The Story: Marcy
Flexibility and perspective may be two of the core traits of the emotionally intelligent manager. Take the example of the nurse-turned-CPA, Marcy. We like this case a lot because it illustrates all four of the skill sets in our model of emotional intelligence.
Marcy was a nurse for many years, working mainly in neurosurgery. She was good at what she did, and she loved her work, but after a motorcycle accident she found herself almost unable to walk. After extensive rehabilitation, she was able to walk again but was forced to consider a new career—one that did not require her to be on her feet for hours at a time.
Marcy reinvented herself by going back to school, graduating with honors, and becoming a CPA. She gravitated toward internal audit, which she found to be similar to the crisis management environment of the operating room. Marcy used her diagnostic skills to put the case together and then handed the case off to someone else, just as she had in the operating theater.
Hired into the financial unit of a large manufacturing firm, Marcy was conducting a routine internal audit when she discovered a $12.5 million mistake in how a division was articleing future revenue, and claiming it as current revenue. Marcy’s interpretation was that it was just that—a mistake. She assumed that the company would do the right thing, which meant admit the mistake, restate its earnings, and aggressively act to correct the root cause of the problem. That is not what Marcy’s boss, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO), wanted to hear, and he asked Marcy to “get one of her people on the situation and make it go away.”
That was advice with which Marcy did not agree, and she refused to let one of her subordinates cook the articles. But the CFO got his way. A month after Marcy was asked to cover up the error, she received a surprise visit from her HR representative, Brad. It took him quite a while, but when he finally got around to it, Brad told Marcy that the company no longer required her services. Of course, there was no connection, he said, between her being fired and standing up to the CFO.
The Emotionally Intelligent Manager Analysis
Marcy’s emotional intelligence skills are part of her strength, and our analysis leads us to conclude that these skills probably were, in part, to blame for her employment being terminated! Our analysis starts with identifying emotions.
Marcy knew that something was up when she had a meeting with Brad, her HR representative. Brad “always taps his fingers” when nervous, and “he looks away” from you when he talks. Well, Brad was tapping away and hardly looked at her during this meeting. She started to pay closer attention.
When Brad finally came to the point, Marcy was fully prepared. She was told that her position was being eliminated and that her services were no longer required. Marcy was not happy about the decision, and she was upset that the company had failed to do the right thing in this case. Yet, as she noted, “If I was angry, I would focus for the wrong reason.” Marcy needed to hear Brad’s message, to see the world through the eyes of the company, both Brad’s eyes and those of the CFO. Marcy’s ability to generate an emotion and reason with it—to use emotions—allowed her to get this part just right.
Marcy understood the dynamics of the situation. She recognized Brad’s discomfort; she saw and understood the CFO’s predicament. She knew how they felt and why they felt this way, showing some understanding of emotions. Later on, she was asked whether this was fair. “It depends on your perspective,” she noted. “They saw me as a loose cannon. I can understand that.”
Marcy pushed the company as hard as she could to recognize the accounting error and confront their problems head-on. Attempting to ignore the issue would not make it go away, no matter how much everyone wanted that. Uncomfortable feelings are just that—uncomfortable—and we often try to push them away. Marcy demonstrated her ability to manage emotions, as she was able to stay open to the feeling and use this feeling to motivate her to act in the best interests of the company. Her actions were not successful, but she made a glorious and passionate attempt to do the right thing.
A Plan for the Emotionally Intelligent Manager
Whether on the operating room floor or handling a tough audit situation, Marcy tried to bring the human side to everything. Marcy is not a strong leader, as she readily admits. She prefers to be in a number-two position. This allows her to leverage her insight, understanding, and big-picture perspective.
But it wasn’t enough in this situation. In spite of her skills, Marcy failed to achieve her objective, and this story doesn’t have a happy ending. When asked about this, Marcy admitted that she wished things had ended differently. She also noted that she could have handled things differently and that perhaps someone else would have been more successful. But she was adamant that she would not have made a decision that compromised her values and ethics. She was willing and able to take a stand in the face of some very stiff resistance.
We wonder whether Marcy could have achieved a different result-if she had used an Emotional Blueprint for this situation. Perhaps. If the desired goal is to have the CFO accept Marcy’s recommendations, then we need to better understand how the CFO is feeling and how these feelings are directing his thinking. Our what-if analysis needs to consider how the CFO will react to various suggestions and how the news is delivered. Managing the CFO’s feelings in order to allow him to stay open to his discomfort and fear may provide him with the insight, desire, and ability to do the right thing.
The Outcome and Lessons Learned
The outcome was that Marcy did not have a job, and her ex-boss did. Although it didn’t take her long to find a new position, it still does not seem fair or just that Marcy’s honesty and integrity went unrewarded. And it is not fair. We don’t know if this outcome could have been altered, but we do know what the lesson is: that leveraging the power and data in feelings is the right thing to do, even when the world around us does not always reward emotionally intelligent behavior.