The Concept of Emotional Intelligence - Literature review Example

ARGUMENTS FOR AND AGAINST THE CONCEPT OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE [Name] [Unit] [Due date] The concept of emotional intelligence has been studied since 1920s. Scholars then started to conceptualize the idea of emotional intelligence in a systematic manner in the early 1980s. Among the scholars who devoted their studies to emotional intelligence include Salovey and Mayer, Bar-On, and Parker, and Goleman (Carmeli 2003, 790- 792). Salovey & Mayer (1989, 185) described emotional intelligence as a subset of social intelligence that consists of the ability to monitor self as well as emotions and feelings of others, to distinguish among these feelings and emotions. Then an individual applies such information for guiding his or her own actions as well as thinking. The two also reviewed this definition later and referred to it as the capability of an individual to perceive as well as generate emotions in order to assist thoughts, and also understand and regulate emotional knowledge and emotions in a reflective manner for promotion of intellectual and emotional growth (Mayer, and Salovey 1997). Another scholar, Bar-On et al. (2000, 1108) defined emotional intelligence as a array of emotional, social and personal skills and abilities that influence the ability of an individual to deal with environmental pressures and demands in an effective manner. In his work, Goleman (2001) viewed it simply as the ability of an individual to recognize and regulate his or her emotions as well as those of others. There has been a growing research concerning the significance of emotional intelligence in the success of organisations. Those in favour of the concept of emotional intelligence are more dedicated to the view that individuals with high competencies of emotional intelligence are usually successful in their workplace as compared to less emotionally intelligent individuals. In specific, the researchers have found out that social skills are very crucial for leaders in the executive level. As an individual gains more power in leadership, social intelligence becomes an increasingly relevant factor for success (Hooijberg, Hunt, and Dodge 1997, 376). They add that the competency in emotional intelligence is capable of improving both individual and organisational performance where individuals with high levels of emotional intelligence are of great value to the organisation (399). Researchers have also realised that there has been increased success especially to individual who share the same positions in organisations and in recruitment and selection of individuals with higher emotional intelligence levels. In addition, training the organisational staff to be more emotionally intelligent is also a factor that has been linked to financial gains in organisations (Goleman 2001). Goleman (1998) is one of the main contributors to the implementation of emotional intelligence in the organisations. He argues that leaders that possess high levels of emotional intelligence can be regarded as the key to the success of organisations. He adds that the leaders must be a position of sensing the feelings of employees about the work environments, being able to intervene when a certain problem arises as well as being able to control their own emotions so that employees can trust them. In addition, they need to have a good understanding of the social and political interventions within the organisation (Goleman 2001). Cherniss (2000) argues that emotional intelligence is very important in the place of work. He outlines four key reasons why the place of work needs to be a logical setting for improvement and evaluation of the competencies of emotional intelligence. First, he states that the competencies of emotional intelligence are crucial factors for success in most of jobs. Second, he found out that many individual usually enter into the workforce without the required competencies for excelling in jobs. This leads to failure in the achievement of organisational goals. Third, he found out that the employers have already realised the importance of emotional intelligence and they are establishing ways and motivation for providing training in emotional intelligence. Finally, he found that most individuals spend most of their time at work and this calls for improvement and evaluation of emotional intelligence competencies. Cherniss & Alder (2000) realised that there is a lot of interest in the way emotional intelligence can be applied in organisations. They went a further step and published guidelines for assisting individuals in organisations to cultivate the competencies of emotional intelligence through distinguishing the outstanding performers from average performers. Mumford et al. (2000, 11-15) argues that the fundamentals of effective leadership depends on the ability of the leaders to solve complex social problems that can arise at any time in the organisations. Thus, emotionally intelligence leaders are capable of establishing mutual respect and trust as well as rapport with the employees. This makes them more effective in successful running of organisations. Cost-effectiveness is another factor that has raised interest in the places of work. Boyatzis, Goleman, and Rhee (1999) conducted assessment on partners in multinational consulting firms based on emotional intelligence competencies. They found that partners who scored high levels of competencies led to a gain of $1.2 million extra profit as compared to the partners with lower levels. This relates higher levels of emotional intelligence to more financial gains in organisations. The researchers also found that, by failure to follow the established training guidelines on how to increase emotional intelligence in the place of work, the industry in USA experience losses of between $5.6 and $16.8 billion annually. Thus, the impact of emotional intelligence training in organisations produced more impact as compared to other programs (Carmeli 2003, 803). Salovey and Mayer (1989, 188-191) argued that the individual success in organisations requires a set of three mental processes that are conceptually related. These include expression and appraisal of self as well as others’ emotions, regulation of self and others’ emotions and use of emotions in adaptive ways. This leads to better understanding of your workmates thus, creating a better potential to manage as well as lead people in an effective way. George (2000, 1029) argues that there is a strong connection between emotional intelligence and leadership in organisations especially on display of components of emotional intelligence. He found that leaders who has significantly high rates of dimensions of self-management, self-awareness, social skills as well as social awareness in regard to emotional intelligence contributed to high performance in the organisation. Salovey and Mayer (1989, 192-194) found out that individuals with high levels of emotional intelligence are more satisfied with their jobs and usually experience positive feelings and moods which act as a source of higher satisfaction levels as well well-being. In addition, individuals who are emotionally intelligent are optimistic, an important trait that is focused on resolution rather than reasoning. Such individuals are capable of placing themselves within an organisation in a positive way given that their negative sides are aof little or no destructive cosequences. Abraham (1999, 214) argues that emotional intelligence enhances an altruistic behaviour that makes employees to understand the feelings of their colleagues and respond in a better way. This makes them capable of recognizing, managing and using of their emotions to eliminate obstacles in the course of their work and advance their career horizon successfully. Thus, they are able to control stress in the workplace in an effective way and prevent the negative effects of stress in theory profession (Blau 1985, 278). Given that managerial work is sometimes challenging and complex, managers require high levels of emotional intelligence in order to be extremely involved and at the same time ensure that complex situations and challenging experience do not occur elsewhere. For instance, successful senior managers find themselves working beyond required hours not generally to gain economic rewards, but deal with deal with complexity that yield intense emotional experience (Ashforth, and Humphrey 1995, 97-100). Goleman (2001) argues that emotional intelligence has a positive effect on the success of an individual at the place of work. This is very important especially when we believe that the skills in management are at the heart of leadership and that emotional intelligence plays a critical role in creating an effective leadership. This is because the aspects of emotional intelligence significantly contribute to effective leadership. Lam, and Kirby (2002, 133) adds that emotional intelligence is powerful and in most of the times more powerful the intelligence quotient. They state that although emotional intelligence may not be a significant predictor of the performance of a job, it offers a concrete base for emotional competencies. However, there are researchers who criticise the legitimacy of the concept of emotional intelligence. While many have adopted the concept of emotional intelligence, those against it propose that emotional intelligence is just another word referring to a collection of competencies that are already known while others refer to it as a catchphrase (Steiner, 1997). Becker (2003, 192-194) criticised emotional intelligence saying that the construct cannot be measured in a reasonable accuracy. This makes it difficult to identify if emotional intelligence is rooted in reality or imagination. Other critics suggests that the theory of development in regard to emotional intelligence is weak where there is a lot of potential for the use of emotional intelligence towards improvement of the performance of human resource and improved effectiveness in leadership among other things (Luthans 2006, 57-60). However, critics of Goleman’s work claim that his main argument, which states that leaders possessing high levels of competencies in emotional intelligence have a unique contribution to the organisation, is not supported well particularly in different important work-related behaviours, attitudes as well as outcomes (Carmeli 2003, 789). Conclusion Scholars studying the concept of emotional intelligence have found its relevance to organisational behaviour. From their studies they have shown that emotional intelligence is essential for individuals as well as the organisation as it contributes to their success. The scholars in favour of the concept of emotional intelligence argue that individual with high levels of emotional intelligence are highly competent and are likely to be successful in their workplace. This is because an emotionally intelligent individual is in a better condition of understanding his or her colleagues, which allows for identification and handling of complex situation among employees as well as within the entire organisation. Due to such factors, individuals with high levels of emotional intelligence are capable of managing and leading effectively in the organisation. High levels of emotional intelligence have also been attributed to financial gains in organisations. The results show that individuals with high levels of emotional intelligence cause a significant increase in the profits with an organisation. In addition, high levels of emotional intelligence give individuals the ability to solve complex problems. They are also able to relate well with their colleagues. Due to the increasing need for emotional intelligence in organisations, the management has gone a step further by providing trainings on improvement of emotional intelligence. Such programs are very essential for boosting the profitability of the organisation. Although there has been much support on the relationship between emotional intelligence and the success in organisations, some of researchers doubt this connection. Scholars that criticise the concept of emotional intelligence argue that it is just another word referring to a collection of competencies that are already known. Other refers to it as just a ‘catchphrase’ that has a very little meaning in reality. Given that there is no measurable accuracy of emotional intelligence that is reasonable, it is said to lack a valid or a reliable measure. However, due to such critic that surrounds emotional intelligence construct, there is a need for further research. The research should be focused on its applicability in not-for-profit organisations. This is because much focus has been directed to the profit making organisations where it is easier to quantify the outcomes through changes in profitability. Based on the critics on reliability, there is a need for further research on the reliability of the measurement of emotional intelligence construct. References Abraham, R. 1999. “Emotional intelligence in organisations: a conceptualisation”, Genetic, Social, and General Psychology Monographs, vol. 125, (2): 209-224 Ashforth, B. E., and Humphrey, R. H. 1995. “Emotion in the workplace: a reappraisal”, Human relations, vol. 48, (3): 97-125. Blau, G.J. 1985. “The measurement and prediction of career commitment”, Journal of Occupational Psychology, vol.58: 277-288 Boyatzis, R.E., Goleman, D., & Rhee, K. 1999. Clustering comptence in emotional intelligence: insights from the emotional competence inventory (ECI), in Bar-On & Parker (eds), handbook of emotional intelligence, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Carmeli, A. 2003. “The relationship between emotional intelligence and work attitudes, behaviour and outcomes”, Journal of Managerial Psychology, vol. 18, (8): 788-813. Cherniss, C. 2000. Social and emotional competence in the workplace, in R. Bar-On & J. Parker (eds), the handbook of emotional intelligence, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Cherniss, C., and Alder, M. 2000. Promoting emotional intelligence in organisations, Alexandria, Virginia: ASTD George, J. M. 2000. “Emotions and leadership: the role of emotional intelligence”, Human relations, vol. 53, (8): 1027-1055 Hooijberg, R., Hunt, J.G. and Dodge, C.E. 1997 “Leadership complexity and development of the leadership model”, Journal of Management, vol. 23, 375-408 Lam, L.T. & Kirby, S.L. 2002. “Is emotional intelligence an advantage? An exploration of the impact of emotional intelligence and general intelligence on individual performance”, The Journal of Social Psychology, vol. 142, (1): 133-143 Luthans, F. 2002. “Positive organisational behaviour: developing and managing psychological strengths for performance improvement”, Academy of Management Executive, vol. 16, (1): 57-76 Mayer J. D., and Salovey, P. 1997. What is emotional intelligence? Implications for educators in Salovey, P. & Sluyter, D (ed), Emotional development, Emotional Literacy, and emotional intelligence, Basic Books, New York, NY. Mumford, M. D., Zaccaro, S.J, Harding, F.D., Jacobs, T. O., and Fleishman, E.A. 2000. “Leadership skills for a changing world: solving complex social problems”, The leadership Quarterly, vol. 11, (1): 11-35 Salovey, P., and Mayer, J. D. 1989. “Emotional intelligence”, Imagination, Cognition, And Personality, vol. 9, No. 3 (1989): 185-211 Steiner, C.1997. Achieving emotional literacy, London: Bloomsbury Publishing. Read More