Studies show an inverse relationship between socio-economic background and emotional intelligence.
http://geronimarion.posterous.com/emotional-intelligence-linked-to-socio-econom
In short, those privileged kids don’t give a damn how you feel, at work, that is.
Kids whose fathers fell from grace (Madoff, Skilling) committed suicide (former) or died a mysterious death (later). And we all knew what happened with Hearst and Getty‘s.
This brought to mind another paradox: parents can leave behind earthly belongings, but can’t fill the kids’ void with stuffs. This applies to both rich and poor families ( millions of rural Chinese children are left to be raised by relatives, while their parents went to work in the cities).
Mr Rifkin recently published a huge book entitled “the Empathic Civilization“.
In it, he traced human evolution, and recent discoveries in neuron sciences to illustrate our latest stage: empathy. In other words, all those striving should result in better understanding of how others feel.
Growing up in a very narrow alley in the heart of Saigon, I know how people live, love and learn to overlook their differences. We have to. Co-existence in a collective culture helps distinguish differences in kind vs degree.
Back in the 60’s, there were a lot of experiments on sharing the stuff (and a joint too).
But that too became unraveled.
Then, corporations started to pay attention to EQ.
In today’s world, we need to pick team members who are smart (IQ), savvy (EQ) and sociable (SQ). Unfortunately, digital natives seem to progress better on the former, but lack later two (Emotional and Social Intelligence). Bad for business, bad for the overall performance of the team (which needs collaboration instead of compartmentalization).
Fortunately, the study concluded that those skills can be improved.
David Brooks mentioned that students in his NYC Class tend to favor data analysis and decision points.
Corporate training could focus on team building, small-group communication, sales skills (if you can do this, you can do anything) and internship abroad to groom executives with a global mind-set. Fridays (google) off to boost team “play” project. In our 24/7 interconnected world, where human resource now encompasses the globe, we cannot afford a huge blind spot (low EQ).
As we move beyond basic subsistence (food, shelter and clothing), Maslow observed that we next strive for love and understanding. Not just understanding, but empathic understanding of those from other cultures. Like it or not, they will be coming and living on our streets and online. A great attitude toward nature (with other people included) is a legacy worth leaving behind besides “stuff” for our kids, as they live on without doubt in an increasingly multi-cultural society. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/05/us/05census.html?_r=1&hp
Thang Nguyen 555 