On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law, putting in place comprehensive reforms that improve access to affordable health coverage for everyone and protect consumers from abusive insurance company practices. Today, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, more than 7 million Americans have signed up for private health coverage. Now, 54 million Americans can receive a free preventive service, such as cancer screenings, through their private insurance plan. But are the healthcare leaders ready for these changes?
The anxiety level of many healthcare leaders has been rise due to the uncertainty and drastic changes of the healthcare industry. Giving the assumptions that healthcare changes will continue in one form or another, it is important to find ways to mitigate these changes and lower the levels of anxiety that these may cause. For healthcare organizations to survive in these increasingly challenging times, leadership must face mounting interpersonal skills. In today’s healthcare industry, the importance of interpersonal skills cannot be stressed enough. Whether the leader is forming relations internally or externally, interpersonal skills to create collaborative relationships are key to the success of the individual as well as the organization.
Collaborative relationships are more likely than antagonistic ones to produce better and high quality services at a lower cost that will result in to a profitable organization. To achieve the collaborative relationship need to navigate through the turbulence water of healthcare leaders need to develop interpersonal skills thru emotional intelligence (EQ). Career experts agree that emotional intelligence is a better predictor of career success than IQ.
Emotional Intelligence has been prove to be more important than cognitive intelligence. In 1995, psychologist Daniel Goleman drew widespread attention to the field of emotional intelligence with his best-selling book "Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ." Goleman's thesis that emotional intelligence -- or the ability to interpret others' emotions and regulate one's own -- was a better indicator of success than traditional cognitive intelligence set off a flurry of new research. Emotional Intelligence is a measure characteristics that research has confirmed are important to successful and enjoyable living. People with high EQ have control over their emotions and impulse, they are aware of their limits and abilities and have real view of their expectations and are able to adapt to changes quickly.
Social and emotional abilities that previous research has shown to be linked to successful performance in the workplace. These abilities are grouped into five core areas: (a) self-awareness, (b) self-regulation, (c) motivation, (d) empathy, and (e) social skills. Healthcare organizations requires leaders with high EI. Many of the daily duties performed by the healthcare leaders can be classified under the five EI skill categories.
Self-Awareness – is no other than knowing and understand your emotions. These will help healthcare leaders to have confidence in making decisions about operations that can have an implication on burnout/workaholic, personal values/self-worth and issues about control.
Self-regulations – is defined as the ability to manage your emotions.to be consider during ethical behavioral issues, temper/patience, objectiveness and multitasking/time management.
Motivation – is the ability to enjoy challenges and to be passionate toward work. Healthcare leaders need to maintain a positive attitude toward the Affordable Care Act changes that cannot be avoided and may impact the organizational culture.
Empathy – is a social awareness skills and the ability to recognize the emotions in others, get our self in other’s shoes. Excellent to manage conflict, maintain a patient centeredness practice, manage patient/family interventions and subordinates problems.
Social Skills – supportive communication skills: ability to influence and inspire. Excellent communication, social and listening skills will drive organizational profitability wit negotiation competencies, governing board/committee relations, employee engagement and patient experience.
How the leaders completes those tasks will be shaped by the person’s emotional intelligence abilities. The healthcare leader needs to know their emotions and how to manage them. Assessing and evaluating an individual’s emotional intelligence can help understand areas of strength and weakness establish the need for targeted development programs and measures. This, in turn, can lead to dramatic increases in the person’s performance, interaction with others, and leadership potential.
Career experts agree that emotional intelligence (EQ) is a better predictor of career success than IQ. But many healthcare executives do not have a clear idea of how their emotional intelligence measures up. With an Emotional Intelligence Assessment, you can measure your emotional intelligence quotient (EQ) and use the results to enhance self-awareness and achieve greater work/life balance.
Healthcare organizations would be wise to incorporate an EI training program for their leaders. Equally important is for the developers of those programs to take into account the specific needs of the different members of their training audience. Beyond the scope of this article, yet critical to mention, is that the tailoring of any EI development program should directly involve employee participation. Having healthcare leaders with good EI skills will boost team productivity, increase organizational effectiveness – two conditions that are desperately needed in healthcare today. In any case, managers or leaders who allow themselves to become more emotionally intelligent, will improve not only their own personal qualities but also those of their organization. Remembered to be a great leader you should know how to manage yourself first.
Wanda Bonet-Gascot PhD, MBA is a Doctor in Holistic Health and Portfolio Manager at DRW Life Skills Institute. Sheila Ortiz, DHA, MBA is the Corporate Program Director at DRW Life Skills Institute. They offer Emotional Intelligence Assessments and Training. Dr. Wanda can be reached at drw@lifeskillsinstitute.net and Sheila can be reach at sortiz@lifeskillsinstitute.net . For more information www.DRWinstitute.org
