One of my former bosses once told me: “I’m not here to teach you how to build relationships.”
This was in response to a question I asked about navigating a conflict with a vendor.
I felt a wave of discomfort. I didn’t know how to respond — but I felt the disconnect immediately.
That was the moment I started to check out emotionally.
Looking back, I stayed in that job because the people were smart and capable. But today? I’d choose caring over brilliant any day.
What emotional intelligence actually means
That interaction reshaped how I think about leadership and emotional intelligence. To me, it means:
- It’s not just understanding what someone says.
- It’s being self-aware enough to read the emotions behind their words.
- And it’s creating enough psychological safety that others feel safe being honest with you.
A more emotionally aware response to my question might have been: “How can I support you in being the best version of yourself in that meeting?”
One sentence. It could have changed everything.
Why it matters more now, not less
There’s a common argument that AI makes soft skills irrelevant — that what matters now is technical capability and moving fast.
I think it’s the opposite.
As AI handles more of the execution layer — the drafting, the research, the synthesis — the work that remains distinctly human becomes more visible, not less. How you navigate conflict. How you give hard feedback. How you create the conditions for honest conversation. How you make people feel seen when things are uncertain.
AI can teach many things. It cannot teach us how to be human with each other.
That’s not a soft skill. That’s the work.
What’s a moment in your career when empathy — or the lack of it — changed everything?