Emotional Intelligence or EI helps leaders meet the difficulties in their leadership roles. There are five elements of EI in the context of emotional leadership. These are perception, expression and appraisal of emotion, understanding and attending to the other’s emotion, emotional facilitation of thinking, analysis of emotion and regulation of emotion. EI is required in leadership. It is said to be the end product of emotional leadership.
In today’s workforce, the leaders need to supervise and direct their team beyond the democratic, consultative and cooperative styles of leadership. They need to communicate with their group members, be responsible for their decisions, develop the potential of their team, give the team members their individual recognition and mentor them. Only through emotional leadership and EI the leaders can motivate their workers and help them to channel their emotions in a positive manner so that they can perform properly even under pressure.
Effective leadership in the context of emotional intelligence is essential so that they can understand their strengths, weaknesses and emotions and evaluate the same in the context of the group. Self-regulation is controlling and regulating one’s patience, emotions and initiatives taken in difficult and unplanned situations. Emotional leadership skills backed by emotional intelligence along with empathy test the employees’ emotions while taking intelligent decisions individually or as a group. Motivation can be achieved through proper communication, influence and collaboration among the group members and the leaders. A high EI can have an enormous impact in the workplace.
Efficient management of EI helps a company or a task assigned to be successful. Leaders with higher EI will perform better than the average members. EI is very important for emotional leadership as the leaders need to motivate others to complete their work efficiently, and this demands very high interpersonal effectiveness. The companies that make EI their priority have a strategic advantage over others.