ARTICLE

EQ Beats IQ: The Leadership Skill You Can Actually Improve

by Shanda K. Miller

When we talk about knowing ourselves as leaders, most people think about strengths, weaknesses, and maybe personality type. But there's one more piece I can't leave out: emotional intelligence.

I thought little about my own emotional intelligence until a few years into leading teams. That's when I finally sat down and took a real assessment of it, and what I found surprised me.

What Emotional Intelligence Actually Means

Emotional intelligence is our ability to handle emotions well. It's the ability to identify and monitor emotions, whether they're our own or someone else's, and use that awareness to guide how we think and behave.

Here's the part that really matters for leaders: people with high emotional intelligence, or EQ, can actually outperform people with a high IQ.

That's not a knock on intelligence. It's just a different kind of skill. And here's the encouraging part. We can improve our emotional intelligence throughout our lives. Our IQ, on the other hand, can stay fairly fixed once we reach adulthood.

The Four Skills That Make Up EQ

In their book Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves break emotional intelligence down into four skill areas. I've found this framework incredibly useful for understanding where I'm strong and where I still have work to do.

  • Self-Awareness: Your ability to perceive your own emotions accurately and remain aware of them as they happen, including how you respond to specific situations and people.

  • Self-Management: Your ability to use that emotional awareness to stay flexible and direct your behavior in a positive way, rather than reacting on autopilot.

  • Social Awareness: Your ability to pick up on what's really going on with other people, even when you don't feel the same way they do.

  • Relationship Management: Your ability to use your own emotional awareness and your awareness of others to manage interactions well, communicate clearly, and handle conflict effectively.

Notice how these build on each other. You start with an awareness of yourself, then you manage yourself, then you turn that same skill outward toward other people.

What I Learned From My Own Assessment

A few years ago, I took the TalentSmart emotional intelligence test. The results showed I did well in Self-Awareness and Self-Management. That part didn't surprise me much, since I'd already put genuine effort into knowing myself.

But I had room for improvement in Social Awareness and Relationship Management. Specifically, I needed to work on two things: picking up on other people's non-verbal cues, and spotting the overall mood in a room.

Those two findings pointed me toward something I hadn't been paying close enough attention to. I set out to practice those specific skills, using strategies straight out of Bradberry and Greaves' book.

Why This Matters So Much for Team Leaders

As team leaders, we get constant opportunities to practice emotional intelligence, whether we're in a one-on-one conversation or leading a full team meeting.

Think about how often your work depends on reading a room correctly. Knowing when a team member is frustrated but not saying it out loud. Noticing tension before it becomes an actual conflict. Delivering tough feedback in a way that builds someone up instead of shutting them down.

None of that comes from IQ. It comes from EQ.

A leader who's strong in self-awareness notices their own frustration building before it spills into a meeting. A leader who's strong in relationship management can navigate a disagreement without damaging trust. These are learnable, practicable skills, not fixed traits you either have or don't have.

How to Build Your Own EQ

You don't need a formal assessment to pay attention to this in your own leadership. Though I'd still recommend taking one because it gives you a clear, honest starting point.

Here's where to begin:

  • Take an emotional intelligence assessment. TalentSmart offers one at talentsmart.com for free if you’ve purchased the Emotional Intelligence 2.0 book. This assessment will show you your specific areas for growth.

  • Pay attention to your own emotional reactions this week. Notice what triggers frustration, stress, or defensiveness, and how quickly you're able to manage that reaction.

  • Practice reading the room in your next team meeting. Before you speak, take a moment to notice the overall mood and energy in the space.

  • Ask a trusted colleague how you come across when things get tense. This connects directly back to the blind-spot work from my earlier article.

  • Pick one of the four EQ skill areas to focus on for the next month. Don't try to improve all four at once.

It Takes Practice, Not Perfection

Improving your emotional intelligence isn't a one-time project. It's an ongoing practice, the same way building trust with your team or coaching someone to their full potential is an ongoing practice.

The leaders who do this well aren't the ones who were naturally born with it. They're the ones who decided to pay attention, do the work, and keep practicing, one interaction at a time.

Your IQ got you in the door. Your EQ is what will make you a leader people actually want to work for.

Heads up: This post is adapted from my book From Supervisor to Super Leader with the help of AI, but thoroughly reviewed and edited by me.

My purpose is to help leaders thrive—at work and in life.

Let me know which of the four EQ skill areas you plan to focus on this month.

Send me an email. I’d love to hear from you.

shanda (at) becomeasuperleader.com

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