In a corporate workspace, we often see instances of people displaying effective technical skills. Yet, these very individuals often find it a struggle with collaborating and managing others in a team. Does this mean we rule them out as smart people? No. What they might need to develop is emotional intelligence (EI). Just being smart isn’t enough – you need to be smart about how you feel.
So what is emotional intelligence? Emotional intelligence is the ability to identify your feelings or emotions as well as of others. It is not just limited to or aimed at happiness and a congenial work atmosphere in the corporate space. Emotional intelligence is more to do with becoming increasingly aware and ability to tackle all kinds of situations. Your responses and reflexes will be ready for various situations and challenges that come your way.
Components of Emotional Intelligence:
Google engineer Chade-Meng Tan’s widely acclaimed course on emotional intelligence combines five aspects of emotional intelligence. In the words of Tan, “The basic structure of the program uses the five components of emotional intelligence: self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills-or, as we call them, leadership skills”. This is the mixed model of emotional intelligence that based on five categories, each with their own set of emotional competencies. Emotional competencies refer to capabilities that are learned and must be developed to result in the desired performance.
1) Self-awareness:
Self-awareness is defined as the conscious knowledge of one’s own character and feelings. One needs to understand their own emotions and also realize that they can control them. Instead of impulsively reacting to each situation, you can decide what your response will be. According to a survey conducted by Harvard University, among 1000 leaders in over 800 companies in more than 100 companies, leaders placed highest in the hierarchy usually have better self-awareness than leaders in the lower rung. Self-awareness is a skill that can be improved.
2) Self-regulation:
Self-regulation refers to the ability to regulate one’s emotions and knowing the correct time, place and way to express your feelings. It is a personal skill that aids in flexibility and adaptability by controlling the inner resources and capabilities. Best-selling author Daniel Goleman who popularised emotional intelligence is of the opinion that the people with strong self-regulation skills have a high conscientiousness. They take responsibility of their actions and are considerate of their impact on others.
3) Motivation:
Motivation is what drives us to fulfil our goals. The focus should be on fulfilling one’s inner needs and targets rather than simply external rewards like money, materialistic gains and fame. Motivated people who are emotionally intelligent are action-oriented – constantly making attempts to improve and grow. Such people show dedication to their work and initiate action when important tasks are laid out.
4) Empathy:
Empathy is having the knack to feel what the other person is feeling. This understanding goes a long way in not just managing your own emotions but the emotions of others as well. For example, if somebody is depressed, your response might be to console them or cheer them up – your response is equally important. Empathy is also helpful in working out the power dynamics influencing social interactions at a workplace.
5) Social skills
Social skills refer to skills such as active listening, leadership and communication skills (verbal and non verbal). You just learnt about how it is important to empathize with others to understand their emotions and our responses. However, how we implement such interpretations in our daily interactions form our social skills. Managers can forge a better connect with workers and vice versa. Communication becomes effective with strong social skills.
Ability Model of Emotional Intelligence
Salovey and Mayer created this model of emotional intelligence. They put forward a formal definition of emotional intelligence – “The ability to monitor one’s own and others’ feelings, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and action.”
The ability model is divided into four interconnected “branches” of problem-solving that assess your level of emotional intelligence. They are:
(i) Perceiving emotions: The most basic skill required to understand emotions is to be able to perceive and assess emotions, which in turn enable you to manage your emotions or keep them in check. Interpreting facial expressions and body language is very important in such a skill.
(ii) Reasoning with emotions: This step involves provoking your thought process using the very emotions that you interpreted. This aids in prioritizing what we should focus on and respond to. Rather than being impulsively and emotionally charged, if we learn to reason with emotions, then it becomes much easier to guide thinking towards the most omnipotent matters.
(iii) Understanding emotions: Various emotions of ours carry various meanings that help us realize the emotional state of another person and why they are reacting the way they are. If someone is upset, for example, the associated set of possible actions could be – consoling, advising, withdrawing and so on.
(iv) Managing emotions: One must learn to manage emotions and it’s various aspects that include regulating emotions, giving an appropriate response and responding to others’ emotions. This is the highest level of emotional intelligence in the ability model. An example of managing emotions would be to make peace when another person is expressing anger and trying to fight.
Trait Model of Emotional Intelligence
While the ability model was developed long back, the trait model of EI is a more recent phenomenon, published by Petrides and his colleagues in 2009. It dismisses the thought that emotional intelligence is based on ability and instead suggests that people inherently have certain emotional traits and self-perceptions as a part of their personality.
The Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue), based at University College London (UCL), is a psychometric instrument that is the most reliable EI measure in scientific literature. It suggests that EI is about perceptions and not about ability.
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