The fourth of Gandhi’s seven spiritually detrimental traits is knowledge without character. In the world of entrepreneurship, think of this fourth trait or sin, as being all analytical while ignoring your “softer” side. In other words, you deal only with cold, hard facts, and brush off the intuitive, emotional, and creative elements of your self.
The Western world largely ignores intuition. And, our institutions often seem designed to stifle creativity rather than encourage it. For example, our educational system tends to focus on more analytical approaches to learning. Yet things that use our creative side — tapping into the muse if you will — have been shown to actually improve cognition and analytical skills. Art, music, creative writing, things that get cut when budgets are insufficient, make our children better students in many ways.
Science is now showing that our brain functions with the use of chemicals, many of which are directly correlated with emotional responses to thoughts or stimuli. Many of us are conditioned to ignore these emotional responses. We suppress them, we channel them in different ways, but nevertheless these responses are still inherent within our makeup. Some of this conditioning can be useful. After all, when the police officer pulls you over to give you a speeding ticket, your primitive brain wants to engage the “fight or flight” response. In our modern society, this is simply an unacceptable rejoinder to this situation.
Moreover, while creativity, whether in art, music, literature, or even business, does tap into our analytical side, emotions play a critical role. Further, one of the key factors in the success of a business (or even one’s life as a wage slave, if you are employed by another) is to understand, learn, and apply the elements of emotional intelligence.
Emotional intelligence is generally defined as the ability to identify, assess, and control the emotions of yourself, of others with whom you interact, and even of groups in which you belong. If you possess a high level of emotional intelligence, you will have a greater ability to process information of an emotional nature and to relate that processing to wider elements of your cognition. Emotional intelligence skills include things such as self-awareness, self regulation, social skills, empathy, motivation, and so forth.
Numerous studies show a correlation between high levels of emotional intelligence and greater levels of success in diverse fields such as sales, creative endeavors, and entrepreneurship. Moreover, emotional intelligence is a set of skills that can be improved upon throughout one’s life.
Similarly, creativity is something that can be encouraged, and developed, even if a person feels they are not a creative individual, or that their creativity is blocked. There are programs and training methods to enhance creativity and to allow it to furnish.
Finally, other research demonstrates links between recognition of intuitive sensing and success in various life-work endeavors.
What’s the bottom line here? Often, persons set out to become entrepreneurs who are excellent technicians. A great engineer, a fine carpenter, or a skillful accountant may choose one-day to open up a small business. But what we find is that technical skills without the corresponding creative/intuitive/emotional intelligence skills, leave our budding entrepreneur with an uphill climb to success. Attempting to create and run a successful small business, utilizing only the hard skills of analysis, while ignoring the complementary softer skills, may indeed be a sin in the world of entrepreneurship.