Running head: GROUP EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE 1

Group Emotional Intelligence

Julie Khmelchenko

HCIN – 544 Advanced Health Care Information Management

Tenille Grifford, RN MSN

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GROUP EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
Group Emotional Intelligence

The workforce is evolving, and workers have higher expectations of their organizations

and leaders regarding management skills and approaches to problem-solving. Hence, a leader

that possesses Emotional Intelligence (EI) plays a significant role in the success of group

dynamics to achieve positive results. Casper (2002) defined EI as “the ability to sense,

understand, manage and apply the information and power of emotions as your greatest source of

energy, motivation, connection, and influence. To be able to utilize EI properly, one must

possess five key components that constitute EI, which are self-awareness, self-regulation,

motivation, social skill, and empathy (Gyles, 2020). A leader with high EI can accurately gauge

how his team feels and can deliver directives in a way that will resonate with the associates

(Core Process, 2018). Additionally, the best practice of EI is when a team intentionally manage

their emotions to benefit professionally and personally.

A group can greatly benefit from EI when working as a team on projects. A leader with EI

quality can cultivate and establish EI norms within the department with an emphasis on

interpersonal understanding. Therefore, eventually, the team will be more sensitive to each

other's needs, concerns and feelings, and understand each other’s perspectives. Barr and

Dowding (2016) stated, “transformational leaders value empathy and two-way communication;

they tend to be friendly and use empathy to motivate staff.” The leaders enhance the group

dynamic by giving feedback and not criticism. Open communication channels create trust, a

better relationship, and successful collaboration. Core Process (2017) stated, "the motivation of

each person on a team contributes to the team dynamic and its decisions by influencing patterns

of thinking, feeling and acting. These factors affect the team’s performance by their approach to

task completion and how they interact with each other.” Therefore, group dynamic becomes
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GROUP EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
positive when leaders and subordinates express EI during collaboration while working on various

projects. Furthermore, when a group possesses EI, they work cohesively, and each team member

is performing tasks based on individual strengths, which benefits a project to be completed with

competence, knowledge, smooth transitions between all phases, and meet all deadlines.
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GROUP EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
Reference

Casper, C. M. (2002). Using emotional intelligence to improve project performance. Project

Management Institute. Retrieved from https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/emotional-

intelligence-improve-project-performance-1019

Core Process. (2018, March 29). How can emotional intelligence improve team dynamics?

Retrieved from https://www.coreprocess.co/team-dynamics-emotional-intelligence/

Barr, J., & Dowding, L. (2019). Leadership in health care. Los Angeles: Sage

Publication. Kindle

Gyles, Y. (2020). Emotional intelligence at work. The Management Centre. Retrieved from

https://www.managementcentre.co.uk/emotional-intelligence-at-work/