strategy+business, Feb. 8, 2017
by Theodore Kinni
“Emotions can be harnessed to live and lead in better ways,” says Susan David. “For so long, we’ve treated emotions in organizations as warm, fluffy, and disruptive. Now we’re recognizing how powerfully they affect outcomes.”
A psychologist at Harvard Medical School, cofounder and codirector of the Institute of Coaching at McLean Hospital, and CEO of Evidence Based Psychology, an organizational development consultancy, David is a leader in the effort to transform how we view emotion in the workplace. This is especially important in business today, as organizations face unprecedented complexity, competition, globalization, and disruptive technologies. Managing in this context requires the ability to adapt and flourish in changing circumstances. “The truth is,” notes David, “that organizations can never be truly agile unless the people who work within them are agile — and more specifically, emotionally agile.”
David introduced the concept of emotional agility to the business world in a 2013 article, written with Christina Congleton, in Harvard Business Review, which heralded it as a “Management Idea of the Year.” Her acclaimed book, Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life (Avery, 2016), outlines how to identify and accept our emotions and respond to them in ways that ultimately make us happier and more successful. (You can assess your emotional agility here.)
When I asked David about the books that influenced her thinking on emotional agility and that executives should read to learn how to effectively use emotions in leading themselves and others, she responded with four titles. Read the rest here.
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