BUILDING LEADERSHIP SKILLS WITH EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

This is the Twentieth Episode of our series #BKOT: Build a KickAss Offshore team. Watch this podcast about building leadership skills with emotional intelligence, and learn how our firms, partners or directors can grow their business with the help of Emotional Intelligence. Watch the podcast to know more.

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#BKOT 20 BUILD A KICKASS OFFSHORE TEAM

BUILDING LEADERSHIP SKILLS WITH EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

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Chris: Hi everybody thank you for taking your time out of your busy day. My name is Chris Rivera, Director of Client Relations with entigrity and we are on episode 20 of #BKOT how to build a kick-ass offshore team and very excited with this special guest today of the  badeauconsulting.com Miss Jaclyn Badeau. We are very excited to talk about Emotional Intelligence today, but first we want to get to know a little bit about your background so Jaclyn Badeau again thank you for joining us today, very excited today, Building Leadership Skills with Emotional Intelligence is what we'll be talking about but tell us your stories. The really good story of how you got into your own company and built your company so go ahead.

Jaclyn: I'm very appreciative of you reaching out to the podcast and excited to be with all you guys today. Yeah I would say my story if I just had to say a little one-liner I would say I'm not your typical CPA, so a little bit like more about my background so I started off in public accounting so I am a cpa, I have my CGMA also so did the public accounting route like a lot of people may choose to do did some audit, did some tax, a little bit of consulting work love working with my clients and lots of different industries loving. I love building those relationships with people and when I was in public accounting also led our training department in our audit practice and coached people did some speaking engagements so then you know you'll already start seeing where I'm gravitating toward like this training consulting coaching kind of thing.

And then I decided that it was time to go to business and industry. I wanted to learn a little bit more about how a company operated. I wanted to really develop those types of skills at a deeper level so I went to a public company that's headquartered here in Kentucky that's where I live in Kentucky and a manufacturing company e-commerce retail store, so it was great it was a great experience. I was almost there for about nine years, was in four different roles within that company, did some controllership roles. My last role before I left was the head of our global internal audit practice so I got to travel around the world to lots of our locations, meeting our employees and doing some training. While I was at that company we also started initiatives of training our managers and really instilling leadership competencies and so I became a certified facilitator through that process with the third party we use to provide the materials for training and I love doing that because we started it off in our U.S operations and I got to meet so many people out at our plants and at our headquarters so I got to leave do leadership training and do a list of coaching with all different types of people so I always is also coaching people at the same time doing all these different CPA roles and so earlier this year it was time I've been thinking about for a while to start my own company and it just worked out. So earlier this year started the doe consulting as you said and what I do now; full time is coaching and training and different consulting and speaking engagements in that leadership space and as Chris as you mentioned yeah I'm also certified in Emotional Intelligence which is what we're gonna chat about today so I'll maybe say EQ or EI or that's all kind of interchangeable but I love talking about EQ it's always been a base of how I've coached people over my career lots of trainings I've done in the EQ space so I just love talking about it so thanks again for having me here. 

Chris: Yes of course see everybody it's a great story there and yeah you're not the typical CPA  this is a I've brought to our audience many different topics I love the uniqueness about it not just you know the general accounting, bookkeeping, tax things like that but outside the box because it's very important to learn and become an overall you know CPA as an entrepreneur which is very hard so to provide what what you do is very important.

So I have a couple questions right: We always hear about IQ and then we have EQ so there's a key difference someone can be really really smart but I feel that if you don't have a high EQ you can't really pull it all together.  Am I right? 

Jaclyn: You are spot on actually there's research and this is one of the classes that I facilitate. I do some intro to EQ courses because there's a lot of misconceptions out there about it, where people are like you know I've heard that word or that buzz term right and they're like but I don't really know what it means or how do I even use it, but specifically with EQ and IQ. So yeah IQ just some fun facts I like to say IQ peaks at the age of 17 which I think is just interesting to understand. EQ is something that you can build over your whole life so EQ and think about that those are like your leadership skills and one of the things just kind of what you said about they could be very intelligent but maybe they don't know how to really approach things the best. They aren't related that there's research that proves that IQ and EQ aren't related so there's no like inverse relationship or anything but the the big difference is you can develop EQ and EQ accounts for anywhere from like 27% to 45% of job success no matter what field, what profession you're in and interestingly enough because a lot of people are like, well I'm smart and I can kind of relate it to the public accounting profession the CPA profession but IQ only accounts for about an average of 6% of job success. 

So like when you hear about it kind of like that you're like oh well maybe this is something I should really pay attention to. It's actually again the largest predictor of job success of IQ technical skills you know anything that you come up with that's the largest one so that's always a fun fact I like to share.

Chris: Yeah six percent that's really low I didn't know that. So as you're working with these companies and throughout your career and you found yourself into this role and so let's say you're in front of a bunch of controllers, directors, senior managers, What's the in the beginning is there a lot of pushback or is everyone really receptive or do they are they really engaged did they think they know everything like what have you seen when you're having your initial meeting. 

Jaclyn: Oh my goodness so there's a mixed approach for sure it is so you really realize everyone or you know it's a very individual human being if you really think about it. So I've come across the gamut of especially when you have those initial kind of EQ conversations and that's one of the reasons why I do an intro to EQ class because I want to like really put it out there like what is it really and then let's just break it down.

I'm really big into like breaking it down to where it just makes sense and let's not use all these fancy jergen kind of things like what's it really mean and like let's do some specific things to where I can build those leadership skills to really help me be successful and so that's what I love doing but to answer your question definitely a mixed approach or some people who think you know I'm intelligent kind of like the EQ right there or the IQ people. I have a high IQ or I had really high grades in college or I have all these certifications. I have all these technical skills right and they're like I don't need all that hocus pocus or whatever with the EQ stuff and I love talking with people about that because then once I start breaking down like scenarios I'm like we'll see maybe you could have thought about approaching it like this and once you start really going through that they're like okay I can see why this is important to help a person like have better relationships with their peers their team members if they're leading a team or their clients or with offshore teams you know helping have better connections with their full team no matter where they are. I mean EQ is especially important when you're working with people that aren't in the same building and just think about that with the pandemic that we've just gone through like there's such a decrease of people working shoulder to shoulder beside each other. So me and EQ are even more important now than they ever have been.

Chris: Absolutely agree and you said well I was kind of thinking about that kind of approach. I got an IQ, I got an EQ. I mean it's completely different for example I had a call with a client last week week or two ago and our company presents software requisites that are that we could source for so the the client doesn't spend time training and the client literally said I don't care what certification they have, I want five years of experience. So someone could be fully certified and have all the certifications in place and it's like so what have you done so far. This is my first day, my first time looking for work, my first time using it and it's like and it's totally different, it's completely different as far as being certified and the experience with it and dealing with real life situations. So I definitely got a good laugh out of that I said okay noted for you because there is a big difference. So when you're working with and doing an introduction and a training class, do you do a lot of role play scenarios?

Jaclyn: Yeah so it depends on the length of the class of course and how much time we have and what kind of format we use. So I have like a one hour course where I do lots of interaction and so I'm kind of going, I want to like really introduce the model of the EQ and go into the definition which is probably I should probably jump into like what the definition is just in case we have anyone that's like okay sounds cool but no what is it because that's what I kind of do is I start with you know EQ.

There's you know there's a technical definition but how I really break it down if it was all about leadership skills so that's I say that because people are like okay leadership skills, I get it and then it's all about kind of understanding your emotions understand, How that affects you? How does it affect others? How can you express it constructively? How do you build interpersonal relationships like all the people skills that we all are required to have? How do you make more effective decisions? How do you manage and tolerate stress and be resilient especially in times like that?

What we're going through now that's all of what EQ is and I describe it kind of like a road map so back in the day when we have paper road maps or think about like you're using your apps like waze or google maps or something and you're trying to get from point A to point B and you're trying to get there the most effective efficient way, that's kind of what EQ is to me if you understand more of those skills and understand how much you use those skills and you understand how to get them better you can more effectively get point from point A to point B and wherever you're going whether that's a career goal or a company goal because you're trying to develop these certain leadership skills to really help you stand out and I wrote an article recently about like how to give you a competitive edge like EQ can give you that competitive edge if you're a firm there's a lot of things that help you get a competitive edge even like services like offshoring and we can talk about that later but you know that is EQ in a nutshell of how I'll describe it so like in a one hour course I'm trying to make sure you really understand what EQ is and I give a really high level overview of some of the leadership skills and I'm really big on.

I want to give you some tips like I like when people are able to have a training where they're not bored they don't feel like they're wasting their time and they can actually like apply something that they learn right after the session and so in a very brief one-hour session I'll give you some tips like okay here's your self-assignment, if you think about this or do that it can help you increase your empathy or your interpersonal relationships.

In longer courses we do exactly what you were saying and I've taught so many different courses where we do a ton of role play, because and lots of times we want to have people bring them into the actual session think about some scenarios ahead of time so that way they can work on them as they're going through courses and then they walk out with like they're already done. With that big issue they thought was something they didn't know how to tackle and they just learned how to tackle it and they worked on it and they can go apply it, so it all depends on the link but i love doing role play lots of interactiveness lots of chat effects in the virtual environment lots of chats or virtual group breakout type of things.

Chris: Yeah awesome! It's important to do the role play because you could talk about it, you could interact but unless you actually try it out and it's nerve-wracking for sure. I'm very comfortable, I could speak in front of 10,000 people. I mean I'd be nervous but I feel comfortable doing it but a lot of people are just absolutely terrified and so you have to have that type of mindset and the confidence in doing it. 

But the role play is so key because if you're just thinking in your head or practicing it you know it may or may not work but if you actually do it in a situation even though it's not real it's very important then you get an understanding of like wow. I would think like body language, I could easily just be like this right now, and be like oh great tell us more awesome wow. I mean body language is key right. Do you find that people are aware of their body language at all or unaware or what have you found a mixed approach? 

Jaclyn: We're all individual human beings but that's a big part of understanding your emotions and your impact on others is reading the non-verbal things. Even like listening to the tone of the voice and the body language and those type of things and so like when I break down EQ and coaching or in training sometimes, we talk about like different Q’s like if you've expressed something the way you intended to and you can go well I know if I messed up because the other person the other day crossed their arms and looked like they were mad at me. 

Chris: Yeah that's great the guys did a really good job awesome. And it means a lot or if somebody's always loud and brash and saying yes great job or like horrible jobs like wait it means a lot. And I find too that sometimes people try to manage everybody the same way. So this is how I manage and they have a staff of 10 let's say and so they manage everybody the same way and that works that's it. I find that to be completely different because in order to get the most out of your team you have to manage each and there's 10 people there's ten different ways you gotta manage obviously you're having a meeting you get your point across but there's ten different people there's ten different emotions. Do you find that people are understanding that or they are managing a certain way or what have you seen? 

Jaclyn: Yeah I mean that's a huge topic in all kinds of leadership training sessions that I facilitated and sometimes you know people are recognizing exactly what you said you've hit it now in the head. You know Billy and Sally and Jill I use those as interchangeable just names, those people are three different kinds of people. 

And so yeah you need to manage them or what I like to say lead them because a manager is one thing of the leaders and other things that you want to lead them in different ways and and even like in the when you relate it to EQ you go well then tell me how that's EQ. 

Well that's the leadership skills like building your relationships also and one of the things of, if you really want to keep on continuing to build like your interpersonal relationships, think about if you're leading a team and you know one of the things that you may hear to do is like you know we need to celebrate our successes and recognize the people for their contributions but a very and I've taught this so many times a very easy tip not eat I don't want to say easy because it could be hard you got to work on it, but a very thing something you can do to really even be more effective at recognizing people and building that relationship is knowing how people want to be recognized not everyone wants to be put on a podium at the annual company event and confetti comes down over their head because they you know they closed the books or had this percent accuracy in the audit world or tax deadlines or matter whatever some people may like that some people may be motivated for days off or a monetary thing you've got to really understand each person to your point.

And how do they like to be led how do you build that relationship so how do you recognize them how do you celebrate their successes in ways that they want and they appreciate so that's a huge thing that we talk about a lot and definitely a mixed approach because like well I pulled everyone together and I said how bob did such a great job and I'm like did bob also curl up under his desk and hide afterwards because he was embarrassed. 

Chris: I completely agree with that they may be absolutely like literally faint because they weren't expecting this and it's true and you have to so if you're doing something celebratory like that and you have you know a good EQ and understanding you'll know how to celebrate, maybe it's a quiet meeting, just want to let you know bob good job rather than put the spotlight up and balloons come out and there's a parade and it's doing these little things will go so much further for your team than a lot of people realize doing all the little things can be so much bigger than  recognizing something that they did well.

Jaclyn: Absolutely and you know one thing just to add on that as I have coached on this a lot trained on this a lot is also tell them why that you're recognizing them or giving them credit or you know because you know the first time that am your boss or your leader or whatever comes around and says great job. I'm excited they told me great job or thank you for doing that but the next time they say great job you're like great job at what like you be very specific on what you're recognizing, so it's this the star feedback type of model it's the situation the task, the action and result when you can frame feedback or recognition in a very specific way that goes the extra mile by far because if you say great job, thank you and that's all you're just saying those words, it doesn't really do much because they don't they're like they're just a little robot.

They're just they were told that they have to thank their employees because that's what you're supposed to do as a manager nothing means you're not a leader just to do this as the manager and then but their employees aren't feeling the appreciation they're like well lord I sent them a note and said thank you. Did you tell them why you're thankful? Did you tell them why they do a great job, specifically a great job about what they did because they want to continue doing those behaviors and exercising those skills so that's what it's all about?

It's a lot of communication, a lot of the people skills, it's a lot of having empathy EQ and helping solve problems collaboratively and being flexible but being assertive when needed and having some independence where you can think on your own but you also know when to bring in other people and collaborate. so that's all about EQ and it makes a difference when people actually practice those skills. 

Chris: Yes, well said and so you are a world traveler and so you know what we're an offshore staffing company so what whatever what have you been there your thoughts or have you done some training as far as you know offshore staffing?

Jaclyn: So offshore I haven't been a part of a company where we have fully offshore something in my department however I've considered doing that with departments and really utilizing those types of services. I would say something I know we talked about I think there's a lot of misconceptions about offshoring especially in the you know CPA public accounting space and I think it's starting to where the model is becoming more to understand. We can really get some good experts and have a help us get a competitive edge within our firm and our practice and use an offshore model.

So I think that it's a model where perhaps I haven't personally used it but that I think that was starting to gain even more traction as you become more aware and educate yourself on it. It's just educating yourself the benefits and I know there's even I know you all specialize with public accountant firms but a lot of companies as you know are considering that in their accounting practices or even their internal audit functions that was something that there's a lot of people i know that are leaders of audit departments who they have a mixed team approach of having some people in the United States and some in Europe and they also offshore in some other countries, and they've been that's been a proven successful model for them. So I guess my thoughts on that have been like educating myself over the years and have seen some success stories with it and I think you know people are just you know getting more awareness of the concept. 

Chris: Yeah absolutely! In order to scale and grow you've got to have a local team but you got to have an offshore team you got to have compliments both right in order to really take off and I mean that's why in the big four that's why all these large american fortune five fortune hunter companies are all you know have offshore teams and even in India specifically simply because that's why they're behemoths right and then people like well how can I do that right and so that's where we come into play to help out and then you come into play to make sure that they're leading in the right way because they're also you can't manage the offshore team the same way your local team. I mean it's a different culture it's all virtual so that's that's a big difference right there.

Jaclyn: Yeah and I think that sometimes people forget about that and it can even whether it's another country or even like another office location in the US. It's understanding the culture, there's different cultures not only for countries but also in different offices even in your India locations I'm sure you there's some different like office cultures and you know different things that you need to be aware of and different people. How there's a lot of differences we could spend the whole afternoon. So to your point yes you gotta really understand each person and lead them differently and it doesn't matter if you're sitting shoulder to shoulder or you're sitting virtually across from them.

Chris: Yeah absolutely! All right so we're going to be winding down. This is awesome you gave a lot of good input. I really appreciate your time.  Do you have some final thoughts for our audience today? 

Jaclyn: I would just say learn about EQ, if you want to learn and grow and I always say that if you can believe, if wants to learn and grow or they think that oh I'm good, I have the technical skills that's why I'm successful and sometimes if you look through history of companies and professions, sometimes those companies do promote based on maybe they've been there and they've just they technically can do things but those people even if they're the most senior people usually aren't the leaders, they may have a title that are typically leadership titles but they aren't leaders they're not looks at to to help give advice to help really grow a company in a really effective long-term way you and can always do something I think the short term and you can survive short term and you can have a mentality where you know you have a very I'm just living to the next quarter type of mentality but that typically isn't building a great culture a bit a great environment where people are committed.

And they feel invested in and they feel like they're you know their company or their leaders or their you know their their peers care about each other and if you really have a company to be successful you want all those people to feel that way I mean not everything's rainbows and butterflies but you really want people to have that culture and it really starts with just some basic things of learn about emotional intelligence, how to be more empathetic, how to listen, more you have two years in one mouth for a reason empathy that's my biggest tip there but build those people skills build your emotional awareness learn how to express those effectively it'll help you make better decisions, it'll help you tolerate and manage stress more effectively and I guarantee you it'll give you a competitive edge to stand out no matter what profession you're in and if you're a firm if your company it'll really help take you to the next level there's so much research that proves that I have lots of case study examples if anybody wants any more information just reach out to me.

Chris: Yes absolutely this is awesome, I wish we had another hour to speak but I have to go speak with some clients now and use what I learned today to make sure I'm not sitting there like this talking to the client. So again Jaclyn Badeau of badeauconsulting.com check her out please, you learn so much this is a very important skill set to have, maybe smart but you gotta have that EQ as well.

So this will conclude #BKOT episode number 20.  Jaclyn thank you so much again, the audience, thank you for joining everybody and have a good rest of the week and weekend.

Jaclyn: Alright, Thanks Bye

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Entigrity™ is a trusted offshore staffing partner to over 500+ accountants, CPAs and tax firms across the US and Canada. Our flexible and transparent hiring model gives helps firms of all sizes to hire staff for accounting, bookkeeping, tax preparation or any other task for 75% less cost. As a firm 'run by accountants, for the accountants', Entigrity captures the hiring needs of accounting firms most precisely, providing staff that works directly under your control and management, still you are left with least to worry about compliance, payroll taxes, overheads or any other benefits.