Emotional Intelligence in Educational Leadership - Essay Example

Emotional intelligence in Educational Leadership Contents Reasons for importance of paying attention to the emotional intelligence in the educationalleadership 3 Causes and effects of neglecting emotional intelligence in the educational leadership 4 References 8 Reasons for importance of paying attention to the emotional intelligence in the educational leadership Emotional intelligence can be defined as ability of an individual to identify feelings of others as well as within themselves, and managing emotions efficiently while dealing with others. There are four competencies encompassed in the concept of emotional intelligence. Firstly is self-awareness which is centred towards accurately identifying emotions of others. Secondly is self management or efficiently managing emotional reactions in all circumstances (Bradberry and Greaves, 2004). The third competency is social awareness in context of analyzing emotions of an individual and its effect on others. Relationship management is another competency of emotional intelligence. It is inclined towards handling interactions through determining emotions of one-self and that of others. This study would majorly focus on evaluating causes and effects associated with neglecting the approach of emotional intelligence in educational leadership (George, 2000). As per studies on this field, emotional intelligence is an important factor for exhibiting leadership qualities. Leaders often possess emotional intelligence in order to analyze emotions of one-self and others. It is stated as self-awareness since it makes an individual awareness about significant emotions and their overall impact. However educational leaders at times neglect the concept of emotional intelligence. This basically occurs since leaders are more cautious about achieving ultimate goal of providing quality education (Caruso and Salovey, 2004). There are certain causes and effects directly associated with negligence of emotional intelligence. In most cases, it is observed that students suffer from traumatic conditions due to their teachers or principal not being able to understand their emotional construct. Causes and effects of neglecting emotional intelligence in the educational leadership Educational leadership is related to measures adopted by principals, staffs, teachers, etc., in order to interact with students. For instance principals are mostly responsible for repairs, school cleanliness and attendance. Educational leadership denotes that principals will be responsible not only for traditional management practices but even would be inclined towards implementing teaching strategies. Focus should be more on needs and wants of an organization. Management can be considered as the central component but professional and democratic issues are also taken into consideration. Mission of education or student learning is accomplished only through controlling maintenance, and managing behaviour of staff and students. Student centred leadership is basically observed in educational institutions (Bar-On, Handley and Fund, 2006). Emotional intelligence is stated as the pillar of educational leadership. The emotional aspect is at times neglected by educational leaders due to more emphasis given on traditional structure of management. Emotional intelligence is a strength upon which leadership attributes are developed. It is often witnessed that cultural competency is not present within leaders. Emotional intelligence can be directly linked with cultural factor. This is simply because while understanding emotions of others, their culture can be determined. Emotional intelligence can be virtually learned by all individuals but in present context it is neglected to a great extent. Educational leadership is closely knitted with this aspect due to its direct impact on children (Cowan and Kolb, 2005). Emotional intelligence if neglected results into emotional and verbal abuse of children by leaders. This in turn sets the platform for creation of emotional neglect trauma. Apart from providing appropriate education it is important that students are well understood by their teachers and principal. However teachers are often not expert in this kind of emotional intelligence. They are more concerned about curriculum design and evaluation of students on basis of their marks and their overall performance. This results into neglect of certain percentage of students. The major area of concern for educational leaders is to create a platform for students where they can excel. It is necessary that students feel safe and comfortable within the premises of educational institution. This aspect cannot be safeguarded during neglect of emotional intelligence. The major impact of neglecting such emotional intelligence is enormous unnecessary emotional suffering (Boyatzis and Van Oosten, 2003). Emotional intelligence is all about analyzing emotions of others or one-self and its impacts. Leaders can be classified on basis of emotional intelligence as highlighted such as resonant leader, clueless leader, dissonant leader and demagogue. Negative emotional tone results into two forms of leaders like dissonant leader and demagogue. On the other hand, positive emotional tone is basis of two kinds of leaders such as clueless leader and resonant leader. If such factor is neglected then emotions of students cannot be well judged and its impact cannot be determined. This in turn enhances the fear or emptiness factor within students. They are not able to communicate well with their teachers and hence cannot clarify any specific doubt. On the contrary, it is even observed that emotional intelligence is an inborn factor and cannot be neglected. Many authors have argued that every individual has the ability to understand emotions of others and react accordingly. It has also been outlined that educational leaders can achieve their objectives only through identifying emotional construct in teachers, staff and students. Absence of emotional intelligence causes a significant impact in terms of emotional and verbal abuse. This kind of abuse proves to be traumatic mostly for children. There are instances where people are not able to validate overall crippling effect of such abuse. Verbal and emotional abuse is considered to be more injurious in comparison to physical abuse. It systematically replaces innate self-esteem with toxic self criticism (Caruso and Salovey, 2004). To a certain extent it can be argued that self-criticism is a vital aspect simply because it reflects upon wrong doings of an individual. However absence of emotional intelligence and more inclination towards criticism results into a combination of disgust and intimidation. This element when infused in children results into toxic shame and fear respectively. It is essential that children connect with teachers easily since their learning is totally based on this approach. This form of communication is an understanding gained only through the framework of emotional intelligence. Attention seeking dimension can only be incorporated in students when there is a proper emotional dialect been followed by educational leaders. Absence of this dialect results into shame and fear condition within individuals. These conditions prevent children from seeking attention in educational institutions. To be more precise it is observed that students feel inferior in terms of expressing their views or opinions (Boyatzis and Van Oosten, 2003). Unrelenting criticism resulting from avoidance of emotional intelligence initiates structural change of children’s brain. All the parameters have been stated from children’s perspective but emotional intelligence negligence causes significant impact on educational leaders. These leaders are not able to analyze well needs and wants of team members. Lack of competencies is a major issue when leaders are not able to be well aligned with emotional intelligence framework. Along with self awareness, leaders also tend to become incompetent in terms of social awareness (George, 2000). If there is an emotional mismatch then common objectives could not be achieved. This form of incompetency enhances stimuli in leaders. They are not able to react appropriately with others and this is often denoted as social trauma. In such scenario it is taken for granted by leaders that other people are dangerous and automatically results into freeze, flight, fawn or fight response. This factor is even argued by many indicating that educational leaders emphasize on emotional intelligence more in case of staffs and some children. This is because devoting more time to evaluating emotions would mislead them from their major goal of providing superior quality education. The importance of emotional intelligence can be well analyzed through a survey conducted in well-known institutions in UK. Scores for EI level in these schools has been increasing due to more importance given by educational leaders. It reflects the growth of EI over the years in schools through contribution of educational leaders. The scores have been increased to 140 in the past few years. There are certain phenomenons within individuals which cannot be altered even through adoption or negligence of emotional intelligence (George, 2000). Younger principals are witnessed to be more concerned about their role as leaders. They are the ones who usually give more importance to emotional intelligence. However this aspect is neglected more by aged principals and it simultaneously triggers fear element in students (Bradberry and Greaves, 2004). On the contrary, experienced principals should possess more emotional intelligence since they are working in this field from past many years and have gained expertise in terms of interacting with other people. Apart mental trauma, students would develop a gap with teachers or higher authority because they might feel their sentiments or emotions are not being appropriately judged. References Bar-On, R., Handley, R. and Fund, S., 2006. The impact of emotional intelligence on performance. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Boyatzis, R.E. and Van Oosten, E., 2003. A leadership imperative: Building the emotionally intelligent organization. Ivey Business Journal, 67 (3), pp. 1-5. Bradberry, T. and Greaves, J., 2004. Emotional intelligence appraisal: There is more than IQ, technical manual update. San Diego, CA: Talent Smart Inc. Caruso, D. R. and Salovey, P., 2004. The emotionally intelligent manager: How to develop and use the four key emotional skills of leadership. San Francisco, CA: Josey-Bass. Cowan, S.S. and Kolb, D.A., 2005. Innovations in professional education: Steps on a journey to learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. George, J.M., 2000. Emotions and leadership: The role of emotional intelligence. Human Relations. 53, 1027-1055. Read More