How emotional intelligence can
benefit career - and your life
• Emotional intelligence describes
the ability to recognize and
understand emotions in yourself
and others.
• Dr. Travis Bradberry reveals why
boosting your EQ can improve
your job prospects and your
mental health.
There is a time in the life of every
predicament where it is ripe for
resolution. Emotions provide the cue to
act when a problem is big enough to see,
yet still small enough to solve. By
understanding your emotions, you can
move adeptly through your current
challenges and prevent future ones.
Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the
“something” in each of us that is a bit
intangible. It affects how we manage
behavior, navigate social complexities,
and make personal decisions that
achieve positive results. Emotional
intelligence is your ability to recognize
and understand emotions in yourself and
others, and your ability to use this
awareness to manage your behavior and
relationships.
Emotional Intelligence Can Make
Your Career
Decades of research now point to
emotional intelligence as the critical
factor that sets star performers apart
from the rest of the pack. It’s a powerful
way to focus your energy in one
direction with a tremendous result.
TalentSmart tested emotional
intelligence alongside 33 other
important workplace skills, and found
that emotional intelligence is the
strongest predictor of performance,
explaining a full 58% of success in all
types of jobs.
Of all the people we’ve studied at work,
we've found that 90% of top performers
are also high in emotional intelligence.
On the flip side, just 20% of bottom
performers are high in emotional
intelligence. You can be a top performer
without emotional intelligence, but the
chances are slim.
Naturally, people with a high degree of
emotional intelligence make more
money—an average of $29,000 more
per year than people with a low degree
of emotional intelligence. The link
between emotional intelligence and
earnings is so direct that every point
increase in emotional intelligence adds
$1,300 to an annual salary. These
findings hold true for people in all
industries, at all levels, in every region
of the world. We haven’t yet been able
to find a job in which performance and
pay aren’t tied closely to emotional
intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence Can Save
Your Life
When you stuff your feelings, they
quickly build into the uncomfortable
sensations of tension, stress, and
anxiety. Unaddressed emotions strain
the mind and body. Your emotional
intelligence skills help make stress more
manageable by enabling you to spot and
tackle tough situations before things
escalate.
People who fail to use their emotional
intelligence skills are more likely to turn
to other, less effective means of
managing their mood. They are twice as
likely to experience anxiety, depression,
substance abuse, and even thoughts of
suicide.
Scores of research studies have come
forth linking emotional intelligence and
susceptibility to disease. Stress, anxiety,
and depression suppress the immune
system, creating a vulnerability to
everything from the common cold to
cancer. The potency of your immune
system is tied to your emotional state
via neuropeptides: complex chemicals
that act as messengers between the
mind and body. When your mind is
flooded with tension or distress, it
signals the body to decrease energy
directed towards fighting disease. This
change increases your vulnerability to an
attack.
Research even shows a definitive link
between emotional distress and serious
forms of illness, such as cancer. One of
the first long-term studies measured
women’s stress levels over a 24-year
period. Researchers tracked the degree
to which each woman experienced
tension, fear, anxiety, and sleep
disturbances─all forms of emotional
distress resulting from unresolved
conflict and unmanaged emotion.
Women who experienced higher levels of
stress during this 24-year period were
twice as likely to develop breast cancer.
Emotional intelligence skills can also be
taught to speed the body’s recovery
from disease. People who develop their
emotional intelligence skills during
treatment recover faster from a variety
of ailments, including the two biggest
killers in America─heart disease and
cancer. Teaching emotional intelligence
skills to people with life-threatening
illnesses has been shown to reduce the
rate of recurrence, shrink recovery
times, and lower death rates.
breast cancer and saw remarkable
effects from teaching emotional
intelligence skills during recovery.
Women who were randomly assigned to
this treatment had reduced levels of
stress, kept a better diet, and built
stronger immune systems. Research
presented to the American Heart
Association revealed a similar outcome
for men and women taught emotional
intelligence skills while recovering from
a heart attack.
Emotional intelligence has a strong
influence on health-related outcomes
because it reduces the perception of
stress in response to trying situations.
Emotional intelligence skills strengthen
your brain’s ability to cope with
emotional distress. This resilience keeps
your immune system strong and
protects you from disease.
Bringing It All Together
It's nice to know that working on your
EQ can have benefits in some of the
most important areas of your life. A
healthy career and a healthy body ticks
a couple of very important boxes.
Source:
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/02/emotional-
intelligence-career-life-personal-development

Researchers at Ohio State University

studied 227 women diagnosed with