What is Emotional Intelligence in Leadership?
Emotional intelligence in leadership is a capacity or capability to evaluate and manage our emotions, control interpersonal skills and emotions in personal or work culture. Under high pressures, we tend to react instantly according to the situation; it has been captured by the people around us and makes them affected too, this makes to throw comments about you. For a successful leader, Emotional Intelligence in leadership makes a vital role. A team leader who evaluates the situation solves rather than showing one utmost stress shouting the team members. Some people are emotionally intelligent naturally, and other needs to develop their EI. The selection of people in a team can be found out by conducting an Emotional intelligence test. An American psychologist, Daniel, has analyzed emotional intelligence into five key structures.
Key Structure of Emotional Intelligence in Leadership
- Self-Awareness
- Self- Regulation
- Motivation (Impossible to possible)
- Empathy
- Social Skills
1. Self-Awareness
Being aware of situations and reacting to them instantly may affect others and shows your strength and weakness; on the whole, it shows your nature of behavior. Knowing, if you’re leading a team and when you become emotional, the problem is not going to resolve, it makes the situation, even more worse; in this situation, a record of entry makes to improve one’s self-awareness, leading and enhancing to next level. When anger comes during stress, suddenly slow down or mitigate by the given steps below.
- Meditation or Yoga
- Think positive
- Listen to mild music
- Go to a calm environment
Self-Awareness: Has a unique understanding of one’s individual tendencies; proceed to behave in certain ways and perceive our emotional state.
Social Awareness: Social awareness is used to recognize others thinking, emotions and thoughts. This is also a part of self-awareness which particularly covers the relationship management in an organization.
Self-Management: Being things run in a flexible manner and keeps us aware of our own emotional state, whether it is in a positive or constructive form of behavior.
Self-awareness is classified into Emotional awareness, accurate self-assessment, and self-confidence.
Emotional Awareness: Ability to understand own emotions and how they affect other behavior.
Self-Assessment: Introspective examination of our strength and limitations.
Self-Confidence: Being comfortable and self secure with a strong sense of self-worth and capabilities.
2. Self-Regulation
It’s the most basic sense of the human; when one loses his temper, he becomes uncontrollable, his emotions, behavior, thoughts are disturbed, so driving and managing this is in a controlled mannerism is called self-regulation.
A manager working on a project makes emotional decisions, and some are stereotypes. Self-regulation is about managing and being in control.
Enhancing the ability – self analyzation, regular practice of Yoga, examine yourself and know your values.
The most common people are affected by emotions and outside influence; self-regulation may be the best result for controlling and increase the performance.
Self-regulation consists of two types:
- High emotional intelligence
- Low emotional intelligence
a. High Emotional Intelligence
- Promotes an optimistic point of view
- React to hurt by processing feeling
- Is emotionally resilient
b. Low Emotional Intelligence
- Dominate negative feelings
- Reacts to hurt with physical violence Carries grudge and is unforgiving.
3. Motivation (Impossible to Possible)
Motivation is a success-driven mode, which acts as a catalyst towards success or positive movement of act. This helps one to stimulate their goals or action to achieve. When someone with fainted, lazy or stress, motivation helps to increase his focus and drive him to be positive.
Every motivational leader makes his team drive towards success. This makes a good environment and a good workplace and others to work with optimistic challenges. It helps in energizing the person’s mind and face the situation in a new way. A little motivation can lead to action, which gives success stating, “I Can’t do too I Can do”.
4. Empathy
Give attention and respond to others feeling. Empathy is something which you support by understanding others situation and share their feeling or exchange of feelings.
In recent, Empathy is also called as psychology. To increase the loyalty and respect among your team leaders, then empathic should be shown. This makes a better understanding and perceptional view of the team and provides them better guidance. Usually, Human resources Management in every organization gives high priority in this element.
5. Social Skills
Social skills are a skill which is used to interact socially with other people, cultured is developed here. Here the exchange of information and thoughts are done. Leaders with social skills are communicators and receiver; the team is eager to hear bad news as good news.
This is used to build communication skills, conflict resolution, and praise others.
Essential social skills are,
- Maintain eye contact,
- Use proper body language,
- Assertive vs aggressive,
- Know your channels,
- Be flexible,
- Be human,
- Show respect,
- Be teachable,
- Remain positive always,
- Accept criticism.
1. Maintain Eye Contact: Maintaining eye contact with other person transfers signal which is used to identify the trust and confidence of the person.
2. Use Proper Body Language: This shows that the person is uncomfortable and shows a negative way of exposing expression.
3. Assertive vs Aggressive: Assertive is something whom you respect and consider others opinion. Whereas the Aggressive is something which you don’t consider others opinion and ignore them.
4. Know Your Channels: First, we should know our ecosystem, Assess our strengths and weakness.
5. Be Flexible: Flexible is something which helps someone to work in any situation and circumstances.
6. Be Human: It is something who shares other feeling and pain, supports them in a positive way.
7. Show Respect: It something that we honor someone at the workplace and respect others opinion with consideration.
8. Be Teachable: In a good workplace, sharing knowledge and teaching others makes circulation information, “Information is wealth”.
9. Always Remain Positive: A person with high motivation makes the person more positive; this is used to share the Positiveness in the workplace.
10. Accept Criticism: Accepting criticism makes one turn their negatives into positives, takes criticism into motivation.
To be a successful leader, these above skills should be achieved and utilized effectively. Extra work always gives excel to a career in the future.
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