The University of Sydney's Lazar Stankov, who has co-written a paper criticising EI, says giving that sort of test is like asking someone if they are intelligent. Goleman concedes that emotions cannot be measured with the same degree of accuracy, but so what. You can measure it enough to know what needs changing. IQ doesn't change too much. If you have an IQ of 140 as a kid, you'll basically be in that range for the rest of your life.
Emotional intelligence is learned and learnable, it's fluid.
Whatever Kerry Packer's strengths as a businessman, he is not renowned for being warm and fuzzy. Goleman has now extended his model to mapping leadership styles. Now, that's another lucrative field for those handing out management advice. The best leaders, he said, did not rely on one style and used most of them in a given week, much like the way a professional golfer would use an array of clubs depending on the demands of a particular shot. Trouble is, emotions are not golf clubs, just as human beings are complex creatures who are not the sum of their parts.