Business EQ 101: Managing Relationships

Self awareness, self control, and social awareness are all key components of emotional intelligence. But the final piece –and a crucial one, especially in business – is being able to manage one’s relationships.

Relationship management encompasses a number of social skills, including:

-being able to lead/inspire others;

-being able to influence/persuade others;

-being able to resolve and mediate conflicts creatively;

-being able to communicate clearly; and

-and being able to stay detached from others’ emotional quirks

As such, the prerequisite to relationship management is a certain degree of emotional maturity – having the insight, that is, to understand what others are feeling and the self control to be able to adapt to that person’s (or group’s) needs and behavior, rather than simply reacting.

That’s a tall order – especially when combined with the other components of emotional intelligence. So next up: Identifying business EQ strengths and weaknesses.