Get Smart

Business owners need to embrace digital intelligence

By Andrea Hill

I remember reading Daniel Goleman’s book, “Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ” clearly. It was 1995, I was president of an apparel firm with nearly 1,000 employees, and I frequently dealt with problems caused by managers who had low emotional intelligence (EQ). I read the book in one sitting and then bought it for my management team, and we read it together book-club style. Over the next 10 years, EQ became an important part of the management lexicon—the subject of training programs, consulting contracts, TED talks, and annual performance reviews.

Not that we’ve solved the problem of low EQ yet (and I sincerely doubt it can be eradicated like polio through injections of training), but now there’s a new Q on the block: digital intelligence (DQ). And every business owner, manager, and professional needs to know what it is and how to increase it.