Forbes magazine has said that in order to be prepared for jobs of the future, our children will need more than technical skills. Soft skills such as emotional intelligence, along with creativity and adaptability will be highly valued by employers in the future.
According to Forbes, “Emotional intelligence is the ability to express and control our emotions.” People who are emotionally intelligent understand that their thoughts affect their emotions which effect their behaviour. These people can manage their own emotions well and see how others are impacted by them. A fundamental aspect of EI is empathy.
Raising emotionally intelligent kids stems from teaching them emotional literacy; the ability to recognise what they feel and then express that in an appropriate way. This might be achieved by giving kids an emotional vocabulary which extends beyond the basic emotions of happy, afraid, sad and mad. Listening to the cues sent by their body, kids can understand what makes them feel the way they do and this can help them manage their behaviour.
This understanding also gives them insight into how other people feel and the way that emotions are contagious. Seeing someone else display socially inappropriate behaviour can lead to a conversation between you and your kiddo about what might be happening for that person before they acted that way. This builds compassion rather than judgement, and empathy.
Helping kids to manage their behaviour is not quick or easy. It takes work from a young age. If your child is already a teenager, it isn’t too late, though. Infact, even adults can benefit from learning about emotions. If this is something you struggle with as an adult, you can imagine how tricky it is for your kids who don’t have your experience and maturity. Modelling is a powerful teacher, so learning how to do this yourself will pay off with you kids.
We all want our kids to be successful in their lives. It seems that EI will be a desirable skill in the employment sector of the future. Do what you can while they are young to model and explicitly teach them about their emotions, and you’ll have set a good foundation for their future selves.
