Darren Peters has had an amazing career in sports leadership, business coaching and university lecturer. He has held some prestigious roles in sports CEO Australia Paralympic Committee, chef de mission of Athens Games , CEO Rowing Australia, GM at Surf Life saving. He know lectures on what it takes to in sports management at Torrens University.
He is also a high performance athlete beach sprinter and understands what it takes to make an elite sportman.
Darren’s insight into what is leadership?
Leadership is a evolution theory. Tribes of people getting somthing done. Aspiration to some and a burden to others. Group of behaviours. Social label in a role. Socially tantalising, it can be lonely places. Its a lot of things. Primarily you have to encourage people to get things done.
Listen to this episode to find out more about what Darren thinks about leadership.
As a leader you are in a position of power over others and…“with great power comes great responsibility”. It’s known as the Peter Parker Principal. Although the origins of this phrase pre-date Spiderman.
Origins…
The bible verse of Luke 12:48: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.”
Many great leaders throughout history have used similar phrases.
In 1817, British Member of Parliament William Lamb is recorded saying, “the possession of great power necessarily implies great responsibility.”
In 1899, U.S. President William McKinley used the following in his State of the Union address: “Presented to this Congress are great opportunities. With them come great responsibilities.”
In 1906, Winston Churchill, as Under-Secretary of the Colonial Office, said: “Where there is great power there is great responsibility,”
Though not the exact phrase, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote in a 1908 letter that “responsibility should go with power.”[16]
As a leader, it is important to understand you have been given a position of power. And with that power, you can choose to use it to build people up or use it to destroy them.
Destructive Power
Anyone who has been a victim of workplace bullying or worked in a toxic workplace will know the damage that can be done. When power is used negligently. It can ruin your confidence, cause anxiety, or even worse lead to severe mental health problems. When you are at work for most of your waking moments this constant stress can lead to physical manifestations and a breakdown in other significant relationships in your life.
There is a growing body of evidence showing that there is a significant correlation between bullying and low emotional intelligence. I believe that most leaders who lead through fear do this because they don’t know another way.
Having been the victim of bullying in my past. I personally understand the emotional and physical impact. It is this experience that continues to drive me to find another way to lead. I am a passionate believer that those in a position of leadership have a responsibility to manage and care for their team in a way that supports them. As a leader you have an obligation to show up, be present and do what you can. So that your team can grow into great leaders themselves.
Understanding the negative aspects of power can be hard to grasp at first. When I first starting managing people I was terrible. I used power rather than influence to get stuff done. I didn’t understand the consequences.
Moving from Good to Great
You always have a choice and sometimes you just need to learn how to influence. Learn to lead rather than manage. Improving your emotional intelligence is the first step.
By increasing emotional intelligence you can transform a workplace. It improves wellbeing and motivation. Research is clear that emotional intelligence creates the difference between good leadership and great leadership. Can you master the Peter Parker Principal?
Embarrassing I reflect back on when I starting managing staff I was terrible, I was a shit boss. I had no idea what I was doing.
I know I just wanted people to do what I told them just because I said so. There was no buying into the vision or understanding their motivations. Even making sure you leave your stuff at the door.
We have all had bosses like it. I made sure there was enough fear so that staff wouldn’t question my authority.
I thought I had to be more “authoritative” than the person next to me. If I was in control so people just needed to do as I said. There was no “win-win” it was my way or the highway. I look back now and shudder. I honestly didn’t know there was any other way. All the managers I had worked for up to that point were very results-driven. If you didn’t reach your numbers, you were marched into the office to justify your job. Fear was how you got people to do their job. I had no role models to learn how to lead or how to mentor someone. However, here I am now more than 20 years later, I have learned how to manage in a way that is more authentic to me and it works!
You don’t have to be a shit boss developing emotional intelligence matters.
What is emotional intelligence?
Emotional intelligence is simply put the ability to control your emotions and others in the present moment. It sounds simple but has a number of key factors. According to Daniel Goleman,
Self-awareness.
Self-regulation.
Motivation.
Empathy.
Social skills.
Why is it important?
Developing emotional intelligence is the one factor that will make you successful in almost every area of your life. At a professional level is the one factor that sets high-performing leaders above others. On a personal level, it means your relationships around you will feel more connected. Allows for improved communication skills and increases your resilience. It turns out it is one of the most important life skills and increases your chances of success in every area of your life.
I have learned how to coach teams into high performance staff that want to come to work. Wow, they even laugh. They are self-motivated and managed with compassion and outcomes. It is possible to enjoy your job.
Emotions start wars and create peace; spark love and force a divorce. While unavoidable, emotions are also indispensable sources of orientation and propel us to take action. But unbridled emotion can make us and those around us to act irrationally.
Emotional intelligence is a relatively new, but started to become mainstream with Daniel Goleman’s 1995 book, Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ.
Emotional intelligence is simply put the ability to control your emotions and others in the present moment. It sounds simple but has a number of key factors. According to Daniel Goleman,
Self-awareness.
Self-regulation.
Motivation.
Empathy.
Social skills.
The business case for emotional intelligence
According to Google’s famous Project Aristotle initiative, a high-performing team needs three things: 1) a strong awareness of the importance of social connections or “social sensitivity,” 2) an environment where each person speaks equally, and 3) psychological safety where everyone feels safe to show and employ themselves without fear of negative consequences. To harness these three elements of a successful team, it takes an emotionally intelligent leader.
People feel cared for when these three items are present in a team or organization. People that feel cared for are more loyal, engaged, and productive.
10 times more likely to recommend their company as a great place to work.
9 times more likely to stay at their company for three or more years.
7 times more likely to feel included at work.
4 times less likely to suffer from stress and burnout.
2 times as likely to be engaged at work.
1. Deep human needs
The three core human needs of work (and life) are to survive, belong and become. Much like Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs, once humans fulfill the need of food, water and shelter they will then seek to be accepted for who they are, and then finally to learn and grow to become their best selves.
The workplace is filling parts of our deep human needs.
2. Technology will enhance humanity
The Industrial Revolution required strong workers. The Information Age required knowledgeable workers. The future age of work will require emotionally intelligent workers.
As the world fills with more sophisticated technology such as artificial intelligence and 5G, human skills like compassion and empathy will define the competitive edge of workers and entire organizations.
In addition, as the world becomes more high-tech, there will be a desire and opportunity for more high-touch. As technology advances, it will take on a lot of the work that humans aren’t good at, don’t like, or too dangerous. This will leave us with more time and capacity to show up emotionally for each other.
3. Work and life blending
Not only are emotions finding their way into work, but workers want it more. A pervasive myth exists that emotions don’t belong at work. As the boundaries blur we want to be able to bring our whole selves into the workplace and this is inevitably messy.
4. Evolving employer-employee relationship
In the past, the employer-employee relationship was very transactional. But in today’s always-on work culture, the boundaries of the employee-employer relationship are expanding.
As employees seek more from their employers, moving from employing to empowering will serve employers well.
It’s not surprising then that more than any other generation, Gen Z wants their managers to be empathetic, according to The Center for Generational Kinetics’ 2020 study, Solving the Remote Work Challenge Across Generations.
If the youth is the future, and Gen Z are lonely and psychologically stressed then the future of work must be emotional intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence in the workplace separates high performers from the average employees. This is something gaining popularity as leaders become aware of the role emotional intelligence plays in the workplace.
Self-awareness; is an understanding of how you are feeling at any moment in time. It is also understanding how your behaviour impacts others.
Motivation – An effective self-motivation requires you to have a positive attitude towards goals across the organisation.
Self-regulation – Processing our own emotions effectively means we have the ability to read the situation effectively. Our response is only possible when we can self-regulate. We need to work to commit ourselves to the goals of the organization with integrity.
Social skills – are critical in a workplace the ability to build teams, forge change, and manage the conflict are important.
Empathy – Empathy is the ability to place oneself in the shoes of another. Managers need insight into how their decisions and behavior will impact their subordinates, peers, and superiors.
Emotional intelligence is a set of skills and behaviors that can be learned and developed.
According to Harvard there are some telltale signs of people with low Emotional Intelligence and those with high Emotional Intelligence.
People with low Emotional Intelligence:
Often feels misunderstood
Get upset easily
Become overwhelmed by emotions
Have problems being assertive
People with high Emotional Intelligence:
Understand the links between their emotions and how they behave
Remain calm and composed during stressful situations
Are able to influence others toward a common goal
Handle difficult people with tact and diplomacy
When staff lacks emotional intelligence they can be extraordinarily damaging to the culture.
The good news is that we can improve our emotional intelligence it is a skill that we can learn. We can improve on skills that improve knowledge of how others and we feel. We can also learn to harness our emotions in a way that meets the needs of our organisation.
At the individual level, exercises such as meditation, psychotherapy, coaching, and eliciting feedback from peers can provide meaningful insight into our own emotional landscape.
Within organisations, team-building exercises, corporate retreats, staff support groups, and training can pay handsome dividends for both collective and individual employee emotional health. In addition, you need to recognise and call out the behaviour.
Leading Together runs emotional intelligence workshops. Engage your leadership potential to improve your self-awareness, self-management, empathy, social awareness, and motivation. Horses are very aware of how you are feeling in the moment and can help you find a powerful way to experience emotional intelligence. The workshops are conducted in a relaxed environment with a horse trainer and leadership coach. They run for a couple of hours depending on the people attending and you will come away with a deeper understanding of yourself.
When creating connections with horses and people beautiful things happen.
Building emotional intelligence in yourself is one thing, but building a culture of emotional intelligence in the workplace can be a challenge. Our leaders must learn it first and model that behaviour. Changing behaviours doesn’t have to be complex. Leading Together uses horses to shortcut the learnings in team workshops. By scheduling team workshop sessions over 5 weeks you can radically change your workplace culture.
