1. FROM COLD TO HOT:
SKILLS TO MAXIMIZE
BUSINESS IMPACT
HARNESSING THE POWER OF EMOTIONAL, RELATIONAL AND TEAM INTELLIGENCE™
Emotional, Relational & Team Intelligence

2. STUDIES HAVE
SHOWN THAT IT
TAKES MORE THAN
COGNITIVE ABILITIES
OR HIGH IQ TO
THRIVE IN BUSINESS.

3. TECHNICAL SKILLS, WHILE ALSO CRUCIAL TO ANY JOB,
don’t explain why some soar, some plateau and others
underperform in the workplace. There’s growing recognition
among business leaders, innovators, researchers and
educators that emotional, relational, and team intelligence
(ERT-i) is critical to success in personal and professional life.
Whereas hiring and training used to focus only on “cold”
intelligence like reasoning, cognition, and technical
know-how, cutting-edge research now places so-called
“hot” intelligences at the center.1 SurePeople is poised as an
industry leader mobilizing the unique interaction between
emotional, relational, and team intelligence. We’ve
developed and applied these insights to organizational
settings, and created an innovative platform and set of
assessment tools that are critical to company leadership,
management practices, and employee development.
Emotional intelligence (E-i) and crucial soft skills like
relational and team intelligence have proven to be
determining factors in career success. One study of over
300 top-level executives of leading global companies found
that emotional intelligence competencies distinguished the
best from the rest.2 Furthermore, hiring decisions that don’t
pay attention to E-i can be costly. A major firm that used
standard methods to hire division presidents found that
50% left in two years due to poor performance. When hiring
methods included attention to E-i, only 6% left within two
years and 87% of those hired with these methods were in the
top third of performers in their divisions.3 Clearly, E-i plays an
important role in employee success and productivity.
SurePeople’s innovation is to recognize that the field of
emotional intelligence needs greater clarity and definition,
and should be distinguished from important factors like
TURNOVER AT A MAJOR FIRM,
DUE TO PERFORMANCE,
TWO YEARS AFTER HIRING3
WERE THE TOP THIRD
PERFORMERS OF
THEIR DIVISION
E-i
HIRES
STANDARD
HIRES
ADDITIONALLY,
50%
6%
87%

4. relational intelligence (R-i) and team intelligence (T-i),
which are closely related and call for specific attention.
We’re pioneering integrative guidance in these three areas,
aiding individuals and organizations in understanding
their own strengths and growth points. We’ve also set out
to help companies maximize the compounding benefits
of integrating these different intelligences through a
unified platform and toolkit. By analyzing and developing
emotional, relational and team intelligence, businesses gain
a critical edge to outperform competitors and bring added
value to the market.
So what are these three categories in ERT-i and how
do they relate to each other? More importantly, why is
attention to ERT-i critical for business growth and success?
What should leaders and managers know about ERT-i
to leverage employee capacities and contributions and to
maximize team effectiveness? Finally, are these skills that
can even be acquired or improved?
This document answers these questions and provides
information about ERT-i to help you understand the role it
plays in business success. At SurePeople, we believe that
attention to ERT-i is central to developing your most crucial
business investment: people. To this asset, we bring the
power of analytics. As MIT researchers found, successful
companies are three times more likely to use analytics
than less successful competitors, and we apply that
technology to your human capital.4 Our cutting-edge tools
are designed to help you and your employees develop
awareness about ERT-i. Through our assessments,
advising, and coaching, we provide customized paths
for all members of your organization to maximize their full
potential in these critical areas, boosting your bottom line.
3×
SUCCESSFUL COMPANIES ARE THREE TIMES MORE LIKELY
TO USE ANALYTICS THAN LESS SUCCESSFUL COMPETITORS

5. SUREPEOPLE AIMS TO MAKE ITS OWN MARK
in applying insights from emotional intelligence in
the workplace. The term emotional intelligence
was introduced in scientific literature in 1990 by
psychologists Peter Salovey and John Mayer.5 They
described it as “the ability to monitor one’s own
and other’s feelings and emotions, to discriminate
among them and to use this information to guide
one’s thinking and action.”6 According to Daniel
Goleman, a pioneer in workplace emotional
intelligence research, E-i includes at least the
following aspects: self-awareness, self-regulation,
motivation, empathy and social skill.7 Other studies
add the ability to handle stress and manage change
and unpredictability as key aspects of E-i. At the
core, high E-i is about knowing how to manage
oneself, one’s emotions, and one’s interactions
with others.
Study after study has shown that high emotional
competence, like the ability to control one’s
feelings, deal with frustrations and work well with
others, is more predictive of life and workplace
Emotional Intelligence
The Hidden Edge for Your Business
success than IQ alone.8 In fact,
hiring based on perceived
intelligence/IQ, cognitive abilities, or technical
skills on their own has not proven effective.
Some studies have found that IQ accounts for as
little as 4–10% of the difference between successful
employees and underperformers.9
Poor hiring decisions can be costly and pose
challenges for HR departments. For companies
looking to attract and retain the highest quality
employees and to see their employees continue
to grow while in their organizations—attention to
E-i is crucial. It may be the single most important
predictor of employee success. As one report
notes, “people with a high degree of emotional
intelligence make more money—an average of
$29,000 more per year than people with a low
degree of emotional intelligence. The link between
emotional intelligence and earnings is so direct that
every point increase in emotional intelligence adds
$1,300 to an annual salary. These findings hold true
for people in all industries, at all levels, in every
region of the world.”10 Harnessing this employee
productivity for your business, means factoring
in E-i assessment.
Two critical aspects of emotional intelligence
are success in handling interpersonal relations
and working well in a team setting. These are
how emotional intelligence translates into
important social competencies that are at the
heart of successful organizations. SurePeople
has worked to clarify the significance of these
categories and explain how they relate to E-i.
Understanding this integration is one key to
your competitive advantage. We’ll look at both
R-i and T-i more closely in the following sections.
E-i
5

6. People with a high degree of
emotional intelligence make more
money—an average of $29,000
more per year than people
with a low degree of emotional
intelligence.... These findings hold
true for people in all industries,
at all levels, in every region of
the world.”10
6

7. AT THE CORE, HIGH E-i IS ABOUT
KNOWING HOW TO MANAGE
Oneself
One’s
emotions
One’s
interactions
with others
7

8. ONE OF SUREPEOPLE’S MANY INNOVATIONS
is to help distinguish relational intelligence (R-i)
from the broad field of emotional intelligence.
Relational Intelligence is emotional intelligence
turned outward, in an interpersonal setting. One’s
ability to recognize and handle one’s emotions
and remain motivated through setbacks translates
into how one interacts with others. High R-i
involves awareness of and sensitivity to the
emotions of others. It includes the skills necessary
to motivate and persuade others in positive and
productive ways. Attributes such as empathy,
humility, and transparency are critical here—as are
optimism and the ability to inspire enthusiasm.
High R-i has been correlated to success among
C-Suite executives, department heads and
managers, in part because employees see them
as more in tune with their concerns.11 In turn,
R-i translates into greater job satisfaction and
productivity company-wide. As one report notes,
Relational Intelligence
Leveraging Social Power in Your Company
“After supervisors in a manufacturing
plant received training in [relational]
skills such as how to listen better and help
employees resolve problems on their own,
lost-time accidents were reduced by 50 percent,
formal grievances were reduced from an average
of 15 per year to 3 per year and the plant exceeded
productivity goals by $250,000.”12 R-i also helps
employees act ethically by considering the
outcomes of their interactions with others and
remaining sensitive to the needs of colleagues.13
And as has long been recognized in sales literature,
high R-i is crucial to successful customer relations.
Being able to measure and predict employee
R-i is important to all levels of hiring. Adding
positive R-i will boost organizational morale,
communication and efficiency. Paying attention
to employee R-i means better customer service
and interface with clients and the public. It also
means more effective teamwork, which is at the
heart of almost all business activity.
50%
$
250,000
15 TO 3
AFTER SUPERVISORS
RECEIVED R-i TRAINING12
LOST-TIME ACCIDENTS REDUCED BY
PRODUCTIVITY GOALS EXCEEDED BY
YEARLY FORMAL GRIEVANCES REDUCED FROM
R-i
8

9. SUREPEOPLE HAS ALSO WORKED TO DISTINGUISH
TEAM INTELLIGENCE (T-I) from emotional and
relational intelligences. Our assessments hone in on
this critical element and highlight assets and growth
areas in your organization. T-i takes insights from
E-i and R-i and applies them in a team setting, where
specific roles and responsibilities have been defined,
and particular goals need to be achieved together.
High T-i means understanding that team dynamics
are different than working alone and that teams
can accomplish things individuals can’t. T-i is so
crucial that measures of a team’s collective aptitude
or competence reveal it to be more a function of
the social abilities of team members than their
combined IQ.14 T-i includes one’s ability to deal
with conflict, understand diverse perspectives and
opinions, establish trust, build shared meaning
and vision, and lead effectively from one’s position
on the team.15 Healthy teams create space for
constructive criticism and the honest expression of
emotions and concerns, avoiding destructive gossip
and increasing overall effectiveness.16
Team Intelligence
Maximizing Group Potential and Productivity
Highly intelligent or technically proficient
employees may never have learned how to function
well in a team setting, which can be costly. One
recent study found that even when board or C-suite
positions are filled by the most qualified individuals,
low T-i means company-wide profitability is reduced
by up to 20%.17 Not understanding team dynamics
may also contribute to employee dissatisfaction,
lowering overall productivity and retention. Another
study of 130 executives found that the major factor
influencing whether or not teammates wanted
to deal with them was not their perceived skill or
competence but rather how these leaders handled
their emotions.18
Teamwork is essential for nearly all organizations.
Companies should recognize that success in team
settings and high T-i are strongly determined by
employees’ E-i and R-i. The study of one company’s
team dynamics found that working through
emotional responses and relational tensions was
crucial to helping the team set and achieve its goals
and accurately monitor performance.19 Hiring and
ANOTHER STUDY OF 130
EXECUTIVES FOUND THAT THE
MAJOR FACTOR INFLUENCING
WHETHER OR NOT TEAMMATES
WANTED TO DEAL WITH THEM
WAS NOT THEIR PERCEIVED SKILL
OR COMPETENCE BUT RATHER
HOW THESE LEADERS HANDLED
THEIR EMOTIONS.18
T-i
training with these factors in mind is therefore
critical to employee and company success. Learning
how to manage employee ERT-i effectively is crucial
to strengthening the organization and maximizing
growth potential.
9

10. WE’VE SEEN THAT HIGH ERT-I IS CRUCIAL FOR
PERSONAL AND WORKPLACE SUCCESS. The good
news is that these skills can be measured, taught
and improved. Companies that take advantage of
the latest research and tools to do so will be the
market leaders in the coming decades.
Helping you develop these capacities in your
employees is at the heart of SurePeople’s mission.
We’ve made the assessment of ERT-i levels a
central aspect of our human analytics. We’ve
also developed an industry-leading program and
platform for customized employee development
to address each individual’s areas needing growth.
SurePeople PRISM is the most comprehensive
assessment tool in the human analytics industry.
It measures an individual’s emotional intelligence,
relational intelligence and team intelligence by
analyzing more than 50 unique traits based on
seven attributes.
Assessing these attributes in your employees
enables a better understanding of their
personalities, strengths, growth opportunities,
and capacities in ERT-i.
SurePeople PRISM and ERT-i
Your Competitive Advantage
Motivation
Conflict Management
Learning Style
Fundamental Needs
ProcessingBlueprint
Decision-making
Personality
BY MEASURING AND
ANALYZING THE ATTRIBUTES
NOTED, THE SUREPEOPLE
PRISM ASSESSMENT DELIVERS
MUCH MORE THAN AN
EMPLOYEE’S STRENGTHS AND
WEAKNESSES. IT DIGS DEEP
INTO BOTH PERSONAL AND
PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS TO
GIVE YOU ROBUST DETAILS
ABOUT AN INDIVIDUAL,
SUCH AS: WHAT TYPE OF
PERSONALITY THEY HAVE,
WHAT MOTIVATES THEM,
HOW THEY MAKE DECISIONS,
AND WHAT SOFT SKILLS
WOULD HELP THEM GROW.
THE SUREPEOPLE PRISM™
10

11. AFTER THE SUREPEOPLE PRISM ASSESSMENT,
we create a personalized curriculum from the
Training Library that addresses your employees’
strengths and growth opportunities, while
providing them with attainable goals. With an
ongoing curriculum of multimedia content,
provided by ERT-i experts and thought leaders,
your employees can grow by engaging in their
personalized curriculum.
The platform also encourages online
collaboration among colleagues while cultivating
actionable accountability and relationship
building. Managers and team members provide
feedback, recognize successes, suggest areas of
improvement and conduct assessments to help
your employees achieve their goals and reach their
full potential. In this way, not just the content but
the very nature of the platform and process itself
strengthens ERT-i. After all, growth in these critical
areas will come from action and not just simply
acquiring new information.
Awareness, Coaching
and Growth in ERT-i
EXAMPLE TOPICS
ƒƒ Active Listening
ƒƒ Constructive Criticism
ƒƒ Decision-Making
ƒƒ Embracing Change
ƒƒ Flexibility
ƒƒ Managing Differences
ƒƒ Relationship Building
ƒƒ Self-Awareness
ƒƒ Teamwork
11

12. Predictive Hiring
Maximize ERT-i Potential from the Get-Go
SUREPEOPLE’S ANALYTICS ENABLES YOU TO
MAKE THE RIGHT HIRING DECISIONS that take
ERT-i into account—which means you’re able to
leverage employee potential before they even
walk in the door. It also means the ERT-i capacities
of your organization are constantly kept in view.
Hiring can be done based on company needs
and predictive matching among employees on
the team. Gaps can be seen and potential conflicts
anticipated, enabling more effective coaching
and management. Feedback from the PRISM
assessment can help HR determine best fits and
deliver information to managers to plan effective
new-employee integration and orientation.
POWERFUL
Mission
Oriented
Relation
Oriented
Big
Picture
Detail
Oriented
ADAPTABLEPRECISE
VERSATILE POWERFUL
Mission
Oriented
Relation
Oriented
Big
Picture
Detail
Oriented
ADAPTABLEPRECISE
VERSATILE
CANDIDATE 1
PRIMARY PERSONALITY
MOTIVATOR
PRIMARY PERSONALITY
PROMOTOR
CANDIDATE 2
PRIMARY PERSONALITY COMPATABILITY 70%
12

13. Relationship Advisor
Harness R-i and T-i in Realtime
THROUGH SUREPEOPLE’S RELATIONSHIP
ADVISORY PLATFORM, you can oversee and
manage team dynamics by making decisions
based on real insights about employee R-i and T-i.
Drastically reduce productivity roadblocks that
emerge from conflict, miscommunication
and misunderstandings. Remain proactive in
establishing mutually beneficial and effective
relationships within your organization and among
PUT CUTTING EDGE MANAGEMENT TOOLS
DIRECTLY IN THE HANDS OF MANAGERS.
R-i+T-i
your teams. Put cutting edge management tools
directly in the hands of managers. Through the
rich information made available by SurePeople’s
assessment, ongoing resources by industry experts
and available advising opportunities—you’re able
to manage and direct your employees’ emotional,
relational and team intelligence. Ultimately
directing them to increasingly higher degrees
of productivity and impact.
13

14. 1 J.D. Mayer, et al. (2012, September). The Growing Significance
of Hot Intelligences. American Psychologist: 502–3.
2 L. M. Spencer, Jr. et al. (1997). Competency Assessment Methods:
History and State of the Art. Boston: Hay/McBer.
3 D. C. McClelland. (1999). Identifying competencies with
behavioral-event interviews. Psychological Science 9.5 (1999):
331–339. Cited in Cary Cherniss. (1999). The Business Case
for Emotional Intelligence. Retrieved from
http://www.eiconsortium.org/reports/business_case_for_ei.html
4 The New Intelligent Enterprise, Analytics: The New Path to Value.
Retrieved from http://sloanreview.mit.edu/feature/
report-analytics-the-new-path-to-value-executive-summary/
5 P. Salovey and J. Mayer. (1990). Emotional Intelligence.
Imagination, Cognition and Personality 9:185–211.
6 P. Salovey and P. Lopes. (2003). Emotional Intelligence. Encyclopedia
of Education. New York: Macmillan, 1191–1194. Retrieved from
http://ei.yale.edu/journal/encyclopedia-of-education/
7 Daniel Goleman (2004). What Makes a Leader?
Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from
https://hbr.org/2004/01/what-makes-a-leader
8 See, e.g., J. R. Snarey & G.E. Vaillant. (1985). How lower- and
working-class youth become middleclass adults: The association
between ego defense mechanisms and upward social mobility.
Child Development 56 (4), 899–910.
9 R. Sternberg. (1996). Successful Intelligence. New York:
Simon & Schuster. Cited in Cary Cherniss. (2000) Emotional
Intelligence: What it is and Why it Matters. Retrieved from http://
www.eiconsortium.org/reports/what_is_emotional_intelligence.html
10 T. Bradberry. (2015, January). Why You Need Emotional Intelligence
to Succeed in Business. Retrieved from
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/241998.
11 K. Simmons. (2001). Emotional Intelligence: What Smart
Managers Know. Retrieved from http://www.asaecenter.org/
Resources/articledetail.cfm?ItemNumber=13040
12 Cary Cherniss. (1999). The Business Case for Emotional Intelligence.
Retrieved from http://www.eiconsortium.org/reports/business_
case_for_ei.html; citing A. Pesuric & W. Byham. (1996, July). The new
look in behavior modeling. Training and Development, 25–33.
13 N. Pless and T. Maak. (2005). Relational Intelligence for Leading
Responsibly in a Connected World. Academy of Management
Proceedings. Retrieved from http://proceedings.aom.org/
content/2005/1/I1.11.short
14 S. Rice. (2012, October). Group Intelligence Correlates More With
Social Aptitude Than IQ. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from
https://hbr.org/2012/10/collective-intelligence-and-th
15 S. Charas. (2014). The Criticality of C-Suite Team Intelligence (TQ) in
Economic Value Creation. Retrieved from http://papers.ssrn.com/
sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2553328
16 K. Ferrazzi. (January, 2012). Candor, Criticism, Teamwork.
Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from
https://hbr.org/2012/01/candor-criticism-teamwork.
17 C. Conner. (2014). New Research: Strong Team Intelligence Equates
To High Profitability. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/
cherylsnappconner/2014/10/31/new-research-strong-tq-team-
intelligence-equates-to-high-profitability/
18 W. V. Clarke Associates. (1996). Activity Vector Analysis:
Some applications to the Concept of Emotional intelligence.
Pittsburgh, PA: Walter V. Clarke Associates.
19 J. R. Katzenbach and D. K. Smith. (1993). The Wisdom of Teams:
Creating the High-Performance Organization. Boston, MA:
Harvard Business School Press, 70.
References
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1-855-755-SURE (7873) info@surepeople.com
We make people sure of themselves, and businesses sure of their people. After
all, people are the single most important investment your business makes.
SurePeople is a human capital analytics company that utilizes qualitative and
quantitative data to provide predictive insight and decision-making support
which impacts performance, productivity and success.
The SurePeople PRISM™ assessment and our products combine to help your
business work smarter. From delivering the most comprehensive analysis of
your employees to customizing learning opportunities for their development—
we provide the insights and tools your company needs to grow.
To learn more about SurePeople, please visit www.SurePeople.com
or contact us today.