What is Emotional Intelligence?

Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is a really significant skill to have when it comes to human potential unlocking. It can lead to individuals’ success in their professional career and it can be developed or enhanced with practice. It is different from personality or IQ and it is focused on the ability to accurately identify, understand and manage both personal and others’ feelings. People can make great choices based on these individual and social competencies.

Emotional Intelligence and leadership

Did you know that EQ is seen as a key part in becoming a great leader? It consists on transparency regarding you as a human being, therefore being aware of yourself in order to manage your tendencies. Additionally, emotional intelligence is focused on identifying others’ emotions or feelings and responding adequately to them. Consequently, it plays a huge role in the leadership area. Nowadays, there are many changes in the business environment and adaptability is highly needed in order to face the issues and challenges which may occur.

EQ and relationship marketing

Relationship marketing can offer a sustainable competitive advantage and it consists of creating a powerful network with all the company’s stakeholders including customers, employees and business partners. People want to be valued, heard, and also understood. For this reason, emotional intelligence is an essential asset. EQ is not powerful only in mastering personal feelings and tendencies but also in relationship management and social awareness. As leaders people need to handle their own emotions in order to be able to connect with other people’s feelings and motivate them to perform better and give their best. Therefore, EQ enhances relationship building, communication, collaboration and productivity in a company.

Personal and social competence level

At an individual or personal competence level, it consists on being aware of your own emotions and managing your behaviours.  The two abilities which are characteristic to this level are self-awareness and self-management. The first one is concerned with acknowledging the stage you are now. You can do it by analysing how you react in various situations with different outcomes, how do you communicate with co-workers, and what do you do when things do not go as they were supposed to.   The self-management stage is related to being able to control your own feelings and adopt a behaviour which leads to a positive outcome.

At a social competence level, relationship management and social awareness are the main abilities used to enhance EQ. Social awareness consists on identifying and understanding other people’s emotions. The management of relationships is the ability to successfully handle interactions using the awareness of your own and others’ feelings.

Other interesting facts about the EQ

  • A study of over 40 Fortune 500 companies revealed that sales people with high Emotional Intelligence outperformed by 50% those with medium to low EQ
  • Technical programmers who were measured in the top 10% of the Emotional Intelligence competencies were creating new software three times faster than those with a lower EQ per cent.
  • Companies which do a better job of communicating with their employees outperform financially those which do not. Actually, on average, a company with an exceptional communications flow delivered 47% greater return to shareholders than others with a weak communication system.

Conclusion

To sum it up, in this ever-changing market environment, people need to have a high level of flexibility or adaptability. Emotional intelligence is an essential asset in mastering own and other’ emotions in order to make proactive and effective decisions. It enhances leadership skills and it develops a good communication flow between an entire business network consisting of internal and external stakeholders. EQ can give companies a sustainable competitive advantage boosting employees’ productivity, motivation and collaboration.

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