Because EI is just as valuable as IQ.

All providers in your practice are smart — after all, there is a threshold of intelligence quotient (IQ) necessary for entrance into the field. However, I have always felt fortunate to barely cross that threshold and rely instead on emotional intelligence (EI) to help create a thriving practice.

Simply put, sometimes being very smart has its limits. Always being right is not always right. So, if your EI seriously lags your IQ, it’s worthwhile to try to narrow the gap.

Providers know how to find and memorize facts; we rely on numbers that do not lie. However, how we react today while we relate to patients and staff will define our career in the end. The noise around us — a pandemic, inflation, market downturns and social division — all get mixed in the daily grind with added distractions due to the speed of information delivered right to our palm. Often, we are easily hijacked by our emotions, which leads to poor decisions. This presents a challenge even the highest IQ provider may fail to recognize.

MY LEARNING EXPERIENCE

I recall one horrible, no good, terrible day. Surgery was going well, my staff remained amazing, but it seemed like the workflow broke down. No, it felt like it crumbled to ashes. I thought I knew the reasons: anesthesia not interviewing a case ahead of time, IVs slow to start and stretchers not cleaned fast enough for the next patient. I felt frustrated, so I grabbed our nurse manager and started “fixing it” on the spot.

That was a big mistake. The only thing I managed in the heat of the moment was to damage some key staff relationships.

A few days later, reflection on this experience motived me to implement a better strategy: Instead of reacting in the moment, I set up a meeting the next day to empower the team by asking them to identify our problems and offer solutions. This way, I could contribute to the conversation to finalize a strategy.

I learned by listening that horrible, no-good day included so many pieces of the flow algorithm that I had not considered. It was only by listening to my team and letting some time pass to process what I’d learned that I was able to truly comprehend the situation.

SELF-AWARENESS = SELF-CONTROL

Daniel Goleman, PhD, author of Emotional Intelligence, outlines why EI can matter more than IQ. If you can develop an ability to recognize early signs of emotions, he explains, you can more intelligently manage your reaction and decisions.

It all starts with self-awareness — understanding what and why you feel this emotion and how it is impacting your thoughts and triggering impulses. Gaining self-awareness will allow you to delay acting on your emotions. In fact, maturity is the widening of the gap between emotions and action.

BUILD EI INTO YOUR PRACTICE

Consider weekly meetings that encourage your team to implement EI. I make a list of my “concerns” and “next great ideas” as I work, knowing I’ll have a chance to share them each Tuesday at 4 p.m. By the time of the meeting, my list is 80% shorter and I didn’t interrupt my workflow or the staff’s while I turned things over in my mind.

This strategy goes both up and down the ranks. Staff will hold off on (most) complaints and new ideas until I meet with them weekly. Knowing they have that opportunity relieves anxiety and proves to them that they have a voice in our practice.

We don’t think of ourselves as overreacting or making rash decisions … often. Sometimes it seems that reacting with passion motivates worthwhile changes. However, providers with high EI will allow themselves to feel the emotion and process it before they react with sound choices.

It is important to note that the goal is not to shut down the emotion you are experiencing but rather harness it to drive sound decisions. The operational definition of resilience is how quickly you recover from an emotional event.

REAL-LIFE STRATEGY

One example from my clinical practice: We were receiving constant negative feedback from cataract patients with regard to postoperative drops. As cataract volume increased, so did my patients’ concerns due to the cost of postoperative drops, compliance and side effects. There were constant calls from pharmacies and families, overwhelming my staff. Postop day one visits left patients anxious and confused about drop regimens despite instructions with color pictures and charts. I became locked in on the negative impact.

Again, what is needed is a plan to process this emotion — not only to allow time from emotion to action but also to create an opportunity to focus on creating solutions. I take my problems to the pool. While swimming laps, I hyper focus on problems or ideas. I use this as an opportunity to workshop solutions and generate ideas with no distractions. Sometimes I would take a break from swimming laps to jot down ideas on paper with the pen I left on the pool deck.

In fact, my problem with postop drops was solved in the pool. I recalled articles by researchers in Europe and Asia that support drop-free surgery along with an article written by a key opinion leader 20 years earlier supporting sub-tenons Kenalog at the conclusion of cataract surgery. Next, I held a journal club for peer review of these articles, which led to the creation of a generic drop-free protocol.

Employing EI turned a stressful situation into a positive, drop-free cataract surgery benefiting my patients, staff and overall practice. In fact, this harnessing of EI accelerated my cataract surgical growth as many new cataract surgery consults come to my office because they want drop-free surgery.

A provider’s day can quickly become overwhelming. One can be bombarded with problems from either patients or staff, have complex medical issues to resolve or workflow barriers affecting care, just to name a few possibilities. This is all to be expected. However, it is your perception and action that will define your career.

Developing and then leveraging EI is a crucial tool to help elevate a provider’s personal and professional satisfaction. OM

Scott LaBorwit, MD, is a principal at Select Eye Care, with locations in Towson and Elkridge, Md., and is an assistant professor, part-time faculty, at Wilmer Eye Clinic of Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore. His e-mail is Sel104@me.com.
Disclosures: Dr. LaBorwit is a consultant to and speaker for Alcon.