Emotional intelligence is crucial in the workplace and how we handle our emotions can directly influence how we handle ourselves and our relationships.

Emotional intelligence helps us analyze and think creatively while engaging our emotions to resolve problems.

When an employee makes use of emotional intelligence in the workplace, it can help one to be more productive and effective, leading to greater professional success.

What is Emotional Intelligence?

It can be defined as the ability to identify and deal with our own emotions, the capacity to recognize and understand the feelings of others, and to adjust our behaviors and responses to others accordingly. It requires self-knowledge and empathy.

Emotional intelligence or emotional quotient (EI or EQ) consists of three main components:
i. Accurately identifying your emotions and the emotions of others.

ii. Managing emotions, which includes controlling your emotions and the ability to influence others’ emotions e.g. calming them down or cheering them up.

iii. Applying emotions for problem-solving and thinking.

People who possess the above abilities normally have higher emotional intelligence. Those with higher emotional intelligence are believed to be more successful at work because they are good at:

Solving problems
Keeping cool under pressure
Resolving conflicts
Listening, reflecting, and responding to constructive criticism

Five Elements of Emotional Intelligence at Work

The under-listed components of emotional intelligence at work were developed by Psychologist Daniel Goleman in the 1990s.

1. Self-awareness

This is the ability to identify your emotions and emotional triggers. It helps you to understand how others might perceive your emotions when you are aware of your feelings.

2. Self-regulation

This deals with the ability to control and adjust your emotions to create a more positive effect. Being able to control your feelings is crucial because your emotions can affect others either positively or negatively.

3. Motivation

This is the urge and desire to do something. It relates to emotional intelligence because your desires can promote different feelings toward something.

4. Empathy

Empathy is the ability to identify and understand the feelings of another person. When you understand the feelings of others, it allows you to handle workplace situations more effectively.

5. Social Skills

Social skills are the tools used to communicate and interact with other people. Having stronger social skills i.e. effective communication and respect allows you to listen, speak, and resolve conflicts more effectively.

Why is Emotional Intelligence Important in the Workplace?

Emotional Intelligence is important at work so you can perceive, reason with, understand, and manage the emotions of yourself and others. The ability to handle emotions gives you an edge to guide and help people, this can help you to be happier and more successful.

It also helps you to understand non-verbal communication and fix a situation before it becomes a problem.

Emotional intelligence makes one to be self-aware of personal emotions, you can use this skill to adjust your behavior before it becomes an issue for a client or co-workers.

It also improves efficiencies, when you are empathetic and understand other people’s emotions, you can make decisions with ease and complete tasks more efficiently.

It can also encourage others to develop strong interpersonal skills. This is because emotions are contagious, and displaying explicit motivation, empathy, responsibility, and teamwork could encourage your team to follow along.

Finally, some tasks might involve just yourself, like looking in the mirror to assess your body language and facial expressions. Other tasks might include communicating with a variety of people to practice your emotional intelligence in the real world.

Making an effort to improve your emotional intelligence can help you progress in your career while inspiring others to do the same.

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