MANAGING PEOPLE WITH EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

As a leader in an organization when we are struggling with a deadline, grappling with cut-throat competition ,managing paradigm changes or dealing with delicate decisions, the last interruption we would want is to deal with "people". When the battle is really on and the outcome is undecided, we would want our team to act co-operatively, quickly, rationally; we would not want a disgruntled employee resisting change, a worker who avoids work, a key engineer being tired all day because he has sleepless night thinking about how secure his job is….. But this is what happens, and as a leader we have to deal with it. Few "people problems" can be solved quickly, some are totally beyond control and can only be contained; but we do have influence over many factors which affect our people and so it is our responsibility to ensure that the influence is a positive one. This is where no formula works, and here the human factor comes in, which is very crucial for success. This of course easier said than done. Keeping people motivated and committed in an era of unrelenting and accelerating change is tough. To meet the challenge leaders must be able to create a climate in their organization that not only fosters performance but also builds a sense of pride and purpose. Hence leadership in organizations goes much beyond possessing the professional skills, the leaders and managers of the organizations should also have leadership skills; the social and emotional competencies required to handle their own and other people’s emotions, and to drive these emotions in the right direction. The authors based on their experiences are briefly looking at the emotional competencies to be possessed by a leader/manager which would affect both tangibles like bottom-line results and the retention of talent, and intangibles like work morale, motivation and commitment.