What is Beyond Emotional Intelligence?

To economic globalization, to the rapidity of the transformations due to the massive mass-media expansion, human globalization has been added, in the sense that human actions, wherever they are born and take place, determine effects even in the most distant areas of the world. Everything that happens now concerns us and, especially in this period, we need to be aware that we live in a world in constant evolution. For example, the opportunity to meet new people is an alternative that will characterize our life more and more.

Sometimes we believe that having shared our time and affinities with some people, we don’t need to know any new ones. We also believe that, when we reach a certain age, we can no longer meet new or different people, since everything around us is now organized and planned.

Apart from the fact that one day we may even begin to disown certain people because we realize that they no longer have anything to do with us, with our values, interests, and our way of planning life, we must always look forward. because meeting different people can enrich and broaden our point of view.

Of course, there are people with whom we have traveled a whole path, fundamental pieces of our life, without whom we would not understand our past well enough. The influence of their behavior, their words, and even their gestures were decisive for us.

However, for one reason or another, some people in our circle may disappear, move away or simply reduce the intensity of the bond they had with us, it is life. Changes along the way are essential to the journey we take.

Thus, our circle of people varies with the passage of time, just like our tastes and attitudes. For this reason, the adventure of meeting new people never ends. There are many different people waiting to meet other different people with whom to get along, share experiences, knowledge.

A premise perhaps too long, but I think it can help to better explain my thinking: relationships are an important part of our private and professional life and this has given rise to a large literature on emotional intelligence, but very little is said about cultural intelligence, which has become increasingly important over time.

Emotional intelligence is considered a useful skill for perceiving, assimilating, understanding, and regulating one’s emotions and those of others, which promotes emotional and intellectual growth.

It is from this information that we interpret the world around us, which determines our way of thinking and behaving. It is usually considered very important when it comes to interpersonal relationships. So we must remember that, when relationships are established with people of a different culture, then it is also necessary to consider another type of intelligence: cultural intelligence: the ability to adapt when interacting with people from different cultures.

Cultural intelligence has four components.

• The motivational component, which emphasizes the intrinsic interest in learning about other cultures and interacting with different people. That desire to know and understand different things.
• The cognitive component, which deals with the knowledge of the rules of the other culture.
• The metacognitive component, which refers to transcultural awareness, that is, the ability to understand cultural aspects when a person makes judgments about his own thinking and that of others and, above all, understanding the ideas of others starting from their culture.
• The behavioral component, which refers to the ability to speak and gesticulate correctly according to the rules of the other culture. The same behavior is not always perceived in the same way by different cultures.

Perhaps, in this era characterized by globalization, to the insistence on the need to develop emotional intelligence, we should add the learning of cultural intelligence, that is, the ability to relate and operate effectively in culturally different contexts, so as to better understand other cultures and, in the end, get to know each other better, because knowing the other is nothing more than knowing oneself.

Improved technology has allowed many companies to operate internationally. As these companies have entered foreign markets, the need for cultural sensitivity among workers has increased. Cultural diversity is therefore a reality of the globalized world. It pervades every sphere of contemporary life. In particular

The QC Model is scientifically based and suggests the path to follow to manage communication and promote effective relationships within multicultural contexts.

Evaluating Cultural Intelligence means obtaining:

• A profound awareness of one’s “diversity”
• The ability to recognize differences and change behavior
• The ability to communicate effectively with “the other” without compromising one’s core values
• The tools to improve communication with anyone who can be identified as “different” from the usual environment.

We encounter cultural diversity especially in multicultural environments or when we operate (work, study or relate) in another country. But these are not the only areas, cultural diversity is also “domestic”. Cultural Intelligence is a transversal skill that is not only needed by multinational executives or those who work with foreigners and immigrants: in a globalized and at the same time diversified world like ours, we encounter cultural diversity on a daily basis.

In fact, cultural intelligence also helps us to undermine any risk of xenophobic, racist, ethnocentric temptations and any religious fundamentalism, positions that make peaceful and democratic coexistence increasingly difficult.

We are carriers of generational, professional, national differences. Our ways can sometimes lead to conflict. And mutual understanding doesn’t always happen without conscious effort. Getting to know other cultures, to understand that “diversity” must be a source of wealth and not a reason for marginalization.