IQ, EQ and HQ: Making Sense of All Types of Intelligences within Your Organization
Look around your team. Without a whole lot of thought, I'm sure you could easily pick those you find smart or those you find more attuned to people's needs. IQ (Intelligence Quotient) and EQ (Emotional Quotient) are standard enough now, roughly broken down by cognitive capabilities (thinking stuff) and emotional/social abilities (feeling stuff). Now I'm sure you could spot another kind of intelligence. Look around your organization and see how's leading, climbing the promotion ladder, and gobbling up head count. Got 'em? Good. Are they the smartest? Are they the most empathetic? Probably not. So what is going on?
This type of intelligence, I posit, is due to their performative allegiance to the corporation, to HeadQuarters. They have high HQ. They know how to identify and navigate the politics and power plays that abound with in organizations. They know how to be a 'team player' AND when not to be. Because while this intelligence is aimed at upward mobility within an organization, ultimately this is self-serving. The better you do in line of the company, often the better you do within and beyond the organization.
Of course, all of these types of intelligence are necessary to navigate corporate life. Understanding HQ is helpful if not only to get ahead, but also to make sense of the nonsense that may swirl around you. Parroting corporate jargon is the language of HQ and you can see those with high HQ repeating buzzwords to hold the attention of other leaders. Call it SEO (Stakeholder Expectation Optimization).
But here is the kicker, leaders with only high HQ can not sustain their reign. Without sufficient IQ, they'll eventually lose footing in the organization when their initiatives don't live up to their promise. Without sufficient EQ, they'll burnout their teams and lose talent.
Now, if you feel yourself as someone with low HQ, there are of course benefits to balancing it with IQ and EQ. You can always study what and who within an organization is succeeding and reverse engineer that. You can become more attuned to the types of changes the organization is making and quickly, proactively get onboard.
Or, you can say fuck it. Both are understandable options. Both depend on your own mobility between jobs. Both options are within your power to embrace. What makes sense to you (IQ)? What feels right to you (EQ)? What makes sense for your organization right now (HQ)?
This type of intelligence, I posit, is due to their performative allegiance to the corporation, to HeadQuarters. They have high HQ. They know how to identify and navigate the politics and power plays that abound with in organizations. They know how to be a 'team player' AND when not to be. Because while this intelligence is aimed at upward mobility within an organization, ultimately this is self-serving. The better you do in line of the company, often the better you do within and beyond the organization.
Of course, all of these types of intelligence are necessary to navigate corporate life. Understanding HQ is helpful if not only to get ahead, but also to make sense of the nonsense that may swirl around you. Parroting corporate jargon is the language of HQ and you can see those with high HQ repeating buzzwords to hold the attention of other leaders. Call it SEO (Stakeholder Expectation Optimization).
But here is the kicker, leaders with only high HQ can not sustain their reign. Without sufficient IQ, they'll eventually lose footing in the organization when their initiatives don't live up to their promise. Without sufficient EQ, they'll burnout their teams and lose talent.
Now, if you feel yourself as someone with low HQ, there are of course benefits to balancing it with IQ and EQ. You can always study what and who within an organization is succeeding and reverse engineer that. You can become more attuned to the types of changes the organization is making and quickly, proactively get onboard.
Or, you can say fuck it. Both are understandable options. Both depend on your own mobility between jobs. Both options are within your power to embrace. What makes sense to you (IQ)? What feels right to you (EQ)? What makes sense for your organization right now (HQ)?