“If you are tuned out of your own emotions, you will be poor at reading them in other people.”

—Daniel Goleman

Who are you? No, don't give me your job title. If I take away your job title, your house, and your car, who are you? What is important to you? Do you know yourself? Are you aware of how you make others feel when you walk into a room? When things don't go your way, are you aware of how you react and how it affects others? Emotional intelligence (EI) is recognizing, understanding, and managing our own emotions.

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

—Socrates

Most of us are familiar with the concept of self‐awareness and emotional intelligence. It's been around a long time; in fact, the term first appeared in a 1964 paper by Michael Beldoch and gained popularity in the 1995 book, Emotional Intelligence, written by the author, psychologist, and science journalist Daniel Goleman. Unfortunately, being familiar with emotional intelligence does not always translate into possessing it. Becoming self‐aware and staying self‐aware requires tools that many leaders do not possess. It is a tragedy because great leadership begins with knowing yourself.

Leaders with a growth mindset cultivate self‐awareness and have high emotional intelligence. They have empathy that allows them to make a deeper emotional connection with the client. They are not robotic. They have a process but they are flexible because they know it's first about winning the heart and then the mind. In other words, we are emotional beings. Therefore, an emotional connection needs to come first, followed by logic. In my interviews with leaders and advisors over the past 25 years, I often ask what's more important, the soft skills or the hard skills. Virtually everyone responds that the soft skills are much more important.

You may be thinking, can I really improve emotional intelligence? Although I'm not an expert, based on what I have read and my own experiences, I absolutely believe you can. I have coached a number of advisors by just pointing out a few things. For example, in response to a client who had an objection about an investment decision, one advisor would start to get defensive, his body language would change, and he would speak louder. He was not aware of how his behavior affected others. It takes focus and dedication to learn how your words and actions might be received by others. But, more importantly, you often need someone else to help you identify such issues and use them as opportunities to improve. Unfortunately, people go through life never knowing that making some minor tweaks to how they react in various situations would make a big difference in their career or personal life. Some people are simply sleepwalking.

“Most leaders have grown familiar with the concept of self‐awareness. They understand that they need to solicit feedback and recognize how others see them. But when it comes to . . . our assessments of ourselves . . . [we] can still be woefully inaccurate.”

—Erika Andersen, “Managing Yourself: Learning to Learn,” Harvard Business Review (March 2016)

So how do you get to know yourself? There are hundreds of books, and just as many self‐awareness gurus, promising to sell you self‐awareness for the modest price of admission—or the price of a meditation retreat.

In my work with thousands of leaders and wealth management professionals, I have found that it is the people with a high level of emotional intelligence who can evaluate themselves most accurately. They ask themselves “What do I think?” and more importantly, “Why do I think that?” Asking yourself these questions should help you make better decisions, have better relationships with people, and stay true to the person you hope to be. Aligning your intentions with your actions becomes a considerably smoother process once you become clear on who you are. Without a good sense of self‐awareness, you can't improve in the areas you should improve.

Ask yourself:

• Who am I?
• What do I believe in? What is my philosophy?
• What do I stand for? What is my credo?
• What are my values? What are my principles?
• What frustrates me?
• What angers me?

Notably, leaders who are self‐aware and spend a lot of time reflecting on what's inside their heads are much better at considering the opinions and inputs of other people. Self‐aware leaders accept that their perspective may be biased or flawed and they seek to achieve greater objectivity. That attitude leaves them much more open to hearing and considering the opinions of others.

I once had a consulting engagement with a large RIA where our objective was to move the firm from no growth to an acceptable growth rate of 10 to 15 percent. Assets under management had been the same for the past three years. In this case, the members of the executive team were all very experienced, each with 30 to 40 years in the wealth management industry. After many hours of one‐on‐one meetings with all the partners, I concluded that the RIA was a great service organization and not a sales/marketing and service organization.

The CEO recognized the firm needed outside help and quickly implemented my suggestions. In fact, I gave them 20 action items and they moved on 17 of them within a week. Everyone was motivated. At first the CEO was not fully self‐aware of his own strengths and weaknesses. He didn't realize that he was not a sales leader and that he didn't exactly know how to identify great sales leaders. However, he did have other valuable skills that helped him succeed in his organization over the years. This self‐knowledge and humility to put one's ego aside to help the greater good is the leadership difference between a firm achieving growth and one that's stagnating. But you, in your leadership role, don't need to wait until the pain is unbearable. If you're constantly reevaluating and assessing and growing as a person, you're more likely to identify the changes you need to make before they become a crisis.

Ask yourself:

• Do I listen to that inner voice about ways to improve myself?
• How well do I listen to other people that I respect?
• How do I react to views and opinions that are contrary to my own?
• Do I only listen to people who affirm my views and dismiss everything else?
• How well can I read someone? Is it obvious (or not so obvious) what they are feeling?
• What's the tone and rhythm of my voice and body language? (Video yourself in your next meeting or presentation. You don't need fancy equipment—your smartphone will do an adequate job. You will probably be surprised about how much you will learn about yourself.)
• How often am I asking for feedback regarding ways I can improve?
• Do I become overly emotional?
• How well can I put myself in other people's shoes? How well do I empathize? Do I feel what they feel—loss, joy, gratitude, regret, fear, love?

“What are my strengths? Most people think they know what they are good at. They are usually wrong. More often, people know what they are not good at and even then people are more wrong than right. And yet, a person can perform only from strength. One cannot build performance on weakness, let alone on something one cannot do at all. We need to know our strengths in order to know where we belong. And the only way to discover your strengths is through feedback analysis.”

—Peter Drucker, Managing Oneself

With a little effort you can improve your relationships with your team, clients, family, and friends. With a lot of effort you can dramatically improve every interaction with prospects and clients. When your antenna is on high alert you become an intuitive listener who is able to really see what that person is feeling, reading between the lines and picking up on what's not being said. With high emotional intelligence you're able to properly respond to the world around you and you become a sponge in the way people connect with you on a deeper level. EI will give you the competitive edge if you stay focused on always improving.