Dr Mushtaque B Barq
The man is a brilliant creation of the Creator for the reason that he is equipped with highly sensitive faculties and equally monitored by sentiments and responses. Emotional intelligence is nothing new, as the man, as mentioned in scripts, has been raised out of dust, and from this dust he has lifted along his intelligence and his sentiments as well. This capability has enriched his self-awareness, which, in reciprocity, has inculcated in him the spirit of knowing His Creator and all about Him.
The more a man takes refuge in the emotional intelligence, the more he feels connected to the bigger cosmos of which he is actually a part. Constantly monitoring his own resources has repeatedly motivated him to regulate himself, resulting in increased self-discipline and awareness. It is this faculty that keeps him motivated to learn, to connect, and to find solace in the assemblies where emotions are addressed. Witnessing this colossal proceeding around, he is able to conquer the mystery of empathy, which is what he finds as a reward for his emotional binding.
One of the best outcomes of emotional intelligence is to derive the best out of the ordinary. A team leader, for instance, can create a better work culture by fixing roles for his team members, allowing them to express themselves, and permitting them to listen and learn. A dynamic leader qualifies emotional intelligence by extracting gems out of ore. His emotions can reshape the deformity in the group, as a better connection makes a better team. This divine attachment can not only add human source but also reduce ‘exclusiveness’ within the team, which in reciprocity can certainly reduce room temperature IQ to let others be vocal whenever needed. Soft skills are really soft, at least for the sake of saying it, but this softness is further softened by being soft to improve others. Emotional intelligence underpins our relationships, both personal and professional.
At the workplace, as I have experienced, it works well, and at home it must be served on the table like a favourite dish. At work places, emotional intelligence can soften the feedback, otherwise a nightmare for one and all. Talking about the feedback at the workplace, every second fellow is a boss; he enjoys the divine power to be judgmental, and above all, his response at any point in time stands valid to please the boss. This invalidity is proportional to his lack of human touch. A mistake by mistake is no mistake, but a mistake for a cause can be rectified by empathy. A repetitive mistake is the outcome of negligence both by the subject and object. In most of the cases, studies have shown that EI has better resolving results to address the ambivalence leading to motivate and coach the rest, thus a culture we commonly refer to as ‘Culture of Collaboration’. Once this culture is nursed properly, it pays back by building psychological safety within the group, where you can reach out to your colleagues to address their professional requirements besides personal counselling.
Emotional intelligence was defined in the 1990s by Salvoy and Mayers as “a type of social intelligence that involves the ability to monitor one’s own and others’ emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions,” but later on they further worked on the definition and broadened its scope by adding the verbal and non-verbal appraisal and expression of emotions, the regulation of emotions in the self and others, and the utilisation of emotional content in problem solving. Profile -3 (WEIP) Work-group reveals that Emotional Intelligence is a scale designed in Australia as a self-report to measure the EI of people in work teams. It has very good internal consistency and presents correlations with several instruments that prove its convergent validity.
When we talk about Goleman’s emotional intelligence model, that is self-management. He says, “The more people develop self-awareness, the more people will see an increase in the ability to manage their actions.” His concept signifies the role of self-management that plays a pivotal role in decision-making. Furthermore, self-management requires recognition and adaptability like patience, understanding, and good listening skills. A good leader must be a good listener; he must be bestowed with attentiveness to tone shifts in speech and change in body language during crucial moments. Goleman’s model is workable if put to use at workstations where leadership programs run in parallel. Leaders must actively guide conversations by focussing on core issues using a functional approach to avoid indirect questions and cross-references or gossip. A leader must constantly cut orthogonal projections to steer the flow leading to logical conclusion.
The key objective in general regarding emotional intelligence is to learn how to control maladaptive emotional responses by keeping track of our triggers and behaviours, like being less aggressive, and to reach out for common and generally accepted conclusions rather than a punitive response in the guise of feedback. It is imperative to know how to render feedback. Before forwarding verbal or written feedback, one must ask himself a serious question. A question that may in turn raise so many other questions, and before forwarding the feedback, one has to answer those serious questions. Do I really know how to provide feedback? Have I ever been trained to do so? What impact can his feedback have on the person on the receiving end? Putting a saddle on the car or vice versa can no longer work; one has to learn when and how to write or speak before it will spoil someone who has never been ‘included’ in the infinite of this rat race.
Studies also reveal emotional intelligence refers to the intelligence of the heart. It is the ability to notice, understand, and manage one’s as well as others’ emotions. In every individual, emotions have a tremendous source of energy filled with vigour, potential, and strength. Everyone is capable of utilising this energy intelligently. It is the need of the hour to learn how to communicate with others regularly in all situations. We try to be polite when the outcome is humble, and vice versa. We are exposed, and our standard and merit of ‘exclusiveness’ come to the fore when we fail to claim our being intelligent. Engaging in profound introspection can enhance our efforts. Things often take the wrong turn at work or at home, for that matter of fact, and our intelligence comes in handy if we have trained and tempered our responses. Very few people know the art of staying cool even when the circumstances are contradictory. They leave a mark, footsteps on the burning sand, to let the travellers reach safe destinies.
Once he becomes a representative of ‘inclusiveness,’ he better comprehends his social skills, like addressing the needs of those who are hard to express and working with them who are either financially underscored or with those who enjoy financial dominance. As a community, we can donate much to achieve our common goal. Studies have revealed that recalling bad memories, nursing negative thoughts, hopelessness, overtaxing the mind, ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ showing some down, lack of human companionship, and, of course, lack of self-introspection are a few triggers that encourage exclusivity. Over all, the man is what he claims: better than the rest of the creations for a few reasons: one, that he is intelligent enough to plan, and second, that he is emotionally rich enough to find a connection with the rest to make this earth the best place to live.
Dr. Mushtaq B.Barq is a Columnist, Poet and Fiction Writer. He is the author of “Feeble prisoner, “ Wings of Love” and many translation works are credited to the author like “ Verses Of Wahab
