The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace

Emotional intelligence is new concept that was developed by Dr. Peter Salovey and Dr. John Mayer in 1990 from American university. It refers to individual’s ability to perceive, acknowledge and manage their emotions and feelings. The whole concept has core aspects that contribute towards its precise meaning in a real situation: self-awareness, self-regulations, empathy, and social skills (Salovey et al p.185).

However, the success of an individual does not only depend on the level of IQ but also emotional intelligence (EQ). The EQ has a positive and significant impact over work environment. According to EQ, the success is influenced by qualities of a person like self-control, perseverance and skill in tackling issues. It is most obvious that much has been put down on how to improve EQ in employees, but most importantly, but hiring of the able managers will establish better decisions when they observe individual in a possession of EQ. workers with better EQ are likely to work in teams and make adjustments to any changes in a work environment. This doesn’t depend on the degrees or amount of education one has, however without the EQ, people tend to stagnate with a slow record of success. As the time goes by, work places are evolving in a manner that technologies and innovations are taking its course and these important qualities will be the necessities (Cooper & Robert p. 35).

Additionally, EQ also has an impact towards the job satisfaction. The job satisfaction can therefore be categorized into two parts; internal and external satisfaction. Internal satisfaction is an internal urge to carry out a specific task in a manner that you do an activity to give you pleasure hence creating a motivation that will in turn bring the satisfaction derived from it. On the other hand, external satisfaction are the benefits provided to the professional by the company in relation to the task performed. Positive feedback enhances self-motivation while negative feedback diminishes the motivation (Kafetsios et al p. 713).

Some of the examples of emotional intelligence are understanding your emotions, putting yourself in the shoes of others and thinking rationally about the feelings before taking any actions necessary.

Work cited

Cooper, Robert K. “Applying emotional intelligence in the workplace.” Training & development 51.12 (1997): 31-39.

Mayer, John D., and Glenn Geher. ”Emotional intelligence and the identification of emotion.” Intelligence 22.2 (1996): 89-113.

Salovey, Peter, and John D. Mayer. ”Emotional intelligence.” Imagination, cognition and personality 9.3 (1990): 185-211.

Kafetsios, Konstantinos, and Leonidas A. Zampetakis. ”Emotional intelligence and job satisfaction: Testing the mediatory role of positive and negative affect at work.” Personality and individual differences 44.3 (2008): 712-722.