• Ethical Training Home
• Ethics: What and Why
• Theories of Ethics
• Ethics in Indian Country
• Traditional Ethics
• Modern Indian Ethics
• SLC Research
• Myths of Ethical Change
• Moral Collapse
• The By-Stander
• Emotional Intelligence
  • Abuse & Fear
  • Your Turn
  • Abuse & Anger
  • Avoiding Abuse
  • Reducing Anger
  • Criticism or Attack
  • Learn More
• Joe Tribal Worker
• Susie Sainte
• Positive Ethics
• Action Plans

Ethics in the Workplace: Emotional Intelligence

Two other signs of ethical collapse Jennings identifies are an arrogant, autocratic CEO and a loss of human dignity in the organization. For example, the CEO of HealthSouth, one of the major corporations that had ethical and financial problems, was fond of responding to explanations from his staff with,

"That's the stupidest thing I ever heard!"

Question: Why do people not say no? Why do smart people do unethical things? To answer these questions, it is time to go back to theories, this time to theories of Emotional Intelligence. Howard Gardner’s interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligence are key to ethics.

Gardner identified seven types of intelligence. One of these was interpersonal intelligence, the ability to understand other people, what motivates them, how they feel. Another was intrapersonal intelligence, the ability to understand oneself.

Daniel Goleman, author of the book Emotional Intelligence, has expanded this research in a broad number of area including anger, optimism, a limited number of emotional responses and much more.
How does this relate to ethics, ethical collapse and by-standers?