No speaker in the history of Intelligence Squared has generated as many YouTube views as Daniel Goleman. His 2013 talk for us has been viewed 3.2 million times. Goleman returned to celebrate the 25th anniversary of his number one, multi-million copy international bestseller, Emotional Intelligence. The book, revolutionary at the time, taught us that qualities such as self-awareness, impulse control, persistence, motivation, empathy and social deftness are more important than raw IQ. These so-called softer skills are the ones which determine whether or not people excel at work, have flourishing relationships and are able to navigate difficult conversations.

In the intervening years, Goleman has written further bestsellers on social and ecological intelligence, leadership and creativity. Emotional intelligence is now taught in schools and in leadership programmes.

In the event, Goleman shared new insights into the brain architecture underlying emotion and rationality, and showed precisely how emotional intelligence can be nurtured and strengthened in all of us.