I am persuaded by the words of Maya Angelou who says, ‘I have learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.’

Evidently, the meeting between President Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta and the National Super Alliance (NASA) Leader Raila Amolo Odinga on Friday March 9, 2018 sparked varied reactions from around the country and the world at large. A majority of leaders and residents welcomed the resolve of the two leaders to put aside their differences and work together to reconstruct Kenya, a nation that is responsive to the urgent need for prosperity, fairness and dignity for all Kenyans.

That was a very encouraging sign of Emotional Intelligence (EI) for many Kenyans that had given up on reconciliation and were resigned to a divided country. Some, particularly bloggers, had made a living out of the division and hatred, with total disregard of how their comments made people feel.

The new found agreement, in my assessment, is undoubtedly the most relevant political move since the 2008 accord between the former Prime Minister, Mr. Odinga and the then President Mwai Kibaki. It brings together, an otherwise, torn country. One thing that we can all agree on is it has uplifted the mood in the country and many people feel so much happier to hear them call one another ‘my brother’.
Everyone has emotions. It is simply a part of our being human, whether we realize it or not. Emotional intelligence (EI) is a set of skills that help us better perceive, understand and manage emotions in ourselves and in others. Collectively, that helps us make intelligent responses to, and use of emotions. These skills are not only important at work but in our personal lives as well.

Emotional Intelligence is also widely known to be a key component of effective leadership. The ability to be perceptively in tune with yourself and your emotions, as well as having sound situational awareness can be a powerful tool for leading a team. The act of knowing, understanding, and responding to emotions, overcoming stress in the moment, and being aware of how your words and actions affect others, is described as emotional intelligence.

Effective leaders are aware of how emotions can have a positive or negative effect on one’s ability to inspire and lead a team. Many individuals try to shut off their feelings, but as much as we distort, deny, and bury our emotions and memories, we cannot ever eliminate them. One can learn to be emotionally intelligent and gain the attributes that allow the individual to show up in such a way that one connects to people’s core emotions, accepting them, and being aware of how they affect one’s decisions and actions.

The ability to relate behaviours and challenges of emotional intelligence to workplace performance is an immense advantage in building an exceptional team. One of the most common factors that lead to retention issues is communication deficiencies that create disengagement and doubt.
A leader lacking in Emotional Intelligence is not able to effectively gauge the needs, wants and expectations of those they lead. Leaders who react from their emotions without filtering them can create mistrust amongst their staff and can seriously jeopardize their working relationships. That applies to a country’s leadership as well.

Reacting with erratic emotions can be detrimental to overall culture, attitudes and positive feelings toward others in the country, community, section, department, organization and the overall mission of an institution. Good leaders must be self-aware and understand how their verbal and non-verbal communication can affect others.

To aide in the understanding of the emotional intelligence competencies required for effective leadership, according to the Genos Model (Genos International Pty Ltd.), self-awareness, awareness of others, being authentic and trustworthy, emotional reasoning, being resilient and being able to influence others positively, are fundamental.

These competencies are also critical in supporting leaders to perform their leadership functions well. As a country, we will continue to take up the challenge particularly through sharing ideas in the leadership fora created by the Kenya School of Government.

Indeed, the School, through her new and revised programs, will ensure that we infuse elements of building Emotional Intelligence capability in all our trainees. Emotional Intelligence greatly enhances strategy execution, performance management, project execution, business process improvements, negotiation skills, presentation skills and certainly the ability to adopt a coaching approach to one’s leadership. Without a reconciliatory approach, openness to dialogue and a handshake, Kenya would never achieve the “Big Four" agenda.

By Prisca Oluoch
Director, Matuga Campus