I was chatting with a client who asked me this question: “Hey, why are you always talking about emotions and how to deal with them? Shouldn’t an executive coach talk more about things like productivity, and time management and goal setting?”
First of all, upon reflection, I am guilty as charged. Most of my practice centers on helping business professionals who are responsible for leading others connect with and understand their own emotions so that they will be able to connect with and understand the people they are responsible for leading.
But isn’t there more to good leadership than emotions? Shouldn’t I be speaking more about the clarity of vision and how to communicate that vision in a compelling way, among many other things?
The short answer is sure, but why talk about the color of the roof shingles when we haven’t even laid the foundation yet?
Emotions lie at the very foundation of all leadership for one very important reason: leadership is about influencing behavior, and all behavior comes from our emotions.
“Wait, what?!?”
Yes, all behavior comes from the part of the brain that handles emotions and not abstract concepts. Simon Sinek explains this well in his Ted talk on the Golden Circle. All behavior comes from our limbic system in the brain. On the other hand, all our capacity for abstract concepts, ideas, thinking, language and explanation resides in our neocortex.
All salespeople know this. In sales training we’re taught: “Every buying decision is emotional; we only use our intellect to justify what our limbic brain decides we want.”
Picture the last time you bought something on Amazon or in a store (if you’re still doing that). Your limbic brain already knew you wanted what you bought before you had it in the shopping cart. Then the rationalizations started: “Well, I know I’ll need this eventually…I can write this off as a work or business expense…It’s been ages since we had a new one.”
All decision making — not just buying decisions — happens on a deeply emotional level.
Does this mean that all of us are just walking bundles of emotions spiraling out of control? Of course not. Even our limbic brains and consequently our emotions are eminently rational, because they are human. But just because we understand something clearly with our neocortex does not mean that it will have any effect whatsoever on our behavior. Just ask anyone who smokes, drinks excessively, eats too much, or doesn’t exercise enough (anyone come to mind?)
So if the core of leadership as a skill set is the ability to effectively and consistently influence the behavior of other people to achieve a predetermined outcome, then our ability to listen to, connect with, relate to and understand our emotions and those of the people we’re trying to lead is critical.
It’s a good thing that every credible business school program in the country covers this extensively…or maybe not.
Here’s the kicker: I will never be able to effectively connect with and influence other people’s emotions until I learn the art of effectively connecting with and influencing my own emotions.
Leadership of other people always has to begin with Self leadership. No one will freely choose to follow someone who can’t even connect with how they feel. This is the essence of what we call “authenticity”.
On the other hand, when we come across someone who has done the internal work of becoming aware of, listening to and connecting with their own emotions on the deepest levels, we instinctually sense the presence of someone deeply wise, trustworthy and attractive.
For many years I didn’t even realize that I had many emotional experiences that I had simply ignored or evaded for decades, simply because a part of me felt that they were too scary to confront. After having walked the journey of Self connection for a little while now, and still having a long, long way to go, I can see how far it’s enabled me to come thus far.
My influence as a coach, and more importantly as a man, a husband, a father and a friend has grown exponentially since beginning this journey. I only wish more and more people would join in.
