The five intelligences of leadership

Knowing the attributes of banked, fluid, connected, relational, and operational leadership intelligences — and understanding how they fit together — will help you become a better leader.

We’ve all heard about various approaches to leadership: distributed leadership, transformational leadership, moral leadership, and servant leadership. I believe five intelligences comprise the DNA of leadership: banked intelligence, fluid intelligence, connected intelligence, relational intelligence, and operational intelligence.

Banked intelligence refers to the content knowledge essential to the task of leading — what academics refer to as crystallized intelligence. A good deal of banked intelligence is generic; it stretches across industries and positions. For example, there is knowing how to resolve conflict effectively, how to conduct a meeting, or how to craft a productive strategic plan. Other banked knowledge is industry specific, in this case educationally anchored. For example, there is knowledge about the laws on student rights. There’s also job-specific banked knowledge, e.g., the knowledge needed to be an athletic director or an assistant principal of student affairs. Finally, some banked knowledge is context specific, e.g., leading William Burnett Middle School in Fisher, Ind., during the 2014-15 school year. Knowing about the teacher contract or community politics could be essential at Burnett. Building content assets is always wise, although leaders must be able to bring those assets to bear on specific challenges, opportunities, and problems.

Fluid intelligence is the ability to think — that is, the ability to puzzle through situations using the banked knowledge at hand. Fluid intelligence is essential for identifying the need for new content knowledge. Even more important, fluid intelligence gives meaning to inert blocks of content knowledge. For example, working through ways to bring a passively disengaged and lonely (or actively disengaged and hostile) high school student into the community requires blending content knowledge with pastoral care for adolescents. In this case, knowledge about student-adult relationships and creating authentic membership in school must be brought forth and thought through. Without fluid intelligence, banked knowledge would sit in the vault untouched.

Connected intelligence is the art and science of bringing pieces of the work narrative together in productive ways. Given the complexity and turbulent world of schooling, growing alignment and coherence is a cardinal aspect of school leadership. For example, units (e.g., teachers, programs) and dimensions (e.g., budgets, goals) in schools often function as if they were in different galaxies. Pulling together school programs around a point of view about student writing or a common perspective on student responsibility are illustrations of connected intelligence.

Relational intelligence means possessing and testing a robust understanding of self in social context, such as in the school community. Relational intelligence honors the mirror of reflection, the wisdom to see oneself as she or he is defined by self and others and the acknowledgement, understanding, and thoughtful examination of differences. In many ways, because this intelligence is profoundly personal and because many school leaders have learned the protective dysfunctionalities of denial, blame, withdrawal, and justification, this is an especially difficult intelligence to master and polish over time.

Relational intelligence is also about understanding others. It is the cocktail of dispositions, knowledge, and skills to work productively with people. Understanding how to work in authentic ways with children, teachers, and staff, and members of the extended community is difficult. Yet without relational intelligence, school leaders cannot succeed.

Making things happen

Operational intelligence or the ability to make things happen is the fifth domain of leadership. It requires possessing the other intelligences. Surprisingly, and quite inappropriately, operational intelligence is often dismissed as “management” or “technical skills.” In reality, this knowledge blends the various intelligences creatively and to positive effect. Often, we see it in anemic form when one or more of the other intelligences are underdeveloped. For example, principals might lack the relational intelligence to lead teachers into effective professional communities. But operational intelligence emits a magical glow when it’s in full bloom. Think of the elementary principal who has navigated the shoals of addressing student needs by changing teaching assignments mid-semester or the high school principal who successfully addresses a community crisis spawned by bullying.

There is an abundance of ways to think about leadership in schools and districts. But the intelligences of leadership open new possibilities for thinking about the work. Thinking of the intelligences of leadership provides an especially robust architecture for analyzing the work, helping leaders understand why certain actions worked and why others did not and pinpointing where intelligences need to be enhanced.

CITATION: Murphy, J. (2015). BACKTALK: The five intelligences of leadership. Phi Delta Kappan, 96 (8), 80.