Growing the Emotional Intelligence of Leadership Preparation Candidates Through Individual Coaching

• In Event: Developing Justice Leaders: High-Impact Strategies in Leadership Preparation

Abstract

Purposes. This study addresses the following question: How, if at all, does individual coaching support the growth of emotional intelligence in leadership candidates? The paper:
1. presents our program-specific Candidate Performance Standards (CPS) document, in particular its standards related to emotional intelligence, and the process by which candidates self-assessed to this document;
2. lays out the process used for our ongoing one-on-one coaching of the candidates, and how that coaching drew on the candidates’ CPS self-assessments as well as immunity mapping (Kegan & Lahey, 2001; Helsing et al., 2008) to focus on building emotional intelligence;
3. presents results from both graduates and their school district supervisors demonstrating growth in candidates’ emotional intelligence.

Theoretical frameworks. This work is grounded in the schema of emotional intelligence introduced by Gardner (1989) and further developed by Goleman (1998, 2002), attending to the four domains of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. The study is further grounded by Kegan and Lahey’s (2001) theory of immunities to change, which forms the foundation of the coaching model studied.

Methods and Data sources. This study utilizes both nested practitioner action research (Anderson, Herr, & Nihlen, 2007) and phenomenological case study methods (Creswell, 2013). It draws on (1) work samples from 20 leadership preparation candidates, including candidates’ self-assessments, “immunity maps” (Helsing et al, 2008), and iterative written reflections on practice, and (2) the author’s ongoing coaching meetings with those 20 candidates between August 2018 and December 2019, which were grounded in the aforementioned work samples. The paper also draws on the work of a doctoral student external to the program, who collected data for her dissertation on growing emotional intelligence in assistant principals. She interviewed 10 graduates who had moved into formal leadership positions and those graduates’ administrative supervisors. This paper draws on her data, although conducts different/new analyses.

Results. The data suggest that individual coaching, and the candidates’ self-reflection on which that coaching was based, supported the growth of emotional intelligence in graduates. Graduates reported the largest gains in the following areas: reflective practice (self-awareness), leadership vulnerability (self-management), and collaboration (relationship management). This growth in turn appears to have influenced the program graduates’ leadership practices, at least anecdotally as reported by those graduates’ supervisors. Significantly, coaching appears to have been instrumental in supporting our women broadly, and our women of color in particular (mostly Latina/Indigenista), to move into formal leadership positions.

Scholarly significance of the study. Leading for an antiracist future is dangerous and challenging work. It is work that requires a great deal of emotional intelligence (see for example Fullan, 2001; Garmston & Wellman, 2016; Radd, Givens, Gooden, & Theoharis, 2021), demanding us to bring compassion and courage to both changing ourselves and supporting others to change. Yet emotional intelligence tends to be wholly absent in leadership preparation standards, or if named, still not operationalized (see for example https://www.ctcexams.nesinc.com/content/docs/CAPE_Placemat.pdf). This study provides both guidance to and evidence of operationalizing emotional intelligence through leadership standards, and growing that emotional intelligence through individual coaching.

Authors

• Jennifer Goldstein, California State University - Fullerton

• Guadalupe Serrano, Anaheim Union High School District