Mindful meditation has been discovered to foster the ability to inhibit those very quick emotional impulses.

If your emotional abilities aren't in hand, if you don't have self-awareness, if you are not able to manage your distressing emotions, if you can't have empathy and have effective relationships, then no matter how smart you are, you are not going to get very far.

Teachers need to be comfortable talking about feelings. This is part of teaching emotional literacy - a set of skills we can all develop, including the ability to read, understand, and respond appropriately to one's own emotions and the emotions of others.

The emotional brain responds to an event more quickly than the thinking brain.

Emotional intelligence does not mean merely "being nice". At strategic moment it may demand not "being nice", but rather, for example, bluntly confronting someone with an uncomfortable but consequential truth they've been avoiding.

In the new workplace, with its emphasis on flexibility, teams and a strong customer orientation, this crucial set of emotional competencies is becoming increasingly essential for excellence in every job in every part of the world,