Emotional Intelligence, Training, and Leadership Behavior of Administrators - Research Proposal Example

Running Head: Research Proposal Research Proposal [Institute’s Research Proposal Aims and Objectives Experts (Abbott, 1988) have indicated that it is very imperative for a researcher to identify aims and objectives for the study before carrying it out, and for this purpose, the researcher has put enormous efforts to identify different aims and objectives for the proposed research that will enable him to acquire efficient outcomes in the end. It is an observation that very few experts have focused on the field of research administration, and thus, this field of knowledge needs urgent study on some of its important aspects. In addition, research administrators play a crucial role in the future of an organization, and thus, the proposed research will focus on different aspects of research administrators, mainly their emotional intelligence, leadership behavior, and the role that training plays in enhancing the abovementioned characteristics in a research administrator. Rationale In brief, research administration is one of the fields that lacks amount of researches carried on it. In the late 1980s, one of the experts noted that success or failure of higher academic institutions depends primarily on the skills and efficacy of research administrators; however, unfortunately, a huge aspect of this field is still unrecognizable due to lack of research on it. In this regard, it has now become very imperative that one carries out extensive research on the research administrators that will play a vital role in enabling experts understand the role of research administrators, and thus, will allow administration to take efficient steps in providing a stronghold platform to them. Literature Review Until late 1960s, profession of research administrator was considered a part-time profession; however, it has been an observation that today, research administrators are enjoying an important status in their organizations. In specific, research administrators play a crucial role in protecting the complex structure of an academic institution, usually a higher academic institution (Braxton, 1992). Historically, analysis has indicated that research administrators were introduced in the academic institutions to justify the requirements of the federal government, as well as provide platforms to philanthropists to carry out their activities formally in the institutions. However, as the incursion of funds witnessed increment and number of higher academic institutions increased, the research administrators began to witness a radical alteration in their responsibilities from providing platform to NGOs and formalizing demands of the government from protecting and managing all the regulatory processes of the academic institutions. Nowadays, research administrators have to go through a huge amount of complex information involving departure and arrival of monetary funds, as well as exchange of complex information in and out of the academic organizations. Although in the past, the role of research administrators was limited to few disciplines, however, nowadays, the field of research administration has flourished and one can observe them in the field of medicine, business, law, education, social work, etc. In specific, the proposed research will be focusing on the factor of ‘emotional intelligence’ while relating it with the role of research administrators in their field (Braxton, 1992). In specific, different experts have endeavored to define this term in their own way. However, in brief, emotional intelligence refers to the capability of an individual to control and run his emotions in line with the objectives of his work. In addition, emotional intelligence is not only limited to one’s own emotions, but to others’ emotions as well. In this regard, an individual with higher emotional intelligence will be skillful in managing his own, as well as controlling emotions of people around him. In this regard, emotional intelligence can be taken as a force, a motivational force that enables an individual to maintain interactions with humans around him in an efficient and effective manner. In addition, emotional intelligence does not remain limited to only workplaces or organizations; however, exists in personal relationships, families, friends, etc. From such understanding of the importance of emotional intelligence, the proposed research inquires whether research administrators have high emotional intelligence or whether they need to have high emotional intelligence or not. Scrutiny of the resources has indicated that such query has been boggling minds of researchers for many years (Creighton, 2005). Brief review of the literature has indicated that in comparison with other professions globally, the profession of research administrators is one of the most complicated and stressful professions, which indicates the need of high emotional intelligence in research administrators. One of the major reasons of such a need of emotional intelligence is that stress and complexity always results in adverse behavior, and thus, experts (Goleman, 2005) have indicated that it is very important for research administrators to have high emotional intelligence, in order to run and manage the academic organizations in an efficient and effective manner. Observations have indicated that individuals with lower emotional intelligence who were on the research administrators’ position, often ended up having mental and emotional health issues with themselves, and that resulted in the adverse impact on the whole organization. In addition, researchers have specified that research administrators often confront workload more than usual teachers due to various monetary issues of the institutions, and sometimes, poor workplace circumstances worsen the issues adversely. In this regard, it is very imperative that research administrators have a very high emotional intelligence, in order to control and manage their emotions in effective manner. Besides emotional intelligence, the proposed research will be focusing on the leadership behavior of research administrators, it is an observation that a huge number of writers and educators have written on different leadership behavior, and various ways of effective leadership. In this regard, one can come across huge number of questionnaires that analyze the leadership behavior of an individual while evaluating it as an effective leadership behavior or vice versa. According to few experts (Scott, 2001), an effective leader practices five things in his behavior that makes him a true leader. In particular, firstly, an effective leader knows how to behave in order to create his own way; however, at the same time, an efficient leader knows how to motivate people around him with a shared vision with his behavior. In addition, successful leaders always challenge the existing formation or system with their behaviors, and do not allow a person around them to dominate that is another specific characteristic of effective leadership behavior. Moreover, analysis of the literature has indicated that leaders know how to act in order to motivate others to act on their given model, and lastly, the leadership behavior always has the capability of encouraging people around them to work with their heart on the project. All these five practices play a crucial role in the life of an effective leader, and thus, the researcher will put extensive amount of efforts to focus on these five practices while analyzing the leadership behavior of research administrators during the proposed research. In brief, experts have indicated that such practices create a fundamental platform for the development and nurturing of a true leader (Kouzes & Posner, 1995). Further review has indicated that in such stressful conditions, it is very important for research administrators to have some kind of platform or environment that can facilitate them in enhancing their emotional intelligence. For this reason, experts have identified that factors of maturity and spirituality plays a crucial role in enhancing the emotional intelligence of an individual. On the other hand, experts have associated both factors with mentorship, and thus, have proposed some kind of mentorship for research administrators that can play a vital role in improving their emotional intelligence, as well as leadership skills at the workplace. In this regard, one study involved training of junior research administrators by their senior research administrators that resulted in evident and effective outcomes. In this regard, training in the form of mentoring relationship can be very beneficial in improving the emotional intelligence and leadership behavior of the research administrators. Although benefits of training on research administrators are evident, however, it is very imperative for understand the necessity of including component of emotional intelligence in training curriculum of research administrators. In this regard, experts have clarified that it is very essential for the institution to include material on emotional intelligence during different training programs for the research administrators, as studies have confirmed that emotional intelligence is something that is teachable, as well as learnable. In this respect, training activities and sessions involving social, decision-making, and conflict-management skills can be very beneficial in enhancing emotional intelligence, as well as improving leadership behavior of the research administrators, as emotional intelligence does have a direct relationship with leadership behavior. Studies have shown that individuals at leadership positions usually have a higher emotional intelligence that indicates the direct relationship of the two factors. Methodology Besides identifying and confirming objectives and problem statement of the research, method is also a very important and crucial component of every research that plays a vital role in confirming the accomplishment or disintegration of the research. In this respect, the researcher has given significant place to methodology part in this study, and thus, the researcher has endeavored to put extensive amount of efforts to opt for most effective method for the proposed research. In this regard, secondary research method will be groundwork of the proposed study that will enable the study to include examination and analysis of a huge amount of books, magazines, journals, websites, etc that will allow acquisition of various theoretical perceptions associated with the role of emotional intelligence and leadership behavior in the effectiveness of research administrators. Subsequently, it is an observation that various experts, educators, leaders, and scholars have carried out studies related to the field of research administration, and more specifically, related to the research administrators and their leadership behavior, as well as the role of emotional intelligence that will be tremendously beneficial during the proposed research. Furthermore, without any doubt, internet is the most resourceful platform for the acquisition of huge amount of matter and literature on any subject, and thus, the proposed research will benefit from it as well. Specifically, various organizations offer their databases of e-books and journals on the internet, and therefore, it will enable the researcher to acquire quality information without going to the library, and thus, will be saving a lot of time of the researcher. Unfortunately, secondary research methodology does have a few constraints that will create difficulties during the research, and thus, researcher cannot rely on the resources of secondary research methodology only. In this regard, the researcher will put efforts to carry out primary research as well to acquire real-scenario information that will be very vital to enhance validity and accuracy of the proposed research. Research Plan Specifically, the researcher will carry out the proposed study in the following way: Selecting the topic Research proposal submission Recognition & classification of the resources Evaluation and analysis of the resources Drafting phase of the report Submission of the draft Writing the dissertation Proofing/Editing Submission of the final dissertation It is expectation that abovementioned stages of the proposed research will take roughly four weeks to complete, in order to acquire efficient outcomes. References Abbott, A. (1988). The system of professions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Braxton, J.M. (1992). ‘Teaching performance norms in academia’. Research in Higher Education, 33(5), 533-569. Creighton, T. (2005). Leading from below the surface: A non-traditional approach to school leadership. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Goleman, D. (1995). Emotional intelligence. New York: Bantam Books. Kouzes, J. & Posner, B. (1995). The leadership challenge. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. Scott, W. (2001). Institutions and organizations. Thousand Oaks: Sage. Read More