Coaching Demo with Kristen Harcourt: Mastering Emotional Intelligence with the EQ-i Assessment

I am really connecting to my intuition. I'm looking for ways to create the space to deepen and forward what the individual is learning about themselves. I'm making sure that I'm self-managing and making it their experience.

And then I am showing up with deep curiosity.

Today, as usual, I'd rather show than just tell you about this. So I actually took the EQ-i self-assessment that Kristen usually uses with her clients, to assess my emotional intelligence, which was quite an interesting process. But before you get to listen to me reflect on my low stress tolerance, let's have Kristen give us some context on how this overall coaching journey looks, and who the leaders are that she actually works with. Let's go.

They might currently be a director and the organization sees them being ready to go to the VP level, or they've gone from the VP level to a CEO position. A lot of the time it's the organization identifying that, in order to set that person up for success,

they should have a coach to support them. I would say that happens around 75 percent of the time. And then the other 25 percent of the time the individual leader might go to the organization, that could be going to HR, going to their boss. Based on some of the things they're experiencing in their role, they can see the benefits of a coach.

That might be because they've spoken to their peers, they've talked to others who have highlighted the benefits of doing coaching, and so they've self-identified that it would be able to help them. Maybe they're being vulnerable and also sharing that there are some struggles they're experiencing that perhaps others might not know about on their leadership journey.

But definitely, I'd say 75 percent of the time it's the organization identifying that need, and then the other 25 percent, the individual has gone and asked for it.

What they're noticing in terms of struggles, where they think they really shine as a leader, and where they notice that they're not always shining. And then, what's the impact they want to have? How do they want to show up as a leader? What does it look like for the fullest expression of their leadership?

And getting them to share all of that. Sharing their struggles, so that we can talk through it. Ultimately, I talk about how, in a coaching session, it's really around deepening the learning.

But then outside of a session it's really forwarding the action, and that's where we have this accountability built in. And after that conversation, I'm happy to say, Tobi, in over eight years every single one of those conversations has led to coaching.

But that's because the person has identified, yes, sign me up, I'm ready for that, I'm ready to do more of that self-exploration.

They know that my job as their coach is to hold up a mirror and reflect those things in a very loving way, where I might be seeing limiting beliefs, where I might be seeing patterns that are holding them back. And they say, I'm ready for that, and I need that, and I want someone to be that mirror for me.

So they really think about what they want their legacy to be. It's not just about what they're doing as a leader, but who do they want to be, if people were really reflecting back to them the impact that they had. And so this gets them to start thinking about deeper questions, not just about what they are doing tactically in their day to day, but also how they want to intentionally show up in their day to day.

So it has four cornerstones. The four cornerstones are, when we're going into a coaching session and we're interacting with people, we're always holding people as being naturally creative, resourceful and whole.

I'm focusing on the whole person, and then I'm creating a space to be able to evoke transformation. Those are the four cornerstones of the Co-Active model. I'm deeply listening.

I am really connecting to my intuition. I'm looking for ways to create the space to deepen and forward what the individual is learning about themselves through the coaching. I'm making sure that I'm self-managing and not making it about my experience, but their experience.

And then I am showing up with deep curiosity. And I highlight that for you because I think it's important to understand what is going on in a coaching session. I talk a lot about this when I'm talking to clients. They're coming with a topic. So they might say,

Kristen, today this is what's most on my mind, this is what I want to dive into for our coaching session. But it never goes in a linear way. That's so interesting. That's how they show up. And if we look at the very end of a session and the arc, where we go and zig and zag in all these different places, you could never have predicted that's where it was going to go. Because you're just holding space to allow what's going to emerge in that moment

to emerge. And of course I'm constantly asking questions and co-creating in that moment with that individual in that coaching session. I really loved this model when I first started, because it gave me a framework to think, okay, how am I showing up in a coaching session, so that I felt a level of trust?

And also honoring that individual, and of course making sure that they're going to get to this place and that actions were happening. But over time what ends up happening is that this model just becomes such a part of who you are that you don't even realize the model is operating. You're just doing it.

Because, as we're talking about this, it's reminding me of a little toddler, a baby, when they're starting to walk. When they first start to walk they're a bit wobbly. And then before you know it they're not falling, they're just running around. So when you're at that beginning stage, you're a little wobbly.

I'd have things to remind me, I'd have anchors. So I would have the model there as an anchor. And then I'd also be aware of, when you're beginning as a coach we're all going to have different places where we might struggle more. So I also had a note that would say, listen. And also, silence is okay.

So there would be times where I'd ask a question and then there'd be silence, because the person is processing and being with that question. Silence is a little uncomfortable. So five seconds, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, that feels like a lot of time, and I want to say something, I want to fill it.

But the magic happens in that moment, because they're being with it and answers emerge for them. So when there were certain techniques or elements of coaching that I wanted to work on, I would make sure I would highlight that for myself, so that in those moments where my natural inclination is to go in and fill the space,

I would catch myself. And even though everything in my body would be very uncomfortable, because I'm like, ah, the silence is killing me, I need to say something, I realized, no, it's in those moments that the breakthroughs, these insights, show up for that individual. And it's in service of them not to fill the silence.

So I would practice different things in the sessions, and then once I felt like I had really built that skill, I might find something else that I'd be working on more, so that I could continue to build those skills.

share in the show notes with your listeners, this Co-Active coaching model, so that you can quickly look at it visually.

That's something we share, in fact. The vision of metaFox is also a world embracing emotional intelligence. That's what we work towards.

What we meant back then was that we are a lot about enabling people to reflect, to name feelings, and also, on a more holistic level, to have this self-awareness. What are my strengths, what are my triggers? And we got to this model of Daniel Goleman and the four quadrants, saying, it's about me and myself on the one hand, and others, the social part, on the other.

And then it's about being aware, observing, and on the other hand the managing, of myself or of the relationship with others. And you are using a model that is slightly different. Would you say that's exactly where I'm coming from as well, or how is your approach and your understanding of emotional intelligence different?

I think when they built their model it was very similar to the areas that Daniel Goleman is focusing on, but they identified five different quadrants instead of four, and the way they spaced it out and looked at the 15 different dimensions. I think when they were doing their research, and probably going into organizations and seeing what they kept on hearing in terms of the specific struggles of EQ,

that's where they took the model in this direction, around the specific areas that they focused on. Very aligned with Daniel Goleman's work as well, because emotional intelligence is emotional intelligence. And the things that you're talking about in terms of naming your feelings, and I always talk about, you need to name it to tame it, building up your emotional vocabulary and

understanding what's happening in terms of your feelings, understanding your triggers, and being able to self-manage and self-regulate in all of these areas.

When we really get to the foundation, it's always been around elements of emotional intelligence that are really causing the struggle, because it's usually communicating with others. For me, what made me really gravitate towards this tool, and why I really embrace it in my practice, is because when I started I just noticed these common themes that would all show up around the emotional intelligence piece.

We have the interpersonal aspect, and then I think what's newly added is the stress management and the decision making, which I imagine is a very common challenge in leadership.

It's the way it's being defined. This isn't about you being able to be an effective critical thinker, or about your ability to problem solve. When we start to break that one down, it's actually looking at what happens when there are issues that matter greatly to you, so there is an emotional connection to them. You might be showing up in a more reactionary way, which of course impacts dialogue with others, impacts collaboration, things like that. It does touch on problem solving. And relating it to Daniel Goleman, when you were talking about triggering, the problem solving is where we also get into impulse control. So impulse control would be very connected to what happens when you're triggered.

Impulse control is around self-regulation, because in those high stakes moments, when people say to me, oh, I'm very logical, I never bring emotions into my problem solving, I'm like, no. When you're in a very high stakes situation. Now, of course, different people have tools in their toolkit and have learned very effective coping strategies.

So that's where we're talking about some of those things. Like, what happens in those moments when there are more emotions, when you are more attached to a certain outcome? Are you still being objective? Are you seeing reality as it is? And then, like you said, the stress management. Being in any organization right now, having tools for how to work with stress.

Because the goal is not to get into an environment where there's no stress. That's just unrealistic. And stress is actually not a bad thing. It's about what your coping strategies are within those stressful moments, so that it doesn't become chronic stress, which we know has huge implications for mental health and physiologically, and can have really long-term negative effects.

Or when would you bring in that model and that assessment in particular?

They are giving information and completing a survey, assessing and answering questions based on their own experience and how they would evaluate themselves when it comes to emotional intelligence. Then when we take the second component, which is to get into a 360, now we have both halves.

We have that individual still completing their own assessment of themselves, but now we're also getting feedback from others. So now we have their direct reports, their peers, their boss, perhaps other stakeholders, vendors they work with, giving their assessment of that individual in the same areas.

The only time I wouldn't have a leader do a 360 is if they're very new to the role and they haven't had a long-term relationship. So if they've been in that particular role three to six months, it's not as helpful for me to get direct reports to give feedback. They haven't worked with them long enough to be able to give really helpful data.

In terms of when I bring the 360 in, it's right towards the beginning of the coaching journey. So after we've worked through our foundation session and really spent time digging through those pre-work questions that I was talking about earlier, those deeper questions that help them really understand who they are and their goals of how they want to show up as a leader, we would then bring in the 360 process, which start to finish usually takes about six weeks.

Every single 360 that I've done, and at this point it's over a hundred 360s, is always an enlightening process. Sometimes it's enlightening because the leader realizes they're much, much harder on themselves, and the direct feedback they're getting from others is actually telling them that they do really well in an area where they don't necessarily see that in themselves.

Other times they might find their relationship with their direct reports is really good, but they're not as good at managing up or managing across. Or other times they're really good at managing across, but notice that they're not doing as well with their direct reports.

Let's say they have seven to 10 direct reports, and half of them are saying, I love what you're doing, keep doing it, and the other half are saying, I don't love what you're doing, stop doing it. So it's also about recognizing that, as a leader, you're constantly adapting, because what works for one person, the other person is saying, that doesn't work for me at all.

experience. So that's where it's very helpful, because they don't know what they don't know. They might say, oh, I think I'm such an empathetic leader, but that's not the feedback they're getting from others.

So it's not exactly the same. But I would say there are also elements of emotional intelligence aspects in there, this is something that we also find super important. And so I have a bit of data and some graphs here. Because I was quite surprised about the discrepancy that I found, for example comparing the ratings that I got from eight team members here.

On the one hand, when it comes to things like creating a safe space for self-expression, openness and so on. Here we worked with a scale of one to four, and it turned out I was at 3.88 overall. Then on the EQ-i model, what I've done here was filling in the survey and scoring myself on 133 items around these themes of leadership development.

I know that the areas of application would make more sense.

That's very much your internal experience when it comes to emotional intelligence, your ability to understand your emotions, creating space for self-actualization, continuing to develop as a leader, as a human. We've got self-expression, how you are communicating your feelings, your emotions, how others experience your emotions.

That is through the self-expression. We've got interpersonal, your ability to connect, to build deep, meaningful connections. We talked a little bit around the problem solving. This is not your ability to solve problems, but when emotions are heightened, how do you work through challenging situations?

And then the last bucket is looking at stress management. There are going to be times where stress comes up, and how do you manage the stress?

When all of these different things are happening, what does your level of optimism look like? Are you continuing to maintain a really positive attitude through it all? And at a high level, I love that Tobi is the type of person who would definitely score high in self-actualization, because he says, I want to understand more about this model by going through it and understanding more about myself.

So if we go back to what I said before around coaching, this is a perfect type of person to do the assessment, because there is an openness and a desire to want to learn more and to be able to put this into practice.

And so sometimes it's interesting when you start to see, oh, how come I scored a little bit lower in that particular area? Things might be really great at work, but maybe there's a stressful situation happening at home and that's bringing up a lot for you. And so when you're answering those questions it's going to reflect that.

So I think it's really important, when we talk about this model, that this isn't something like when we're looking at personality, where it tends to be very static. This is very much about whatever is going on currently in your world, that's what the assessment will reflect. If you do this three months, six months, a year from now,

it can shift, based on what those changes are and what's happening in your world.

I think it's great that you're identifying, if you looked at all these 15 dimensions, super strong in these ones, but these other ones are the ones where, if I was going to pick somewhere to focus some of my time and energy, these would be the ones I'd focus more on. Because even when you were talking, Tobi, about people evaluating you, you said you were really good at expressing yourself.

If we look at this one, you got very high on that particular dimension as well.

But for time's sake, for today's conversation, it'd be helpful to go to the page before the model, where we look at your top three subscales and then your bottom three subscales. And everyone, when I look at this page, immediately wants to go to the bottom three subscales. And no, we're not going to start there.

So I'm just curious, Tobi. We look at these top three areas, and actually, even through some of our conversations, this feels quite aligned. I'm not surprised to see this. But what are your thoughts when you see these areas as being your top three? Does that make sense? Do these show up in your day-to-day as being strong strengths for you?

I feel very comfortable talking about my inner world, and I would say exploring that is also a passionate hobby. That also connects really nicely for me with social responsibility, because I think that is also what we need more of in society. Many years ago I decided to study

energy technology, because I was thinking, okay, we really need to solve the climate crisis, the energy system, make that renewable. And at some point, working for a few years in that sector, I realized it's actually not a technology problem that we are having, but a societal change readiness problem.

And that is also what made me switch industry. But what I want to point out here is that both of these decisions for an industry were very much driven by this sort of, how can I do my part, basically make the world a better place? How can I do my part to help people and society?

So overall, I have to say, it makes a lot of sense.

It's interesting when you look at the impulse control as well, that's very connected to triggers and understanding your triggers. So if you're someone who is spending the time, and you've talked about how important it is in your organization to be aware of our triggers, then it would make sense that you feel comfortable with that, because that's something that you've really implemented.

You're paying attention to those times and recognizing, how can I respond as opposed to reacting in this situation, and really building up those self-management tools and being able to know how to self-regulate. Which is awesome.

So when we look at the stress tolerance, I'm curious what came up for you when you saw the stress tolerance. Do you see yourself as someone for whom stress can sometimes be difficult? Do you have a lot of coping strategies? Tell me more. What's your current relationship to stress?

Especially when there's no time, because there are just too many things going on. You also said earlier that people often think of their personal lives when filling this in, and that's also very true for me here. Because in my professional life, or as a leader, I'm not sure, but probably not many people would name that proactively and say, in stressful situations Tobi really is not functional.

They may say I'm inflexible and I like plans. But for this stress tolerance I was thinking a lot more about my personal life. Getting into fights, or trying to fix whatever my wife is doing when we are in a rush trying to get somewhere. There I often can spot these behaviors, that when I'm in this stressful situation where we need to rush and there are many things going on and I'm overwhelmed,

I fall into these useless behaviors. Then I start cleaning up things, or I somehow want to set things in order, because I really want to have this order in my life and it's not there because everything is a mess. And that's my coping mechanism, which often makes things rather worse than better.

So in that sense it makes a lot of sense to see this here.

When we start to talk through it, they're like, oh yes, in a work environment it's fine, this doesn't show up, but actually when I'm at home and when my wife, and this kind of stuff happens, or my husband and these kinds of things, I notice we go into this pattern, and I don't want to be going into this pattern.

I want to be doing more of this. And so this is really great, because what you start to notice is, you know what, I'm actually really happy with how it's going at work in this particular area. The good news is, I know I have that ability, because I do it just fine at work. So I have it in me. And what does it look like?

And of course, relationally, I always say that the people who are closest to us are our best teachers, because those are the people with whom those patterns show up. So I know it's here, and I hear you saying you're very invested in your personal development. So if I'm going to take it to the next level, I notice I'm doing all of these things quite well at work.

What would it look like to focus a little bit more on, if I normally do X, Y, Z in this kind of situation, what do I want to do instead? What do I want to do differently? I notice my coping strategy is, I'm feeling a lot of emotions, and to work through those emotions I start tidying, I start cleaning, because I'm trying to find something to control. And then maybe significant others, what's going on here. Just as an example, because we're talking about it, and I really appreciate you being vulnerable and sharing.

How would you like to approach that differently, if you were in this moment? And even taking in some of the ways you might handle a stressful situation at work, where you might do it differently, what might you want to shift here?

But I would love it if I could go into a meeting less prepared, and embrace the stressful situation by just leaning into it and being more flexible. That's been a theme, something I've become aware of in the last months. I'd say my answer is leaning into it and being okay with the stressful situation.

The other low scoring item here is independence, which I think is related. Because when it comes, for example, to facilitating a meeting or having a one-on-one conversation, I like to be prepared. That's because I care a lot what other people think.

So I can also work on that stress tolerance.

Maybe you just have some bullets, but maybe you don't have it all formulated, and you allow what could possibly emerge in that moment. So it sounds like a bit more self-trust, and a bit more surrendering and letting go. Being able to see what happens in that moment, and maybe something beautiful gets created that wouldn't have been created if there was so much formalized planning.

I also hear you saying there's some opportunity around, there could be a bit of a limiting belief around people pleasing, and this is a saboteur that shows up with many people. We've been conditioned. What might be possible if you allowed yourself a little bit more of the letting go? It doesn't necessarily go perfectly as you thought it would, and yet there's another element of deeper trust, or something else that gets created that wouldn't have been created if you didn't let yourself let go of some of that control.

So we are now doing this one first. And as simple as that sounds, that is already me getting out of my comfort zone and seeing, ah, maybe let's actually try that.

The report then would be something that they have for themselves and sometimes go back to. So for example, with us talking today, if we went further into this, we might say, yes, those three areas are the ones that you've identified you wanted to work more on.

And we can't be working on all these goals all at once. So you might only pick one or two and say, okay, for right now I really want to work on the stress. And so I'm going to go to that one page and I'm going to read through some of those things, and then say, what are some specific actionable goals I could set around that?

That's what I would say for you, based on the conversation we've had today. When I'm working with an individual, we would actually say, okay, these are some of the things we've identified.

Someone is being challenged with performance, and instead of giving the direct feedback in real time they might wait until six months later when it's a performance review, which is very ineffective, because now that person has continued that behavior for six months.

So if we're going to set a goal around it, we would say, okay, tangibly, if we're going to work on that, what does this look like? We might say, the goal is going to be that this individual is going to have more one-on-one conversations with their direct reports. In those conversations they're going to give them consistent feedback around what they're doing really well and where there are opportunities for development.

Ultimately there are some behaviors, there are some ways in which they're trying to protect themselves, that are why they're not having those difficult conversations in the first place.

And it's not like they're just going to wake up one morning and be like, oh, now it's so fun to have difficult conversations, I'm going to do it all the time. It's going to be something that they're working on. And then I'm coaching them, and we're talking through the times that felt more uncomfortable or didn't go as well.

Sometimes we're doing role playing in a session as well, so that they can practice saying what they need to say. So they're building that muscle. You can't just go to the gym once. You have to be consistent. You have to do the reps. It's a long-term strategy.

It's the same thing for this. Once we've identified what those goals are, so if we talk about you, Tobi, with the stress and noticing what some of those natural defaults are, it's not like you're all of a sudden going to be like, oh, I'm going to show up in all conversations with my wife completely differently now.

And with coaching I'd be saying, how's it going? What worked well? What didn't go well? And you're experimenting and practicing. Coaching is where you have that safe space with a person who's championing you as you keep working on those skills.

And then, okay, what could you do to actually test that? Going from goals to options, if I heard that right.

Where did that coping strategy come from? Because there's a reason why you're doing that behavior. It's working for you in some ways as well. I want to highlight that part too. We don't get immediately into action, there's also going to be some deeper work to uncover why that behavior is happening in the first place.

And then also, we did identify one around the people pleasing. Because a lot of times there are limiting beliefs that get uncovered as well. And limiting beliefs are often coping strategies that were created to protect you and to enable you to function in the world.

But sometimes those coping strategies, especially if they're limiting, are no longer working. And it's still about understanding why they were created in the first place, and that can help with the behavior change as well.

I'm very blessed working with a business partner who is really good at decision making, so I can also lean back there a bit and let him take the lead.

Something that can be an incredible strength in certain situations can be a blind spot in others. So it's just uncovering what might work for you really well here, and maybe it's holding you back in these other ways. And that's where you're continuing to identify what that looks like.

Let's get underneath what was going on there. And so this is where we're really working on cementing the behavior change. Coaching is where you have that support, someone championing you and holding you accountable as you continue down that path.

And that's why I don't work with organizations for less than six months, because I don't believe I can help a leader get there after a couple of coaching sessions. That's just creating a lot of awareness. But now they need to put that awareness into practice and create consistent action.

And I say, you have to do the miles. It takes time. Especially when I was first starting, in the first couple of years as a coach, I would do everything in my power to be coaching constantly. Sometimes that would be pro bono. I just wanted to do as much as I could to get the hours, because I knew the more hours I got, the more confidence I would get and the more comfortable I would feel in the model. Which is going to make me

for sure more effective as a coach, but then also in building your business. The more confident you are in what you do, the more you're going to be able to sell that when you're talking to organizations, because you have evidence you can speak to, of the transformations you're creating.

In my personal experience as a client with the EQ-i, I really did lack the EQ 360 feedback part, because some statements from the self-assessment report were simply quite inconsistent with the feedback that I got from others. And this is why at metaFox we are intertwining self-assessment and peer feedback very closely with our very first own diagnostics tool, the metaFox Strengths Explorer.

We are about to launch that on metaFox.eu/strengths. For sure the tool will evolve in the months to come, we are also working with scientific guidance from a university partner here, but you can already start using the beta version entirely for free right now on metafox.eu/strengths. So much for our small ad here.

Also, so much for today's episode. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend, leave us a rating and follow us on your favorite podcast app. I'm Tobi from metaFox, and on our next episode, spoiler, I'm meeting yet another Kirsten. That is only one week away. Until then, all the best and bye bye.