Emotional Intelligence: Is it important?

Summary

Emotional intelligence, also known as EQ ("emotional quotient"), is a person's ability to recognize, understand, manage, and reason with emotions. It is a crucial skill for interpersonal communication, and it is a hot topic in psychology and business.

Psychologists coined the term in the 1990s. The first psychological theory of emotional intelligence was developed by Peter Salovey and John Mayer (1990, p. 185), who introduced EQ as a:

"a set of skills hypothesized to contribute to the accurate appraisal and expression of emotion in oneself and others, effective emotion regulation in self and others, and the use of feelings to motivate, plan, and achieve in one's life."

From this vantage point, emotional intelligence has the potential to be useful in almost every aspect of life. Let's look at some real-life examples of emotional intelligence.

EQ example:

Self-Awareness

Our emotional awareness is critical to our relationships and ability to lead others (Schutte et al., 2001). (Rosete & Ciarrochi, 2005).

Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand, has been praised around the world for her ability to listen, show empathy, and connect with people in crisis. According to CEO Today Magazine, we can learn a lot from Ardern's ability to effectively manage her own emotions because "self-awareness is the foundation on which everything else is built" and "allows us to engage others on their terms" (Lothian, 2020).

Decision Making

According to EQ expert and psychologist Daniel Goleman (2019), listening to your gut instincts reveals "decision rules that the mind gathers unconsciously." Emotional signals from our bodies, in this way, provide a kind of intangible wisdom, guiding us toward the "right" decisions.

To support this, Seo and Barrett (2007) discovered that stock investors who experienced more intense emotions and were better at discriminating between emotions performed better in decision-making. The researchers hypothesized that increased emotional awareness improved investors' ability to manage emotional biases, resulting in better decisions.

Is EQ important in the workplace?

Emotional intelligence is widely acknowledged as a valuable skill that improves workplace communication, management, problem-solving, and relationships. It is also a skill that researchers believe can be improved with training and practice. According to Lopes, C?té, and Salovey (2006a), improved emotional management skills can improve work performance in a variety of ways. Using emotional intelligence in the workplace can improve decision-making, smooth out social interactions, and improve employees' ability to deal with stressful situations.

It has been linked to better task performance, organizational citizenship behaviors of employees (C?té & Miners, 2006), higher company rank, and higher scores of stress tolerance and interpersonal facilitation (e.g., positive interaction) as rated by peers and/or supervisors (Lopes et al., 2006b).

A meta-analysis of 43 EQ studies found that ability measures, mixed models, and self-report and peer EQ measures were all equally effective at predicting job performance (O'Boyle, Humphrey, Pollack, Hawver, & Story 2011).

EQ and Leadership

Being a leader is a difficult job that is likely to be made more difficult if you have difficulty managing your own emotions or the emotions of those you lead.

Even when IQ and personality are taken into account, EQ has been found to predict leadership effectiveness (Rosete & Ciarrochi, 2005). Furthermore, Gardner and Stough (2002) discovered that emotional intelligence, specifically understanding and managing emotions, was strongly related to (positive) transformational leadership behaviors of senior managers.

BOOKS ABOUT EQ!

• Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence... (Daniel Goleman)
• Becoming a Resonant Leader: Develop Your Emotional Intelligence, Renew Your Relationships, Sustain Your Effectiveness... (Annie McKee, Fran Johnston, and Richard E. Boyatzis)
• The Emotionally Intelligent Manager: How to Develop and Use the Four Key Emotional Skills of Leadership. (David R. Caruso and Peter Salovey)
• The Critical Thinker: The Path to Better Problem Solving, Accurate Decision Making, and Self-Disciplined Thinking (Steven Schuste)
• Applied Empathy: The New Language of Leadership (Michael Ventura)

References

EI Consortium. (2018). The Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT). Retrieved from https://www.eiconsortium.org/measures/msceit.html.

Kidd, D. C., & Castano, E. (2013). Reading literary fiction improves theory of mind. Science, 342(6156), 377-380.

Salovey, P., & Mayer, J. D. (1990). Emotional intelligence. Imagination, Cognition, and Personality, 9(3), 185-211.