August/September 2005

Special Edition
Leadership...
A Blend of Being and Doing

“She brought forth the best in everyone – just by being there.” This simple, yet profound, description of a woman in a novel captures the essence of leadership. It emphasizes the importance of “being”, in addition to “doing”. In fact, “being –ness” may be the backbone of leadership.

In working with Emotional Intelligence, former New York Times science writer and Harvard professor Daniel Goleman says this “being-ness,” which he calls Emotional Intelligence, is as vital to a person’s management and leadership success as IQ. He believes that the higher a manager or executive climbs the leadership ladder, the more important Emotional Intelligence becomes.

Goleman describes Emotional Intelligence as an individual’s capacity to recognize his or her own feelings and behaviors and their impact on others. A skilled manager uses Emotional Intelligence to manage personal emotions and motivate other using those same skills and techniques.

Goleman’s point: To get results, people who manage or lead others must pay as much attention to who and how they are, as they do to their actions – the things they actually say and do.

When organizations turn to Working Solutions for executive coaching or leadership training, their mid-level managers and senior-level executives learn the skills and techniques necessary to exercise Emotional Intelligence.

Working Solutions’ Executive Coach Wanda Lowenstein has successfully coached executives to help them strengthen the interpersonal skills they need to bring out the best in their teams. With extensive experience and a strong executive coaching history, Lowenstein applies the leading edge of human dynamics and behavior studies and insights to coach executives to achieve personal, business and organizational goals.

For more information on Working Solutions’ coaching programs, Emotional Intelligence, or Wanda Lowenstein, please call (816) 753-1114 or email wlowenstein@workingsolutionskc.org.

Working Solutions is a non-profit  organization providing employee training and  leadership development services for  healthcare organizations,  non-profits and corporations.  This retention tip is  published monthly to provide tips, strategies and new  ideas for HR professionals, managers and executives to  help retain their  employees.