Emotional Intelligence & Conflict Management

Learning Objectives

To understand the meaning of emotional intelligence
To understand the meaning of constructive conflict management
To learn strategies for cultivating emotional intelligence
To understand why emotional intelligence is important for communication and conflict

What is Emotional Intelligence and Constructive Conflict Management?

Emotional intelligence is the ability to understand, use, and manage your own emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges and defuse conflict (Flanagan & Runde, 2009).

Constructive Conflict Management is understanding each other and building a decision considering what is stated by different team members ("Group," 2013).

Why is emotional intelligence important to understand for conflict management?

Emotional intelligence contributes significantly to an individual's ability to resolve conflict and do so constructively. It is important to understand the individual role we all play within conflict before diving into specific conflict scenarios. Emotionally intelligent individuals are able to control their emotions to remain calm while dealing with stressful situations. They are a valuable contribution to their teams because the other members know they can rely on them during a crisis. Emotionally intelligent individuals are able to recover from setbacks quickly through the use of their positivity (Reilly, 2022). These are all valuable traits for being able to work with others to resolve conflict.

Emotional Intelligence Strategies

Figuring out how to get the most you can out of conflict is emotional intelligence at work.

Here are some strategies to do so:

Start early to develop norms for how conflict will be addressed when it arises
Create a climate of trust and collaboration
Allowing emotions to foster open communication about issues
Using constructive communication techniques to stay focused on creatively resolving problems

(Flanagan & Runde, 2009).

Video: "5 Ways to Build Emotional Intelligence in Teams in 2022"

This video will help to further your understanding of what emotional intelligence is and why it is important to consider within a team. It discusses the way low emotional intelligence shows up in teams as well. The video describes the different levels of emotional intelligence and how to build it.

This Session Lab article lists 25 activities for teams to build emotional intelligence within each category of Goleman's "five categories of emotional intelligence."

Sources

Flanagan, Tim, and Craig Runde. “How Teams Can Capitalize on Conflict.” Strategy & Leadership, vol. 37, no. 1, 2009, pp. 20–22

Group processes & intergroup relations, 2013, Vol.16 (1), p.126-136

Reilly, P. J. (2022). Developing Emotionally Intelligent Work Teams Improves Performance and Organizational Wellbeing: A Literature Review. New Review of Academic Librarianship, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/13614533.2022.2112716

Schlaerth, Andrea, et al. “A Meta-Analytical Review of the Relationship Between Emotional Intelligence and Leaders’ Constructive Conflict Management.” Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, vol. 16, no. 1, 2013, pp. 126–36, https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430212439907.

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