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Raman Chadha Empowers Entrepreneurs Through Emotional Intelligence
File this one under "things you don't want to hear while recording a podcast entitled #WeGotGoals":
We've actually stopped using the word "goal" at The Junto Institute.
"Cool, cool," I thought to myself, as I mentally face-palmed during my interview with Raman Chadha of The Junto Institute. "This is fine. Everything is fine."
Chuckling a little at my dismay, Chadha went on to explain that his team had shifted towards using the word "priority" in place of goal. They'd found that their apprentices viewed goals as "far out in the distance," while priorities had a greater connotation of urgency, and gave their apprentices something to work on that very day.
The language nerd in me sat with that thought for the rest of the day, debating the hidden meanings of goal versus priority, and how using one word over the other shifted your focus on a daily, weekly or annual basis.
It's what I call a "fuzzy concept" - an idea that you can grasp, but that doesn't always have tangible, actionable deliverables attached to it. And fittingly, that's exactly what Raman Chadha specializes in every day.
As the co-founder of The Junto Institute, a leadership revenue accelerator for growth stage companies, Chadha helps leaders and entrepreneurs improve their leadership skills and their companies' bottom lines by developing emotional intelligence skills, which they then apply to their companies for a higher probability of success.
And as anyone who watched Nick Viall's season of The Bachelor knows, emotional intelligence is another fuzzy concept that's difficult to understand, let alone apply in a high-stress environment like a growth stage company. (FYI, Chadha and Junto define emotional intelligence as "the ability to recognize and regulate the emotions in ourselves and in others, and how we use that information/data to guide our thinking, actions and behaviors by progressing through self awareness, self management, social awareness and relationship management.)
The Junto Institute is based on the belief that emotional intelligence is the single biggest contributor to leadership effectiveness and job performance - crucial factors for growth stage companies in the "sink or swim" phase of entrepreneurship.
Chadha also highlighted two common traits of leaders that he's observed throughout his time working with entrepreneurs: tenacity and the ability to cope with ambiguity, uncertainty and chaos.
"In entrepreneurship, there are more lows than there are highs," Chadha said. "So [you need] the ability to bounce back on a regular basis, the ability to power through a rough day."
Similarly, since no two days of running a company are the same, you need to get comfortable with the unknown and operating without a fully-fleshed out path of how you'll get from Point A to Point B.
For those of us not at the helm of a growing company, we can still develop emotional intelligence in our everyday lives. One specific way to do that: work on becoming increasingly aware of how you're feeling in as many moments as possible throughout the day.
Try it right now: how are you feeling? Push yourself further than "fine," "tired," "happy" or any other generic adjectives; try using the most specific word you can find (need inspo? Check out this emotion wheel for ideas). By becoming uber-familiar with your own emotions and feelings, you develop self-awareness AND empathy for those around you (which in turn helps you become a more effective leader).
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Show transcription:
JAC: Welcome to #WeGotGoals, a podcast by aSweatLife.com on which we talk to high achievers about their goals. I'm Jeana Anderson Cohen; with me I have Cindy Kuzma and Kristen Geil.
KG: Hi Jeana.
JAC: Good morning Kristen. You talked to Raman this week, right?
KG: I spoke with Raman, who founded the Junto Institute, which is a really interesting company here in Chicago that helps growth stage startup companies and takes their leaders and their key employees and helps them develop their emotional intelligence skills through a sort of nine month cohort program. So it's really interesting because they're learning about their emotional intelligence, how it's important in the workplace, how to become better leaders and better read the emotions of other people—which is a very what I call a fuzzy goal right? It's much more of a process oriented goal. But he and his co-founder have found that in doing so they're really helping these companies with their outcome oriented goals, you know, increasing their bottom line and improving their profitability and lowering employee turnover. So I thought it was really interesting, the juxtaposition of the vagueness and sort of intangible quality that I think of emotional intelligence as and how it contrasts with the black and white numbers on a page.
CK: And he had some really interesting insights about how this applies on a personal level too. Right. And I loved his tangible tip for squaring up with someone when you're listening to them. What else did you get out of that transition from what they do on a corporate level to how you can apply things like this to your personal life?
KG: Yeah, one of the things Raman talked about that I love and like, need to apply more in my everyday life is just the practice of being self-aware, really being aware of how you're feeling in every moment. And he pointed to the use of something called an emotions wheel. Where, instead of just saying yeah I'm doing fine when someone asks how you are you can use this emotions we to actually point to a very specific adjective whether it's tense, surprised, excited. And that really helps you ground yourself in your emotions and in turn prompts the other person to be more empathetic which I think is great just being a little more in tune with your emotions through the power of language. He also talked about the skill of listening and how you can become a better listener and how important that is with leaders especially. And he gave some really tangible takeaways through just making eye contact putting down your device squaring your hips pointing your toes in your knees towards the person that you are paying attention to, all these small non-verbal cues that really signal to the person you're having a conversation with: You have my entire attention, I am focused on you. Let's go.
JAC: And so these skills that he's teaching others and practicing himself haven't always been sort of a part of his life. He learned them along the way. Can you talk a little bit about that?
KG: Yeah. One of the things that we talked about I asked about qualities and personality traits that are common in leaders. And he immediately pointed to tenacity and in a sense being comfortable being uncomfortable right? Being comfortable with that you might not know the exact outcome of a situation. And he said that these traits can be both inherent, he's seen them straight up and people. Or you can work to develop them over time and how that sometimes happens with certain sort of entrepreneurs. He pointed to himself—he said he didn't think that he had always been a tenacious personality but he learned it just by getting thrown in the fire over and over again and realizing, hey, this is a situation where I can't give up, I have to persevere. And in that way he was able to develop a certain personality trait which not everyone thinks is possible.
CK: Well it was a fascinating conversation and I'm can't wait for everyone to hear it. So here is Kristin with Raman.
KG: Welcome to #WeGotGoals. I'm Kristen Geil here with Raman of the Junto Institute. Hi Raman.
RC: Hi Kristen.
KG: Raman, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what the Junto Institute does and your role in it?
RC: Well I'm a lifelong Chicagoan; went to college here at the University of Illinois, went to Kellogg for my MBA. I've spent my entire career in Chicago. I founded the Junto Institute in 2012 with my co-founder Catherine. The Junto Institute is a leadership and revenue accelerator for growth stage companies, and we believe that companies and their leaders can become infinitely better at who they are and what they do through developing skills that relate to emotional intelligence and business savvy and so we designed a program through which they can learn those and ultimately apply them to their companies for a higher probability of success.
KG: On the #WeGotGoals podcast we start off by asking a couple big questions of every one of our guests. First one, and we'll start with thatm is what is a big goal that you've achieved in the past? And why was it so important to you and how did you get there?
RC: Yeah that's a really interesting question. I don't know if I can say that I've had a big goal that I wanted to achieve but one thing that I'm very proud of recently is, my wife and I have two daughters 19 and 17. And about 20 years ago I remember sitting on the couch when we were expecting her first child. And I read a column that described the difference between career oriented families and family oriented families and asked my wife what she wanted us to have. And she said family oriented and I said, me as well. Didn't mean that we weren't going to have successful careers or want to have successful careers it was just which one were we going to choose over the other. And at the time I remember saying to her, we're only going to have 18 years to be parents but we have our whole lives to build, so ...
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File this one under "things you don't want to hear while recording a podcast entitled #WeGotGoals":
We've actually stopped using the word "goal" at The Junto Institute.
"Cool, cool," I thought to myself, as I mentally face-palmed during my interview with Raman Chadha of The Junto Institute. "This is fine. Everything is fine."
Chuckling a little at my dismay, Chadha went on to explain that his team had shifted towards using the word "priority" in place of goal. They'd found that their apprentices viewed goals as "far out in the distance," while priorities had a greater connotation of urgency, and gave their apprentices something to work on that very day.
The language nerd in me sat with that thought for the rest of the day, debating the hidden meanings of goal versus priority, and how using one word over the other shifted your focus on a daily, weekly or annual basis.
It's what I call a "fuzzy concept" - an idea that you can grasp, but that doesn't always have tangible, actionable deliverables attached to it. And fittingly, that's exactly what Raman Chadha specializes in every day.
As the co-founder of The Junto Institute, a leadership revenue accelerator for growth stage companies, Chadha helps leaders and entrepreneurs improve their leadership skills and their companies' bottom lines by developing emotional intelligence skills, which they then apply to their companies for a higher probability of success.
And as anyone who watched Nick Viall's season of The Bachelor knows, emotional intelligence is another fuzzy concept that's difficult to understand, let alone apply in a high-stress environment like a growth stage company. (FYI, Chadha and Junto define emotional intelligence as "the ability to recognize and regulate the emotions in ourselves and in others, and how we use that information/data to guide our thinking, actions and behaviors by progressing through self awareness, self management, social awareness and relationship management.)
The Junto Institute is based on the belief that emotional intelligence is the single biggest contributor to leadership effectiveness and job performance - crucial factors for growth stage companies in the "sink or swim" phase of entrepreneurship.
Chadha also highlighted two common traits of leaders that he's observed throughout his time working with entrepreneurs: tenacity and the ability to cope with ambiguity, uncertainty and chaos.
"In entrepreneurship, there are more lows than there are highs," Chadha said. "So [you need] the ability to bounce back on a regular basis, the ability to power through a rough day."
Similarly, since no two days of running a company are the same, you need to get comfortable with the unknown and operating without a fully-fleshed out path of how you'll get from Point A to Point B.
For those of us not at the helm of a growing company, we can still develop emotional intelligence in our everyday lives. One specific way to do that: work on becoming increasingly aware of how you're feeling in as many moments as possible throughout the day.
Try it right now: how are you feeling? Push yourself further than "fine," "tired," "happy" or any other generic adjectives; try using the most specific word you can find (need inspo? Check out this emotion wheel for ideas). By becoming uber-familiar with your own emotions and feelings, you develop self-awareness AND empathy for those around you (which in turn helps you become a more effective leader).
---
Show transcription:
JAC: Welcome to #WeGotGoals, a podcast by aSweatLife.com on which we talk to high achievers about their goals. I'm Jeana Anderson Cohen; with me I have Cindy Kuzma and Kristen Geil.
KG: Hi Jeana.
JAC: Good morning Kristen. You talked to Raman this week, right?
KG: I spoke with Raman, who founded the Junto Institute, which is a really interesting company here in Chicago that helps growth stage startup companies and takes their leaders and their key employees and helps them develop their emotional intelligence skills through a sort of nine month cohort program. So it's really interesting because they're learning about their emotional intelligence, how it's important in the workplace, how to become better leaders and better read the emotions of other people—which is a very what I call a fuzzy goal right? It's much more of a process oriented goal. But he and his co-founder have found that in doing so they're really helping these companies with their outcome oriented goals, you know, increasing their bottom line and improving their profitability and lowering employee turnover. So I thought it was really interesting, the juxtaposition of the vagueness and sort of intangible quality that I think of emotional intelligence as and how it contrasts with the black and white numbers on a page.
CK: And he had some really interesting insights about how this applies on a personal level too. Right. And I loved his tangible tip for squaring up with someone when you're listening to them. What else did you get out of that transition from what they do on a corporate level to how you can apply things like this to your personal life?
KG: Yeah, one of the things Raman talked about that I love and like, need to apply more in my everyday life is just the practice of being self-aware, really being aware of how you're feeling in every moment. And he pointed to the use of something called an emotions wheel. Where, instead of just saying yeah I'm doing fine when someone asks how you are you can use this emotions we to actually point to a very specific adjective whether it's tense, surprised, excited. And that really helps you ground yourself in your emotions and in turn prompts the other person to be more empathetic which I think is great just being a little more in tune with your emotions through the power of language. He also talked about the skill of listening and how you can become a better listener and how important that is with leaders especially. And he gave some really tangible takeaways through just making eye contact putting down your device squaring your hips pointing your toes in your knees towards the person that you are paying attention to, all these small non-verbal cues that really signal to the person you're having a conversation with: You have my entire attention, I am focused on you. Let's go.
JAC: And so these skills that he's teaching others and practicing himself haven't always been sort of a part of his life. He learned them along the way. Can you talk a little bit about that?
KG: Yeah. One of the things that we talked about I asked about qualities and personality traits that are common in leaders. And he immediately pointed to tenacity and in a sense being comfortable being uncomfortable right? Being comfortable with that you might not know the exact outcome of a situation. And he said that these traits can be both inherent, he's seen them straight up and people. Or you can work to develop them over time and how that sometimes happens with certain sort of entrepreneurs. He pointed to himself—he said he didn't think that he had always been a tenacious personality but he learned it just by getting thrown in the fire over and over again and realizing, hey, this is a situation where I can't give up, I have to persevere. And in that way he was able to develop a certain personality trait which not everyone thinks is possible.
CK: Well it was a fascinating conversation and I'm can't wait for everyone to hear it. So here is Kristin with Raman.
KG: Welcome to #WeGotGoals. I'm Kristen Geil here with Raman of the Junto Institute. Hi Raman.
RC: Hi Kristen.
KG: Raman, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what the Junto Institute does and your role in it?
RC: Well I'm a lifelong Chicagoan; went to college here at the University of Illinois, went to Kellogg for my MBA. I've spent my entire career in Chicago. I founded the Junto Institute in 2012 with my co-founder Catherine. The Junto Institute is a leadership and revenue accelerator for growth stage companies, and we believe that companies and their leaders can become infinitely better at who they are and what they do through developing skills that relate to emotional intelligence and business savvy and so we designed a program through which they can learn those and ultimately apply them to their companies for a higher probability of success.
KG: On the #WeGotGoals podcast we start off by asking a couple big questions of every one of our guests. First one, and we'll start with thatm is what is a big goal that you've achieved in the past? And why was it so important to you and how did you get there?
RC: Yeah that's a really interesting question. I don't know if I can say that I've had a big goal that I wanted to achieve but one thing that I'm very proud of recently is, my wife and I have two daughters 19 and 17. And about 20 years ago I remember sitting on the couch when we were expecting her first child. And I read a column that described the difference between career oriented families and family oriented families and asked my wife what she wanted us to have. And she said family oriented and I said, me as well. Didn't mean that we weren't going to have successful careers or want to have successful careers it was just which one were we going to choose over the other. And at the time I remember saying to her, we're only going to have 18 years to be parents but we have our whole lives to build, so ...