Measuring EQ: What Most L&D Leaders Don't Realize

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is a big piece of coaching. In many 1-1 coaching scenarios, coaches choose to focus on EQ because it’s a learnable skill that has tangible impact on someone’s professional life. Think about it: how would your life be different if you significantly improved your ability to interact with other people?

Your career, your business, and your closest relationships are only as good as your emotional intelligence is. And your ability to improve your EQ is only as good as your ability to measure it.

The 5 A’s of coaching

Aside from modeling, coaching is the other indispensable tool we have to promote and accelerate the development of another person. It’s central to talent development. Here is the framework we use at LeaderFactor when we talk about coaching: Assess, Aim, Apply, Accelerate, Account.

Regardless of where your coaching conversations end up, all 1-1 coaching starts with the same thing, assessment. We have to figure out where we are today so that we can see: what are our strengths, where are the gaps, what do we need to do in order to become more effective?

Every effective EQ assessment has these 5 things

1. A valid, quantitative instrument. While qualitative, in-depth interviews can provide unique insight and color into a leader’s interactions with others, quantitative data is undeniable. You need both to get the full picture, but you need high-quality, actionable data in order to really look in the mirror and face the facts.

2. Multi-rater feedback. Feedback from direct reports, peers, and supervisors will help you determine where you are (point A) and where you need and want to go (point B).

3. Real accountability mechanisms. When you couple an assessment with planning and reflection, then you are more accountable to (1) your results, and (2) your improvement.

4. Consideration of internal and external motivation. If we don’t account for the fundamental beliefs a person has about themselves and others, we can easily assign high emotional intelligence scores to those with manipulative tendencies. This dark side of charisma (or dark side of emotional intelligence) can let destructive leaders slip through the cracks in both self- and multi-rater assessments.

5. Built-in forward momentum. A high-quality EQ assessment will help you sort through your results and prioritize where you should spend your time. There’s certainly a lot to improve, but where should you start? And how can you leverage your time to maximize impact?

The rest of the guide walks through an EQindex® sample report so you can see those five criteria in practice: the overall score across six domains, skill scores for all 30 skills, the per-skill pages with high- and low-competence character profiles and development tips, the 5P action planning process that turns results into sustainable behavioral improvement, and the 360° multi-rater views that surface hidden strengths and blind spots.