—Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics

Emotional intelligence, though often overlooked, is a highly sought-after quality in businesses. In a broad sense, emotional intelligence is the ability to channel one’s emotions and harness them in a more productive manner. Self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, proper people skills, and social awareness are all the stepping stones of emotional intelligence in the workplace in a way that they all lead to an overall “organizational awareness.”.

It is no secret that within any organization, it is the employees who, through their synergy, create a work environment that is functional both on the interpersonal and professional levels. Thus, it is imperative that, for a business to thrive, its employees must thrive. A high emotional quotient (EQ) – which is the level of emotional intelligence – has been proven to lead to a happier and more efficient workforce which is more innovative. So, since this cooperation exists between employees, it is only natural that with higher EQs across the board, the result would be better employee engagement as well as higher customer satisfaction.

As stated by Nuzhath-Khatoon (Osmania University – Business department and PhD in Business Management) in her article “The Impact of Emotional Intelligence on the Growth of Entrepreneurship”, researchers attempted to find out the level of emotional intelligence of the entrepreneurs and the difference between the group, gender, and age as well as to find out the percentage of growth and how emotional intelligence has an impact on said growth. It was thus concluded that there was no difference regarding age and gender, but there was a significant difference between the scores of emotional intelligence and growth percentage of the entrepreneurs.

It is obvious then, that a high EQ is a quintessential trait in any leader! According to author and science journalist Daniel Goleman in his book “Emotional Intelligence”, there exist two levels of professional competence, thus two big categories of evaluation modes. One of them evaluates the minimum required competence, those of which are necessary for employees to successfully complete their tasks, and the other focuses on more distinct aspects in which leadership lies. In fact, 60% of those who have used emotional intelligence assessments are very effective in their leadership development, and organizations are 3.2 times more effective at leadership development. Emotionally intelligent leaders have the capability to understand their employee’s needs, can empathize more effectively, and therefore interact and manage their relationships in a more positive fashion all the while retaining, if not increasing, their levels of trust and respect.