Emotional Intelligence Retains Obama’s Emotional Link with the People

Dr. Sherman N. Miller

11/30/08

The media pundits are waiting with bated breath to rate President-elect Barack Obama on his choice of cabinet officers. Yet I worry that they are missing the importance of what Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis, and Annie McKee, authors of “Primal Leader” label as Emotional Intelligence. I am especially worried about Obama retaining his ability to turn out 100,000 people in the future because he could fall victim to what Goleman, et al, discuss on “Transparency” under the heading, “Self-Management.”

“Leaders who are transparent live their values. Transparency—an authentic openness to others about one’s feelings, beliefs, and actions—allows integrity. Such leaders openly admit mistakes or faults, and confront unethical behavior in others rather than turn a blind eye.”

It is clear that Obama established an emotional link with the American people in his historic win in the 2008 General Election; however, his ability to use his emotional intelligence will signal how long he can retain this bond when the going gets tough where he has to make unpopular decisions.  Goleman et al proffers, “When a leader focuses on people, emotional bonds are created that are the ground in which resonance is sown—and people will follow that leader in good times and bad. Resonance creates an invisible but powerful bond between people based on a belief in what they are doing and a belief in one another. . .”

However, Obama must guard against morphing into to a discordant leader because he allowed a nightmarish situation to fester. Goleman, et al, give us one last thing to ponder. “Dissonant leadership produces groups that feel emotionally discordant, in which people have a sense of being continually off-key.” Therefore, one might argue that a scrutiny of the Wall Street gangsters and financial treasonous speculators perpetrating the global financial crisis has the potential to become a nightmare if Obama mishandles it.

In November 2008, as I listened to Valerie Jarrett, then co-chair of the Obama transition team, I found myself struggling to contain my worry as a member of the Trotter Group – a collection of African American newspaper columnists. Jarrett, now senior White House advisor to Obama, revealed that Obama wants to get things done, attempt to accomplish what is doable, make people feel safe, and let folks understand that there are no bad ideas. She says Obama wants to get folks involved at the grassroots level because he believes ordinary people can do extraordinary things.

I could no longer contain my worry, so I asked Jarrett about the prosecution of the Wall Street gangsters and financial treasonous speculators that have brought down the US economy. She felt that is an issue for the new Attorney General to investigate. I was glad to hear her response for it appears obvious that the American populace is distressed that we are bailing out all of the financial institutions who will not make loans to Main Street.

I hope President-Elect Barack Obama sees the need to include the Attorney General as a member of his financial teams because the American people deserve transparency on financial dealings and the perpetrators need to be revealed and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.  Mr. President-Elect, people committing financial treasonous speculation and Wall Street gangster crimes must be tried in front of the world or you may lose your great emotional link with the American and world peoples.