I recall watching Sir Ken Robinson's TED talk many years ago on the topic of creativity. I'm sure I've watched it over ten times since. It's mesmerising. He shares that "as children grow up, we educate them progressively from the waist up. And then we focus on their heads. And slightly to one side."
What Ken is saying here is that we are all educated to rely mostly on our cognitive brain, and even here, mostly on the left side, which is our logical, analytical, and reasoning side. IQ is thus dubbed the hero, other intelligent centres are set aside, and we're left (excuse the pun) with limited intelligence to navigate our landscape.
"The ability to shift from reacting against the past to leaning into an emerging future is probably the single most important leadership capacity today. Time and again we try to cope with situations using collective instruments that are out of tune." Otto Scharmer
To tune our instruments and harmonise as a collective within an organisation, as Otto Scharmer states above, means adopting a more holistic intelligence and celebrating diversity. To make all intelligence quotients equal heroes and to eliminate measurement of worth based purely on left-brained IQ capacity.
Intelligence quotient
Commonly, people measure an individual's level of cognition to determine their IQ. Their capacity to harness memory, knowledge, spatial reasoning, and visual language to solve problems. It relies on logic, reasoning, and visual data, and this can be nurtured further through regular mental exercises, learning a new skill, and shifting our daily habits to create new neural pathways.
Emotional quotient
Typically, EQ is measured by an individual's level of self- and social-emotional awareness. Their capacity to perceive, evaluate, and express emotions and to sense their impact on social circles. It relies on feeling, compassion, and tuning in to themselves and others to understand resonance. This can be nurtured further through regular social connection, breath work, practicing empathy, active listing, and becoming socially aware of the "field" in which you are operating.
Future quotient
Still a new concept to many organisations, FQ is the level to which an individual can be adaptive, making sense of the complex and dynamic data surrounding them. This data is more than just visual data (IQ) and emotional or social data (EQ). It includes collective, system or "field" data.
It is one's capacity to connect dots across the ecosystem, hold multiple perceptions, remain open to what the system needs, and calibrate to this emerging need. Requiring ongoing curiosity.
It relies on the holistic integration of head, heart, and gut intelligence to sense for emerging solutions, knowing that the "field" already has the solution. This can be nurtured further through mindfulness practices, systemic thinking, co-creative skills, and embracing diversity.
“When you trust your gut, follow your heart, and use your head, magic happens!” Jodi Livon
How to implement FQ within your workplace
Experiment with somatic problem-solving. There are many tools to support your team with this, including constellation facilitators, NLP practitioners, and U-Lab practitioners.
Embrace diversity. This extends beyond culture, ethnicity, beliefs, or sexual inclination. It is this plus ideas, perceptions, expression centres, and deeper motivations. The Enneagram is an effective tool to unpack this.
Expand your training and development. Include other intelligent quotient skills such as creative thinking, self-awareness, systemic leadership, and polycrisis agility to encourage new ways of approaching challenges.
Increase awareness of the ecosystem. Switch all operations to serve the whole. become aware of how every part impacts the greater system and how the collective system influences each small part.
Anchor all operations in purpose. Get radically clear about your company's northern star and ensure every stakeholder feels it, senses it, understands it, and buys into it. Once set, practice agility along the way.
Start at the top. Train yourself and your leadership team in the art of FQ leadership to propel organisational harmony, problem-solving, and empowered decision-making that nourishes the whole.
"In an era of complexity and chaos, leaders encounter many complex problems which, by definition, cannot be fully understood. Solutions cannot be reduced to a formula or easy answers." Katherine Tyler Scott
It is possible to integrate all intelligence quotients to better lead our teams; in fact, it is natural. Awareness is the first step. The second step is the courage to start leaning into different ways of thinking and solving. The comfort zone will never support creativity or sustainable outcomes.
If you focus on serving all stakeholders and the collective field in which your organisation operates, if you zoom out to view the whole and zoom in to confirm patterns of behaviour, you will begin to sense emerging solutions, and the eco-system will begin to look after you.
Want to find out more? Get in touch.
