From EI to SI

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Social Intelligence (book)

Competencies: interpersonal skills, oral communication, conflict management, building strategic relationships, interpersonal sensitivity, self-development, stress tolerance, engenders trust, team building (to a lesser degree)

Who benefits: anyone seeking to improve their abilities to interact more effectively with others

Consultant Usage: especially useful to those doing work related to emotional intelligence or multiple intelligences, good background material for all HRD professionals, coaching

What’s it about? The EI guy is back to introduce us to a related, but new field within the social sciences. In the shortest possible description of the book, it is about the social brain and our social aptitude in acting wisely in interactions with others. 

Daniel Goleman describes an emerging science called social neuroscience, the science of neural mechanics at work (a set of circuitry that is activated as people interact).  As a body of work it apparently has existed about 15 years and is still considered in its infancy.

Social neuroscience describes brain-to-brain linkups as we engage with another person.  It is the process of how we connect with others. 

He views this book as a different focus that Emotional Intelligence. EI is about us as individuals and what goes on inside of us, a one-person psychology.  SI (dare I call it that?) is two-person psychology, what happens when we connect with another person.  He summarizes EI as self-awareness and self-management.  He summarizes SI as social awareness and social facility (relationship management).

He explains how emotions and moods get transferred from one person to another.  It triggered a memory for me of my friend Terry Paulson who speaks and writes about two kinds of people in this world: “Energy Boosters” and “Energy Sappers”.  Terry’s advice: Seek out the Energy Boosters and don’t worry, the Energy Sappers will find you!”  Terry, if you are reading this, social neuroscience describes exactly why your advice works!!!

One of my favorite quotes from the book is from Edward Thorndike, a Columbia University psychologist who first coined the term social intelligence: “Social intelligence shows itself abundantly in the nursery, on the playground, in barracks and factories and salesrooms, but it eludes the formal standardized conditions of the testing laboratory.”  (The quote kind of reminds me of the Supreme Court Justice who said he couldn’t define it but knew it when he saw it!)

Yet true.  Those of us who have followed the development of multiple intelligences know so well how much more difficult it is to measure intelligences other than “IQ”.

There are two important considerations in deciding to read this book.  First, and most obvious is that the book is half descriptive science and half story telling with analysis.  And I will admit that I read mostly the stories and skipped much of the science…but that is how I am wired.

Second, he is clear that this a book about a new area and that much of what you read may change with new research.  Like Emotional Intelligence was just the descriptive beginning of tidal wave of related ideas and practical application, this book too is the beginning, with the middle and endings still to come. 

A final footnote I can’t resist: He has a chapter entitled “The Neuroanatomy of a Kiss”.  It is a detailed description of what actually occurs.  I have never seen a kiss described before as (in part) “…to execute a face-to-face interaction, the far-flung networks of the social brain create a common neural conduit.”  I hope I never read that description again.  Talk about taking the fun out of something….
[tags]social intelligence, social neuroscience,  social brain, emotional intelligence, IQ, EQ, SI, social awareness, social facility, relationship management, terry paulson, bill bradley, william bradley,  bradley[/tags]

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.