It is evidently clear that almost every development program for emotional intelligence comes with a few best practices but most of the times optimal impacts comes from their added potency when used together. More often do we associate great leadership with a person’s intelligent quotient, but it has been proven that IQ is just one of the contributing factors. Emotional intelligence is also a major contributor to great leadership. People are born with different gifts lie emotional intelligence while others do not possess these gifts, but luckily enough emotional intelligence can be learned. The needs to build successful training programs that will build people’s level of emotional intelligence are necessary. Goleman et al. (1998), proposed some goals that are important for the best practices. The guidelines were divided into four phases of the development process that include the preparation, training, maintenance and transfer and evaluation.
In preparation, there is the need of assessing the organizational needs and those of the individuals in it. This would be done to assess their strengths and weaknesses of both the individual and the organization. Assessments should be delivered with most care based on their strengths and weaknesses. These assessment should also be accurate and clear, and the people should be given time to be able to digest the information. Feedback should also be provided in a safe and supportive environment to minimize the defensiveness and resistance. Emphasis should also be on learner choices and the encouragement of participation in the training program. Learners should also be encouraged that social emotional intelligence can be learned and improved which may further lead to better outcomes.
During the training, it is important to build a relationship between the trainers and the learners. The learners should also be motivated as this motivation would lead to a successful training program and better outcomes. Clear goals should also be set and change expected should be self-directed. The learners should also be provided with opportunities to practice what they have learned. Feedback on performance should be provided as it is a source of encouragement and a driver of change (Wall, 2008). For these performance feedbacks to be effective, they need to be tailored to meet personal interests, personal goals and resources. Experiential learning methods should be used as they tend to work best for learning of social and emotional competencies.
There are different ways in which people know more about ourselves than we do. This is usually true because of evaluations. The best evaluation is one with multiple perspectives as it promotes the development of self-awareness. The types of evaluation would include self-evaluation, feedback from others, tests and evaluations. Evaluation should be done to assess whether the development program has had any long lasting impacts to the learners. Evaluation would establish sound outcomes measures for the competencies, most importantly those that were targeted at the beginning of the training and for improved job performance. Most organizations go without evaluation and hence the mistakes and ineffectiveness in certain programs go unchanged. It is therefore important to find measure for competence and skill as shown on the job or at the beginning and end of a training program. Evaluation before the training and that one carried out at the end of the training would help to know whether any form of development on the learners has taken place. In addition to evaluating the acquisition of social and emotional competencies, it is also necessary to assess the impact of the training on other job related outcomes such as indicators of adjustment such as absenteeism and health status, performance measures among many others.
References
Goleman, D. (1995). Emotional intelligence. New York: Bantam Books.
Goleman, D. (1998). Working with emotional intelligence. New York: Bantam Books.
Wall, B. (2008). Working relationships: Using emotional intelligence to enhance your effectiveness with others. Mountain View, Calif: Davies-Black Pub.
