by Feeling unsure how to stay emotionally connected in a world increasingly driven by AI? Wondering how to preserve your authenticity and human touch while embracing powerful new technologies?
In this article, you'll discover how to integrate emotional intelligence with AI tools.
IQ vs. EQ and Why Emotional Intelligence Matters to Marketers in an AI-Driven World
As more marketers and entrepreneurs integrate artificial intelligence (AI) into their daily work, we're increasingly competing with other humans using AI, making our emotional intelligence the key differentiator that sets us apart in an environment of AI sameness.
Without the emotional context that humans provide, AI's potential remains limited.
While AI is becoming increasingly human-like, it is not emotionally intelligent. It cannot navigate complex human interactions. For example, it can't replace us in the offline world–the sphere where we build networks, establish trust, and create meaningful human bonds.
Claire Bouvier frames the importance of emotional intelligence for marketers with a powerful statement. She says data wins minds, but empathy wins wallets.
In a business context, intelligence might mean knowing demographics and data, while emotional intelligence provides value beyond those numbers, helping us understand our customers' deeper motivations. Intelligence helps us know who buys, while emotional intelligence helps us understand why they buy.
How to Combine AI's Intelligence With Human Emotions to Improve Business Results
Emotional intelligence can be applied in many situations – from dealing with angry customers to motivating team members.
#1: Start With the Enneagram for Emotional Intelligence Insights
The Enneagram categorizes people into nine basic personality types with distinct motivations, fears, and behavior patterns. Each Enneagram type is identified by a primary number with a wing.
Understanding your Enneagram type can provide valuable insights into your natural tendencies, strengths, and blind spots.
For example, Michael Stelzner is an 8w7. His personality type 8indicates strong leadership qualities, and his 7 wing indicates enthusiastic tendencies. Type 8s tend to prefer moving quickly and value progress over operational processes, sometimes resulting in a lack of repeatable systems. Understanding this facet of his personality, he has intentionally surrounded himself with operationally-minded individuals.
The Enneagram can be especially valuable when navigating workplace dynamics, customer relationships, and personal interactions.
If you don't know your Enneagram type, you can take an online test to learn your type.
#2: Use AI With Your Enneagram Type for Personalized Business Strategy Advice
Open your preferred AI tool and tell it about your business. Then, give it context about you using your Enneagram type. From there, you can have a back-and-forth conversation with the AI to learn how to approach various scenarios successfully.
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GET THE DETAILSThe AI will ask a series of follow-up questions.
While many people use AI for surface-level help, like writing emails, Claire believes starting with your fundamental concerns allows AI to provide more meaningful assistance rather than just tactical help.
For example, Claire was previously chasing small clients and wasn't seeing much success in her business. When she combined her personality test results with her business and operations details, she received a new plan she had never considered before. This gave her a new perspective, leading her to try new approaches and previously untapped communication channels. Although initially uncomfortable, this new direction led to much larger contracts and work that better aligned with her strengths. Recognizing her limitations, she brought on an operations-focused project manager.
You are a business growth strategist who understands the Enneagram. I am an 8w7. I am struggling to acquire larger clients, which is making it difficult to scale. Based on my personality, why am I struggling to scale my business?
#3: Use AI With Your Team Member's Enneagram Type to Improve Role Satisfaction
When Claire hired for her project manager role, she chose someone with excellent attention to detail.
Through the Enneagram, Claire discovered this person was an Enneagram 2 whose primary motivation didn't mirror Claire's motivation of hitting scorecard metrics or making more money. Instead, the motivation was helping others, and this team member needed to understand why she was doing each task and how it helped deliver on the business's mission.
Based on this insight, Claire changed her approach to emphasize the purpose behind each task and how it contributed to their company mission of helping small and medium businesses with AI. This adjustment transformed their working relationship.
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GET YOUR TICKETS—SAVE $300You are a business growth strategist who understands the Enneagram. I am an 8w7, and my operations manager is a 2w3. How can I best communicate tasks to my manager so that she is properly motivated to complete them?
#4: Use AI to Discern a Client's or Contact's Enneagram Type for Improved Communications
What if you don't know someone's Enneagram type? In these cases, Claire recommends observing behavioral patterns and taking notes. Then, you can ask AI to review your notes and indicate possible Enneagram types.
Alternatively, you can ask AI to analyze someone's LinkedIn profile or writing style.
While these approaches won't give you refined results, you can use them to craft more effective communications. For example:
You are a business growth strategist who understands the Enneagram. I am reaching out to a cold prospect. Assuming this person is a 5w6, how should I write a cold outreach email to introduce myself and my business to them?
#5: Test, Learn, and Adapt
Once you've gained insights from combining AI and Enneagram understanding, Claire emphasizes that the next step is execution.
Rather than treating AI outputs as definitive answers, Claire advocates for testing ideas in the real world, observing results, and refining approaches based on human feedback.
While AI can provide valuable suggestions, many nuances become apparent only when ideas are implemented and results are tracked.
While many people intuitively try different approaches, quantifying and tracking results makes a significant difference. This is particularly valuable in marketing and business contexts, where understanding the emotional components of messaging can unlock powerful results.
Tips for Using AI with Emotional Intelligence
Claire referenced several key principles that help her maintain emotional intelligence while embracing AI in her work:
- Apply Ethical Boundaries and Personal Guidelines: Alongside her extensive use of AI, Claire maintains personal boundaries and a list of activities for which she won't use AI based on her own ethical guardrails. She shared that she used AI to help her develop these guidelines, creating a thoughtful framework for responsible use.
- Use AI as an Enhancer, Not a Replacement: Claire consistently positions AI as a tool that enhances human capabilities rather than replacing them. She emphasizes that AI allows us to be more human by handling tasks that drain our creative energy.
- Balance Digital With Real-World Connection: Claire emphasizes that her AI use has “unlocked all my offline worlds,” – showing that effective AI use should enhance rather than diminish genuine human relationships.
- Don't Limit Yourself to One AI Model: Claire uses multiple AI platforms based on their unique strengths. She knows “exactly what each one has personality-wise” and has “memorized a bank of models” that fit her workflow. By understanding each model's unique capabilities, she selects the right tool for each task rather than trying to make one system handle everything.
Claire Bouvier is an AI strategist who helps businesses improve their operations with AI. She is the co-founder of BriteLite and hosts the Human-first AI podcast. Follow her on LinkedIn.
Other Notes From This Episode
- Connect with Michael Stelzner @Stelzner on Facebook and @Mike_Stelzner on X.
- Watch this interview and other exclusive content from Social Media Examiner on YouTube.
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