More than twenty years ago Harvard professor, Howard Gardner, began teaching that human intelligence could not simply be measured by IQ. Instead his Multiple Intelligences (MI) describes a broad spectrum of human ability. A clever person, for example, may lack common sense, or a brilliant musician like Mozart be short of social skills.

Of Gardner’s categories perhaps the most famous is Emotional Intelligence (EI). This has largely come into our everyday consciousness as a result of the bestselling books by Daniel Goleman. Karl Albrecht’s book is the latest thinking on the subject.

While agreeing with Goleman that EI is about self-awareness and self-management, Albrecht asserts that by including relationships as part of his concept Goleman stretches EI beyond its natural boundaries. Managing relationships or “the ability to get along well with others and to get them to cooperate with you” is what Albrecht refers to as Social Intelligence (SI).

While there are some irritations with Albrecht’s book – he quotes himself rather too often and his self-designed psychometric is too simplistic - it is nevertheless a valuable read largely because of its pragmatic approach. Albrecht lists five categories of SI that individuals need to constantly monitor and improve:

1. situational awareness,
2. presence,
3. authenticity,
4. clarity
5. empathy.

This book has more of a practioner than academic bent, and so for each of these categories he provides insightful stories and helpful tips as to how a person might develop their capacity to influence others effectively.

We will not have long to wait for Goleman’s response; his new book, Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships, is published in late September 2006.

 

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 21st, 2006 at 12:23 pm and is filed under Book reviews, Engaging People, Leadership. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.