Letting the ECD crack open a tough audience by Sherril Harris

I was delighted to take my maiden voyage with the deck on July 9th. The audience was a group of facilitators for an auto manufacturer that has been struggling with gender and generational bias. Their leadership affectionately described them to me as an “Old Boys Club full of cranky old white dudes (and one unbelievably forgiving woman) who think they know everything and don’t know when they are being #$sholes.” I had 3.5 hours to help them develop their emotional intelligence around anyone not white, male and over 60. I kicked the conversation off with the ECD.

My ice breaker was the familiar, “When you think about the last 48 hours what 5-6 emotions most accurately describe how you are feeling?” No surprise, the woman was able to make her selections in about 5 minutes, most of the men found their way to the 10 minute mark, and 2 struggled all the way to the finish line at about 15 minutes. Before I had them share with a partner I asked, ‘How did that feel?” and from that one interaction I was able to get a read on everyone in the room. I love this card game!🥰🙏🏼 One very flustered gent said, “Holy crap! I don’t know how I am feeling. How am I supposed to know how I’m feeling about anything? “ and so the day began.

Following the icebreaker I opened with why emotional granularity matters and that was a huge hit spawning lots of juicy conversation. I used the game again in several other places - “How are the people you serve feeling right now?” and “How would you like them to feel after working with you?” as well as leaving 3 cards (if they so choose) face up at their seats before each break to let me know how they are feeling about the class. I found the pre-break check-ins empowered me with feedback that I could use to deliver the next piece of content more effectively.

I flew out that night but they remained for a train-the-trainer that lasted 3 additional days. One of my people on the inside said, Sherril, I can’t count the number of times someone referenced the deck either affectionately in jest or with admiration. Whenever someone struggled to express themselves someone else would shout out, Wait, where’s that deck?!”😂

I am so grateful for this tool. In my 3 decades of training, coaching and development I have never seen as much potential in any one tool as I see in this. And it’s inspired me to shift my focus to advocating for cultural makeovers with more of my clients.

My client of the 9th was so pleased with the outcome that they have asked me to expand the program to a full day and roll it out to their other training teams, some of whom have much more complex challenges. And they accepted my suggestion to do a full cultural makeover.☺️

Thank you, Jeremy, for creating this quietly powerful tool, and thank you to all the ECD practitioners who have generously contributed hacks, use cases, and stories. You’ve inspired and empowered me and my business more than you will ever know!🙏🏼👊🏻❤️