The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace

Laura Benton, COO, Reassured

As the end of 2021, the coronavirus pandemic continues to impact employees in a number of ways– from worries about job security and anxiety around personal health to concerns about older relatives and family. Employees have always had worries to contend with, of course, but the pandemic has exacerbated these issues even further, with mental health diagnoses skyrocketing this past year as a result.

While there is no perfect antidote to solving these issues, treating employees well – and with a little emotional intelligence– can go a long way. Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand and manage emotions and those of the people around you. It means knowing what you’re feeling, how to control those emotions, and how they will impact others. And it can work wonders on staff morale and productivity.

Lockdown strategy

Emotional intelligence was central to our strategy in 2020. When lockdown hit, our biggest priorities were our people and our customers, and we knew that we could only look after the latter by focusing on the former.

As an employer, we’ve been extremely mindful of our employees’ mental health. From the outset, we prioritized transparency and communication from management to staff, with regular email updates, satisfaction surveys, and one-to-one virtual meetings to make sure everyone was coping well and felt adequately supported.

But it was our emotional intelligence training that really made all the difference. The concept has five key tenets – self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills. Focusing on these areas drastically impacts how effectively the business communicates with our people. With the pandemic completely overturning life as we know it, this has never been more important.

And it has a knock-on impact too. Emotionally intelligent leaders foster loyalty because they treat their people as individuals; they understand them on a much deeper level, they are aware of their own development areas, and they never let their own emotions get the better of them. When employees feel like their needs are being put at the center of the business decision-making process, they feel valued, cared for and appreciated.

"When lockdown hit, our biggest priorities were our people and our customers, and we knew that we could only look after the latter by focusing on the former."

As we move into a period that many have coined ‘The Great Resignation’, it’s vital that employers champion this approach. According to the ONS, 791,000 people moved jobs between April and June this year, roughly 2% of the workforce. That represents the highest rate since March 2019, and the second highest for more than a decade. If employers can push back against this tide by promoting greater emotional intelligence in the workplace, it will be a worthwhile endeavor.

Hard decisions will still need to be made, of course, but how they are communicated will be key. Those with a high degree of emotional intelligence are much better communicators because they can respond well to people’s feelings by reading body language and picking up on subtle changes in tone that might indicate disappointment, happiness or any other emotion that will impact wellbeing. This means that news can be delivered to individual staff in a way that suits their personality, leaving them feeling much more comfortable with any changes being made.

Being able to put this into practice will make a tangible difference to a company’s workforce. Not only will it make staff happier, but it will also make them 13% more productive, according to a study published by Oxford University's Saïd Business School. For Reassured, it has resulted in our highest-ever employee engagement scores this year.

Put it into practice

Communications around the return to the office provide a good opportunity to test these skills. In our experience, employees’ feelings are very mixed on this subject, even in cases where management thinks having people in the office will improve performance, boost engagement, or simply get back to “normal”. But many employees have adjusted to homeworking now and are excelling in their role. So, if they are doing their work to a high standard, why take it away?

We realized through lockdown that it’s the person, not the location, that determines success at work. If our employees continue to do an amazing job working from home beyond the pandemic, we have no reason to stop this from happening. They can also choose to work flexibly between their home and the office and have the best of both.  This school of thought exemplifies good emotional intelligence. In this one policy alone, we can see three of its five key tenets self-awareness, empathy and emotional regulation.

Without a doubt, loyalty and happiness breed a more stable, productive workforce that is likely to weather uncertainty more effectively. Proper emotional intelligence can deliver all of these benefits and more, so employees that put these skills into practice will not only survive the challenges of the pandemic, but also continue to thrive.