The Difference Between Emotional Intelligence and Self-Management

Wow, wow, wow.

In the last month, my head is just spinning from all of the poor decisions accomplished, trusted, leaders in business have been making.  It’s a great time to explain the difference between emotional intelligence and self-management.

LOADS of companies espouse emotional intelligence (EI) as an important leadership quality, but you can plainly see by the illustration that EI alone does not ensure good decision making?  EI has to be coupled with self-management.

EI is not only understanding what “makes you tick” and working to mitigate behaviors that might be offensive or get you into trouble (such as a quick temper) it also requires that you recognize the emotional and mental state of others and act appropriately in social situations. EI is a component of self-management.

Self-management requires self-restraint, thoughtful responses (sometimes no response), and “decorum” which is a word my mother used all the time and which I never hear anymore.

We can use road rage as an example of EI vs. self-management. See if you can label each of the options below, correctly.

Recently, in the area where I live, a young woman was stopped in her car at a stoplight. When the light turned green she didn’t take off quickly enough for the man in the pickup truck behind her. He could have:

A.     Waited patiently – really how much longer could she sit there unaware?

B.     Honked quickly – a polite “yoohoo” to pay attention

C.      Laid on his horn – impolitely showing his displeasure at how she was impacting him

D.     Put his bumper up against hers and pushed her down the roadway for .25 of a mile

Which did you label EI? (Answer: B)

Which did you label EI PLUS self-management? (Answer: A)

Which option was a big FAIL? (Answer: D)

 In case you’re wondering, the pickup truck driver chose D.  He’s now charged with attempted murder as well as various vehicular violations.

The thing I have observed with poor self-management is that the ramifications are huge. When you observe someone with poor EI you might think s/he is “uncouth.” It’s the kind of person to whom you say, “Read the room.”  But poor self-management often results in irreversible harm – certainly to the person who lacks self-management and often to others surrounding him or her.

In the illustration for this article, we have high-ranking business executives (all from the C-suite) who have had affairs (sometimes with each other), berated employees, spied on former employees, and posted shocking things to social media. If they are doing it – imagine what the “rank and file” employees are doing.

It’s time to make self-management the skill we teach everyone in our organizations. It’s not like EI – it’s not enough to know about it. We all must be able to practice self-management or companies will have to continually spend their time and money mitigating bad behavior and collateral damage.