The Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Employee Performance and Productivity - Essay Example

0 Introduction Emotions influence almost everything in people’s everyday life. Both people’s physiology and behavior are affected by emotions, such as anger, sadness or happiness, as well as by mental reactions like acceptance of self, and attitudes and reactions to the external world’s stimuli. In other words, people are controlled by their emotions. In the business context, a lot of scholars believe that emotions might have a great influence on employees’ behavior in the workplace - emotions affect employees’ actions, motivation, and even performance directly. Scholars also mention that Emotional Intelligence (EI) has strong influence on the performance of employees (EP). The basis for such a statement is the assumption that emotional intelligence can enhance individual, team and organizational effectiveness. The aim of this paper is to critically examine the relationship between emotional intelligence and employee performance. In particular, this paper aims at defining why emotional intelligence is important for employee performance and how the two concepts are related. First of all this essay will attempt to provide a reader with a basic understanding of what emotional intelligence and employee performance are. Secondly, the paper will utilize existing scholarship research in order to identify the relationship between emotional intelligence and employee performance. Thirdly, analysis and evaluation of the relation between emotional intelligence and employee performance will be conducted in order to determine whether emotional intelligence is important for employee performance or not. Finally, the presented work will provide conclusions outlining the relationship between emotional intelligence and employee performance, as well as limitations of the given research. 2.0 Defining Emotional Intelligence (EI) and Employee Performance (EP) 2.1 Emotional Intelligence (EI) According to Mcshane, Olekalns and Travaglione (2010, 130), “emotional intelligence is a set of abilities to perceive and express emotion, assimilate emotion in thought, understand and reason with emotion, and regulate emotion in oneself and others.” However, emotional intelligence is not about just being friendly, giving appropriate comments, or controlling one’s feelings (Mustafa and Amjad 2011, 241). It is an ability to recognize and understand own emotional responses of self and other people accurately (Cherniss and Adler 2000, 13). The statement of Allameh et al. (2011, 349) also supports this definition saying that emotional intelligence is not a simple quality of a personality; instead, it is a combination of capabilities, which includes comprehension, judgment and perceiving of emotions – own emotions and emotions of other people. Mcshane, Olekalns and Travaglione (2010, 130) have identified four dimensions of emotional intelligence. They are self awareness, self management, social awareness and relationship management. This classification goes in line with the findings of Boyatzis, Goleman and Rhee (1999, 3). These researches have determined that “emotional intelligence includes two dimensions, internal and external. The self awareness, self image, independence feeling, self realization capacity and decisiveness regard as internal elements. The external elements are inter-individual relationship, compassion and feeling of responsibility.” Finally, many scholars and researchers argue that emotional intelligence have positive influence on employee’s job satisfaction, ability to deal with stress, and work attitudes (Mustafa and Amjad 2011, 241; Allameh et al. 2011, 348). 2.2 Employee Performance (EP) Wu (2011, 22) described employee performance as the amount of effort that employees input into their jobs. The definition of Schermerhorn, Hunt and Osborn (2005, 122) is quite similar – it states that employee performance includes two elements: quantity and quality of final results brought by employee’s or team’s effort achievement. Moreover, Befort and Hattrup (2003, 17) present another perspective at the concept – they defined employee performance as “the demands of the job, the targets and assignments of the company, and beliefs in the company about what kind of behaviors are most valuable.” Many researchers of organizational behavior believe that together with emotional intelligence employee performance is influenced by many factors, among which are job satisfaction, stress in workplace, work attitude, work success and outputs, among others. Wu (2011, 23) also outlines that stress will definitely lower the performance of employees, because employees need to spend some additional time and energy for dealing with stressors. Therefore, stress limits employees’ concentration on the task being performed. Also, Rehman and Waheed (2011, 168) wrote that social sciences and behavioral research show that job satisfaction has a positive effect on employee performance. 3.0 Discussion 3.1 The relationship of Emotional Intelligence (EI), Job satisfaction, Attitude and Stress Many researches provide findings that show that emotional intelligence has a positive impact on job satisfaction. For example, the results of Mustafa and Amjad’s research (2001, 249) indicate that higher levels of emotional intelligence lead to better job satisfaction and involvement. This, according to the scientists, is caused by high levels of emotional intelligence of the people (employees) – they are believed to experience long periods of positive moods that enable them to respond to the current situation in a more adequate manner, without the feelings of angriness, depression and lost. However, Allameh et al. (2011, 348) hold a different position. They report that emotional intelligence and job satisfaction have only moderate relation. Accordings to these researchers, the relationship between emotional intelligence and job satisfaction is not strong enough to be taken into account. They also write that job satisfaction is not affected by emotional intelligence much enough and can be influenced by environmental factors. Many scholars use the study conducted by Carmeli (2003, 789) to argue that emotional intelligence can, potentially, lead to more positive attitudes and behaviors of employees. Moreover, Mayer, Salovey and Caruso (2000, 99) state that they “view emotional intelligence as a competency that is expected to augment positive attitudes toward work, and drive positive behaviors and better outcomes.” In addition, employees’ attitudes are predefined by several factors that in include job satisfaction, employees’ emotions and job involvement among others (Staw and Barsade 1993, 304; Mustafa and Amjad 2011, 243). Therefore, emotional intelligence has a relatively significant influence on employees’ job attitudes. Another idea to take into account is the fact that most of the researches, as well as their findings, support the idea that emotional intelligence has positive relationship with the ability of employees to manage stress. According to the statement of Motowidlo, Packard and Manning (1986, 618), complex task requirements given by a manage or a supervisor might cause an increase in the employee’s stress level. In the other words, negative emotional experiences will lead to employee’s experiencing the emotions of fear, angriness and depression. On this matter Wu (2001, 23) writes that job stress is a kind of work-related factors that are likely to bring negative effects to the psychological state of an employee. However, emotionally intelligent employees better at coping with such problems – they have a better ability to control and use their emotions effectively enough as to deal with those stressors. Therefore, the relationship between emotional intelligence and job stress is very strong. 3.2 The relationship of Employee Performance (EP), Job satisfaction, Attitude and Stress Many scholars and researchers have spent years trying to find out “whether a happy worker is a productive worker.” Iaffaldano and Muchinsky (1985, 251) define the relationship between employee performance and job satisfaction as “blank theory” and “illusion.” This means there is no dependence between job satisfaction and employee performance. However, more recent studies conducted by Saari and Judge (2004, 398) point out that the dependence exists, and it is stronger in cases when employees have to deal with more complex tasks (professional jobs). This idea leads to an assumption that employees’ performance is better stimulated by difficult assignments. In the past, many researchers believed that the relationship between job satisfaction and employee performance is dependant on job attitudes that affect employees’ performance. However, Staw and Barsade (1993, 304) argue that job satisfaction is not the only element of job attitude that can affect employee performance. They also point out that job performance of the employees may be affected by the moods (positive and negative) of the people as well. In addition, according to the conclusions of Lazarus (1991, 542), any effective reactions, such as change in moods and emotions, that employees experienced in the workplace, have a direct impact on job performance. In other words, the performance of employees is influenced by the attitudes of the employees. As for the relationship between stress and employee performance, most of the empirical studies and researches have pointed out an inconsistent relationship between stress and employee performance. Siu (2003, 342) concludes that it is impossible to improve employee’s job performance if stress factors are involved. On the contrary, stress factors have a negative impact on the performance of employees. Job-related stresses require employees to spend time dealing with them, first of all, and, secondly, reduce the level of concentration on the task being carried out at the moment. However, LePine, Podsakoff and LePine (2005, 766) argue that, if an employee percepts stress as challenge, he or she show causes psychological resistance to the stressors, thus achieving higher performance. The finding of Wu (2011, 22) also support this argument. The researcher argues that in some situations certain types of stress can stimulate the performance of employees and, in such a way, lead to higher performance and a number of positive outcomes. 3.3 The relationship between Emotional Intelligence (EI) and Employee Performance (EP) According to the presented above information related to emotional intelligence and employee performance, it can said that job satisfaction, employee attitudes and work stress have a significant influence on both emotional intelligence and employee performance. Moreover, it can be said that that job satisfaction, employee attitudes and work stress have a direct impact on job performance. The major reason for drawing such a conclusion is that emotional intelligence is ability for self control that is related to self-awareness, self-discipline and self-adjustment. It also helps employees to interpret emotional reactions of other people. Therefore, employees that have high levels of emotional intelligence have a better understanding of own feelings, feelings of other people, and of the whole situation. Thereby, these abilities are sure to lead to positive effects in relations to job satisfaction, employee attitude. In addition, higher levels of emotional intelligence are likely to contribute to work stress levels of emotionally intelligent employees. Once an employee is satisfied with the job, he or she is likely to develop a positive attitude towards the job and, as a result, show improved job performance. Such positive attitude does not only help employees to achieve higher performance levels, but also helps them to deal with work stress. However, some scholars argue that a dissatisfied worker can be productive as well. This assumption is based on the findings of the researchers that argue that stress has a stimulating effect on some types of the employees. At the same time, it should be remembered that not all the employees will be able to fight with stress during a long time period. If such an employee fails to manage stress at some point, the level of his or her performance will decline because job stress always leads to job burnout, which, in its turn, reduces the employee’s potential for personal accomplishment, increases chances for physical illness and negatively influences the mental state of the person. Therefore, it is important to understand how emotional intelligence can be used for controlling and managing employees with the purpose of improving their job performance. In addition, most of the scholars believe that people with higher levels of emotional intelligence always experience long periods of positive moods and attitudes, and, thus, it is easier for them to achieve better job performance and behaviors. 4.0 Conclusions and Limitations To sum up, emotional intelligence does have a positive and strong effect on employees’ job performance, whether the influence is direct or indirect. At the same time, employees’ job performance is influenced by such factors as job satisfaction, job attitudes and work stress. However, these three major factors that have a strong influence on performance, are, in their turn, directly influenced by emotional intelligence. At the same time, these conclusions cannot be said to be absolutely accurate because, as literature review suggests, age, personal experiences, gender and personality factors also have positive and negative influence on emotional intelligence and employee performance. Therefore, the limitation of the given paper is inability to consider those factors in the research, while, according to some studies, they play a significant role in impacting job performance. Some studies prove that performance of older employees, who are more experienced, may be better than that of young employees, even if young ones are more emotionally intelligent. In addition, it is possible that employees might use personal and extensive work experience to compensate low levels of emotional intelligence and, thus, achieve better performance. As for the gender difference, it has a relatively moderate influence on emotional intelligence and employees’ job performance. However, different ways of thinking of male and female (logically and socially) employees do have an influence of job performance. Finally, the personality of an employee is another important factor that is likely to have some impact on emotional intelligence and, as a result, job performance. This interrelation is caused by the fact that peoples’ thoughts and behaviors are always influenced by peculiarities of their personalities. Read More