Emotional intelligence training or corporate-sponsored ableism and discrimination? Part 1 of 3

What could be wrong with emotional intelligence training or fostering a consistent company culture? Can’t everyone benefit from understanding more about emotional responses and developing empathy for others and their experiences? What’s wrong with trying to foster a culture with like-minded people that work well together? Well, lots, actually.

If you ask neurodivergent people subjected to some of these programs, you may get some insight into how they are not always what they are cracked up to be. What if I told you these training programs often perpetuate ableist views on appropriate behavior and emotional responses, ironically disregarding a large population’s emotions and triggers? Or that these programs can be weaponized against persons that have neurodivergent or cultural differences?

In this three-part series, I will discuss why emotional intelligence training programs may not practice what they preach and how these programs often discriminate against neurodivergent persons on the autism spectrum, who have ADHD, or have lived with other differences that are often invisible.

In this first part, we will discuss common myths that run rampant among emotional intelligence programs and how they can cause discrimination. In part two, we will discuss the populations with large risks of discrimination from emotional intelligence and culture training programs and how to prevent these programs from being used as ableism-based behavior admonitions. And in part three, I will help you identify problematic emotional intelligence training programs in the wild and identify how they could be better.

Emotional intelligence myths

Myth #1—Emotional intelligence and cultural-fit scores are an accurate prediction of a person’s emotional response

The types of exams that are said to measure a person’s emotional intelligence have numerous issues, but the biggest is that these measures are subjective and usually self-assessed. Some of the most manipulative and selfish people can score high on emotional intelligence exams. I’ve never heard of a cult leader that would score low on one of these exams. So, why do corporations place so much weight on their outcomes? Knowing isn’t doing. Is there an argument that you have to know before you do? Perhaps. But that leads us to our next myth.

Myth #2—Emotional intelligence and cultural fit knowledge are relevant for every person and every job

You may be able to convince me that high emotional intelligence is important for someone who works in sales, HR, counseling, marketing, or the like. However, this is because understanding emotions and navigating them is an essential aspect of accomplishing the main objectives of those roles. How can an advertisement overcome your logical reasons not to buy that expensive new laptop without tapping into your emotional responses? You can’t experience the FOMO without the emotion of fear.

But does that mean that the software engineer working on the new laptop operating system needs to have the same understanding of emotions as a person selling those laptops? Absolutely not. It is not essential for that role, just as it isn’t essential for the salesperson to know all the code used to create the operating system. So, why are companies trying to assess every employee on the same scale?

Myth #3—Emotional intelligence and cultural fit testing can prevent poor hiring choices and identify problem employees that can bring the whole team down

Nope. Just nope. In my experience, most poor hiring experiences have been because too much emphasis has been put on cultural and interpersonal skills. I can tell you, that I’ve never failed a culture test during an interview process, and I’ve been hired at jobs where I was not culturally fit. Usually, these types of interviews and assessments are used to weed out applicants that would otherwise be qualified. Still, for one reason or another, the hiring manager doesn’t think they will fit.

Have you ever heard of a manager wanting to hire someone, but alas, they failed the company culture interview? Nope, me either. Have you heard of a more qualified candidate being rejected because they “weren’t a cultural fit”? Yeah—me too—many times. Totally a coincidence the rejected candidate that was “not a cultural fit” also happened to be a person of color or the better-qualified candidate over the hiring manager’s best friend’s daughter. Pure coincidence…

In this same line of excuse development lies the lack of cultural fit or emotional intelligence as a reason to terminate the employment of someone who would otherwise be considered a great employee. “The team doesn’t like working with her. She’s difficult and too rigid in her principles. I’m tired of having to mediate disagreements between her and her other teammates…” Perhaps the person has many disagreements with how her team works, but is the person the problem? If she’s the only one complaining, it may seem obvious. However, many things can be the problem—including the culture itself. It takes independent investigation, but this rarely happens.

Myth #4—Emotional intelligence and workplace culture training can fix inappropriate behavior

I saved this one for last because it is the most egregious, in my opinion. Many people that are subjected to these types of training programs are done so in an attempt to fix what they deem as inappropriate. I’ve found that often, what is called inappropriate is determined through subjective reasoning.

To be clear, I’m not talking about harmful behaviors. If someone is purposely bullying or sexually harassing someone, they need to be fired. If someone is engaging in problematic behaviors sub-consciously, it may be worth training to correct the behavior. An example of this type of behavior is a manager consistently assigning males as project leads and females in supporting roles. Maybe alerting them of the trends of their decisions may result in them checking their implicit bias, or maybe not. That type of behavior is harmful to others and can subject the company to lawsuits.

This becomes a problem when behaviors that are not directly related to job performance are used as justification for intervention. This can be something like not smiling or laughing at jokes, not attending after-work functions, or expressing frustration when a project’s scope changes suddenly.

Some of you may be thinking, “Wait, if they don’t get along with everyone, that can harm their ability to do their job!” I can understand that sentiment, but for the most part, I disagree. There are some ways to determine if a problem really exists. In the next part of this series, I will go through how to identify if a person’s behavior is a problem or if it is the expectation of a person’s behavior that is the problem. Stay tuned for part 2 next week!