Yvonne Thompson, CHRP
president and CEO,
Change Innovators Inc.

Yvonne Thompson, MA., CHRP, president and CEO of Change Innovators Inc®, is a nationally-recognized author and acclaimed speaker whose passion for providing life changing leadership and creating positive energy in people and organizations is felt and inspired in every keynote at conferences and conventions.  Thompson has authored Spiritually Aligned Leadership: Becoming SELF Centered  and Leadership for a New World, The Organic Approach to Employee Engagement.

Have you ever made a decision you shouldn’t have made but did anyway? How did you know? Most people respond with my intuition or gut was telling me. New research would indicate that not only is EQ more important then ever before but that understanding the heart-center and how our feelings and emotions communicate with the brain is critical.

How our leaders feel really matters. When we feel gratitude, alignment, joy and abundance the messaging to the brain creates the higher centers to activate allowing for better decision-making. Anger, frustration and fear do the opposite.  Our emotions and feelings are a keen indicator of our effectiveness at work. EQ is a critical starting place. Training leaders to connect to how they feel and the resulting emotions is fast becoming one of the most important leadership attributes along with creating positive energy through those emotions.

Russell Cullingworth
president,
EQAdvantage Learning and Development Inc.

Russell Cullingworth, MBA, founder and president of EQ Advantage Learning and Development Inc.and the Centre of Excellence for Young Adults, speaks and trains about emotional intelligence.  His career includes executive level positions at CGA-Canada and at Canuck Place Children’s Hospice. Russell is an accomplished speaker, facilitator and coach.  He has an MBA from SFU and is an Accredited Insights Discovery Licensed Practitioner.

The HR profession has worked extremely hard to earn their place at the table, to be accepted as a legitimate contributors to the profitability and stability of an organization; however, many executives may still regard HR as a liability, and do everything they can to avoid running into HR in the hallway.

HR professionals can make a greater impact in the workplace and bring exceptional value to their role through emotional intelligence competencies, the pinnacle of which is building trust and influence.

Workplace impact is not about legal issues, job descriptions, payroll, processes or performance evaluations.  It is about people.  How you deal with people above, below and beside you.  Emotional intelligence competencies lead to a deep awareness of how you show up, how you collaborate and motivate others, and how you build rapport, trust and ultimately, interpersonal influence. It is that ability to influence that will create the lasting workplace impact that every HR professional dreams seeks.

Violet Frost, CHRP
HR lead, Canadian Operations
Agility Fuel Systems

Violet Frost, CHRP has been a member of the HRMA Southern Interior Advisory Council for the past six years.  She currently leads the Canadian HR operations at Agility Fuel Systems, the innovative provider of highly-engineered and cost-effective natural gas fuel systems for heavy duty vehicles.  Based in Kelowna, she has held other HR roles in Vancouver and Winnipeg.

With today’s current trendy HR topics on wellness, mindfulness and resiliency, the common denominator is EQ and its positive impact in the workplace.

When the topic of emotional intelligence, also known as EQ, comes up, many will think of Daniel Goleman’s best-selling books. Studies from Goleman’s, Working with Emotional Intelligence, shows that people with high EQ have greater mental health, exemplary job performance, and more potent leadership skills; EQ accounts for 67 per cent of the traits identified as necessary for superior performance AND mattered twice as much as technical expertise or IQ.

Developing high EQ enables us to better cope during uncertainty, make difficult decision more easily and allows us to be more socially and personally competent.  A higher EQ enables us to perceive, understand and express our feelings more accurately and better manage emotions so they work for us. That’s an effective leadership tool that HR professionals can share.

Take a look at Goleman’s research on this valuable leadership topic. Plus, don’t forget to practice your own EQ!

Kerry Roberts, CHRP
HR advisor,
University of Northern British Columbia

Kerry Roberts, CHRP joined the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) as a human resources advisor after 16 years in the airline industry with WestJet—where he learned that investing in the right people will grow and enhance your desired workplace culture which can only lead to positive implication and success of your organization.  Kerry began a new adventure in 2014 at UNBC, and has brought his employee-focused approach as an HR advisor.

The emotional intelligence quotient (EQ) should be understood by every HR Department.  EQ has proven to save time and money while increasing the growth rate and efficiency of an organization.

In my past experience, EQ was strategically used to educate the employee population. Training HR staff and leadership how to identify employees with a high EQ and placing them in an environment that supports this trait allowed the organization to meet their targets while decreasing their overall people and operational costs. This has resulted in a reduction in workplace injuries, poor behaviour and missed deadlines.

Recruiting high-EQ staff provides the organization with increased sales, stronger understanding of customers’ needs, increased customer satisfaction, and growth of an insightful and intelligent workforce that will foster a thriving work place culture. EQ is not just a trend, but an opportunity to educate, strengthen and transform your workforce into an industry leader.

Kim A.V. Annis
MBA student,?
Thompson Rivers University

Kim A.V. Annis is currently part of the Central Interior HRMA Advisory Council, has a post-BA in HR, and is pursuing the CHRP designation while taking his MBA at at Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops. Also enrolled in the Provincial Instructor Diploma (PIDP), Kim grew up in Chilliwack, B.C., and moved to Clearwater, B.C. where he owned his own I.T. consulting business and was a system administrator for an Internet Service Provider before going back to school in 2013.

One can use metrics, raw numbers, theories and past experiences to build evidence for a C-Level argument or strategy, but to understand the underlying currents in business, one arguably needs emotional intelligence (EI).

EI is relatively new in the psychological domain, having the trait vs. the ability only defined since 2000 (Petrides, 2000). Although, “there have been promising developments” (Matthews, 2002), current studies often show, “there is no empirical data supporting a causal link between El and any of its supposed, positive effects”(Matthews, 2009).

Against this empirical evidence, my personal experience has shown that reading the situation on an emotional level can give great leverage in business: knowing when to ask is sometimes as important as what to ask. Secondly, organizational culture and attitudes do exist, even if they are difficult to measure; only through E.I. and critical thinking can HR make positively affect long-run decisions.