Utilizing Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace
Emotional intelligence, popularly known as emotional quotient (EQ) refers to your ability to perceive, control, evaluate and reason with your emotions. It is vital for interpersonal communication and is a hot topic even in the business world.
Understanding Emotional Intelligence
Psychologists John D. Mayer and Peter Salovey, the leading researchers on emotional intelligence, define it as a person's ability to recognize and understand emotions in oneself and other people. This ability involves using emotional understanding in making decisions, solving problems and communicating with others.
According to these leading researchers, emotional intelligence can be classified into four different levels:
Level 1: Perceiving emotions
Level 2: Reasoning with emotions
Level 3: Understanding emotions
Level 4: Managing emotions
In the past decades, emotions and intelligence were generally viewed as being on opposite ends. However, researchers exploring emotional psychology are becoming more interested in cognition and affect. To better understand this concept, you can imagine how emotions and moods like anger, happiness, sadness and fear influence people on how they behave and make decisions.
EQ and Its Impact on Your Success
The interest in emotion psychology, as well as the concept of emotional intelligence, became famous in 1995 with the publication of Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ by Daniel Goleman. In the book, the author pointed out that emotional intelligence is critical for predicting your success in life. Moreover, he also mentioned that emotional competencies also play an important role in the workplace.
The concept that was introduced in the book quickly gained the attention of many including business leaders and human resource managers.
Researchers suggested that emotional intelligence can greatly influence how well employees interact with their workmates and manage work-related stress and conflict. EQ also affects a person's overall job performance. Other studies found that there's a link between emotional intelligence and job satisfaction.
Furthermore, studies have shown that employees who scored high on measures of emotional intelligence tend to have a higher score on measures of leadership abilities, interpersonal functioning and stress management.
Goleman also suggested that while intelligence per se is associated with leadership and success, it alone is not enough. People who ended up being successful at work are not just smart but they also have high EQ.
EQ in the Workplace
Emotional intelligence in the workplace is not just for the higher-ups or senior executives and CEOs but is also for every employee in a workplace. If you are just starting your career and you want to move up the career ladder, having high EQ is key to achieving your goal.
In one survey of hiring managers, 75 percent of the participants indicated that they value a person's EQ more than their IQ. It only shows how emotional intelligence is recognized as a valued skill.
To give you a better understanding of the difference between an employee with high EQ and an employee with low EQ, let's check the following comparison:
Characteristics of Employees with High EQ
- Make better decisions
- Solve problems
- With the ability to keep cool under pressure
- Resolve conflicts
- Empathize with others
- Know how to accept constructive criticism
Characteristics of Employees with Low EQ
- Play the role of the victim
- Avoid taking responsibility for mistakes
- Communicate passively and aggressively
- Find it hard to collaborate and work with a team
- Is overly critical of others
- Dismiss others' opinions
As EQ is considered a skill, researchers believe that it is something that can be improved through training and practice. With this in mind, we at Change Works are offering a course called EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE FOR PROFESSIONALS which is designed to help professionals who want to master their emotions and be able to lead others in their workplace. This course is composed of six modules:
Module 1: Introduction to emotional intelligence
Module 2: Self-awareness and self-management
Module 3: Self-motivation
Module 4: Empathy
Module 5: Social awareness
Module 6: Relationship management
EQ does matter, and if you want to improve your emotional intelligence, attending training and courses can be a good start.