr Stevens has also said earlier in the article, “The real and sustained effectiveness of organisations depends crucially on the wellbeing of their members. The happiness of employees is not just a bonus but the crucial oil that can turn a good organisation into great one.”

This leads us to a final conclusion.

EI leads to sustained high performance.
EI leads to happiness/wellbeing.
Happiness/wellbeing leads to sustained high performance.

So the three are intrinsically linked:

EI = HAPPINESS = SUSTAINED HIGH PERFORMANCE

Find out more about how you can bring Happiness/Wellbeing to your organisation, and how AppliedEI™ can help you with that, by booking your place at the Applied EI conference today www.emotionalintelligence.co.uk/conference.



References:
R. Veenhoven, World Database of Happiness, Item bank. Erasmus University Rotterdam. Available at: www.worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl (2006).

‘Making Slough Happy’, BBC Press Office

‘The Slough of Happiness’, The Times Online

EI Development from the CAEI

For EI development to be effective it needs to be:
Individual-oriented – because each person’s EI development needs are different
Developmental – starting with an assessment and continuing with supported development
About attitudes – developing emotionally intelligent attitudes and habits that lead to effective self and relationship management
Over time – to sustain the changes in attitudes and habits over the long term
Ethical – provided by qualified practitioners who have developed their own EI

For organisations: we either work with you to design and implement effective EI development programmes specific to your needs, or we run ‘Train the Trainer’ programmes to provide your organisation with people who have the necessary attitudes and skills to implement long-term EI strategies.

For individuals: we provide individual programmes for developing your personal EI, or practitioner courses if you are seeking to specialise in EI to help develop others.