Emotional Intelligence for Truck Drivers

The first time I met my father-in-law, an awesome guy who drove a truck for UPS for 33 years, I was working at a computer software company and making a good living. I got his stamp of approval when I asked if I could have permission to marry his daughter.

 

Then I did something he could not have expected from his son-in-law with the degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. I told him I was leaving my high-paying job in the tech industry to jointly own a small startup company that teaches Emotional Intelligence. I have to give my father-in-law credit, he didn't throw me out of his house right there, but he did look at me in confusion and puzzlement and asked what the (blank) is Emotional Intelligence??

 

Of course what he was really asking (understandably) is "how are you going to support my daughter and the grandchild she is expecting, by teaching … what did you say it was?"

 

I could have tried to provide the definition of EQ (or EI) that Dan Goleman gave in his book titled Emotional Intelligence (it's too long to put here, but you can see it on page 43-44 of the book). I knew that a clinical definition would not work and that I needed to explain it in terms my father-in-law could understand.

 

So I asked him a number of questions and these were his responses:

 

1. Question - tell me about a bad manager you've had? "A bad manager is the kind that sees you in the coffee room and immediately walks the other way." So not a people person. 

 

 

2. Question - tell me about a good manager you've had? A good manager is the kind that sees you in the coffee room and says hello." Ok, now we are making some progress.

 

3. Question - tell me about a great manager you've had? "A great manager is the kind of person that sees you in the coffee room and not only says hello, but asks how your little daughter is doing because he knows she had surgery last week." Aha!

 

4. Final question - would you do anything differently for the great manager vs. The others. "I work in a union, so there are very specific rules, work hours, etc. But I only have to do the minimum for the bad boss. For the great leader, I can carry that extra box, hustle to make that extra delivery, be more courteous to the customer, and let the great boss know if I have an idea on how to improve things. I'm not giving anything away to the bad boss."

 

I explained to my father-in-law that what he just described was the business impact of an emotionally intelligent leader vs. A leader with average or poor EQ. Multiply that times the number of managers and employees at UPS (or any company) and that's a very significant impact on efficiency, quality, performance and client service. 

 

I remember him leaning back at that point, un-folding his arms and unfurrowing his brow. It didn't take a ton of Emotional Intelligence to recognize that he'd understood the impact that EI training could have on an organization, and more importantly, that my new business had a pretty good chance of being able to support his daughter!

 

Bill Benjamin is an inspiring keynote speaker with IHHP offering  Emotional intelligence certification.

Author's Note

I got his stamp of approval when I asked if I could have permission to marry his daughter.