A psychological blind spot is an unawareness of an aspect of one’s personality or behaviour. Coaching helps in recognising psychological blind spots as well as seeing your emotional blind spots. Dealing with a blind spot can be emotionally draining.
Our personalities/behaviors are hidden from us. So we make decisions based on biases and create comfort zones that limit our growth. Leadership development programmes aim to improve self-awareness and emotional intelligence. Leadership coaches help leaders identify and address their weaknesses from an egalitarian perspective. A psychological blind spot is an unawareness of an aspect of one’s personality or behaviour. Recognizing and dealing with a blind spot often causes emotional distress.
Good Read: Reframing the Thoughts
The wise leader can translate intention into action. He/she “makes things happen” in line with organisational goals. Psychological blind spots are the most difficult to overcome.
Leadership development and coaching help leaders overcome psychological blind spots and invisible barriers. However, senior leaders can benefit more from leadership development than junior leaders.
Self-awareness and emotional intelligence are key predictors of leadership blind spots. One study found that among all job titles, C-suite executives have the lowest average emotional intelligence. Despite this, the study found that high-EQ executives outperformed their low-EQ counterparts.
Seeing your emotional blind spots and Leadership Development
Psychological blind spots are difficult to address without outside assistance, as I have stated in my leadership development books. Soothing the ego, they fit well into a comfort zone people often find difficult to leave.
Psychological blind spots can be identified and addressed through leadership coaching.
- Increasing self-awareness and EQ
- Directly assisting executives in identifying their psychological blind spots from an egalitarian position free of authority-related bias
Intelligent leadership development is apolitical. A leader in an environment that constantly validates his/her opinions, behaviour, and personality is thus perfectly positioned to receive eye-opening insights and new perspectives.
Leaders become better versions of themselves and better able to recognise their psychological flaws as they gain self-awareness and emotional intelligence.
Executives’ psychological blind spots
Some leaders may not realise how their actions affect others. Some may feel compelled to take on challenges alone, needing to prove their leadership skills. Here are a few of the most common psychological blind spots that executives face.An executive coach helps them in – ‘seeing your emotional blind spots’
- Aversion to conflict
- ignoring commitments and others’ time/energy
- Personal agendas overriding organisational goals
- Maintaining low standards
- blaming others for failures
- Reluctant to commit or take a clear position on a controversial issue.
Leadership Coaching Addresses Blind Spots
A leadership development coach addresses these flaws by:
Identifying the invisible barriers and blind spots that impede the leader’s growth.
- Creating a written action plan detailing the coach’s, client’s, and third-party stakeholders’ improvements.
- Proposing solutions, discussing improvement methods, and securing ongoing feedback.
- Creating a plan to monitor progress and adjust course.
- Leadership coaching is not job training. Rather, it is a deliberate action to identify strengths and weaknesses and use them to create growth opportunities.
Notes on Psychological Blind Spots:
Eliminating your blind spots deliberately and carefully just serves to amplify the natural process that we all go through when life teaches us its harsh lessons. If you pursue this accelerated trip, you will learn a lot more in a shorter amount of time (although with a few more scrapes and bruises) and get a deeper level of self-awareness than you would have otherwise.
You will begin to transform just by seeing the truth about yourself without judgement or spin. It’s nearly hard to see oneself more clearly as you continue to operate without integrity or in opposition to your true purpose in life. You could eventually understand what Marianne Williamson meant when she wrote, “Our biggest dread is not that we are insufficient.” Our deepest fear is that we are incredibly strong. It’s our light, not our darkness, that scares us the most.” Recognize that you have a capacity for goodness far greater than you ever imagined, with all the immense responsibility it includes, by seeing your actual nature. It’s a challenging idea, but the view makes it all worthwhile in the end.
Citations
[1] Reference Article: SEEING YOUR EMOTIONAL BLIND SPOTS
