In a world full of dynamic changes, emotional intelligence is gaining more and more importance in the workplace. In essence, emotional intelligence, or EQ, is a person’s ability to manage their own emotions and to correctly recognize the emotions of others. EQ helps people cope with a constantly changing environment, improves coping with stressful situations in everyday life and, as a result, improves work-life balance.
In detail
EQ components are two by two. These are the knowledge and management, respectively, of one’s own emotions and those of others.
Knowing yourself includes strengths and weaknesses, as well as managing your own emotions. Understanding the emotions and needs of others and managing relationships with others are also part of EQ. One cannot always control the emotions one experiences, but one can manage one’s reactions provoked by them.
Empathy
Empathy is the ability to put onerself in another person’s shoes to understand their feelings and motivations for their actions.
To become more empathetic, one can develop one’s skills through active listening. This means hearing and understanding the meaning of the words spoken by others and is more difficult than it sounds. Other ways to develop empathy is to actively seek different perspectives to improve understanding of those around you. Being curious about others and reading about different cultures enriches a person and his/her ability to put oneself “in the shoes” of others.
The difference between empathy and pity
Empathy has four components. They are accepting another person’s perspective, refraining from judging someone, recognizing the emotions of others, and communicating. When a person is experiencing strong emotions, it is empathetic when someone tells him/her that he/she understands him/her and that he/she does not need to go through this period alone. Expressing regret is when a person tries to soften what they hear by looking for the positive in it and saying something like “it could be worse” or “at least it’s not this” (meaning something worse or referring to something, via which someone else passes). In a moment of sharing something difficult and personal with another person, a better response is “I don’t know what to say, but thank you for sharing with me.”
