Jun192018
Equipo realzando actividad team building

We start a series of articles on one of the aspects that can best affect how your company functions: emotional intelligence. Through these publications, we will try to get you closer to this exciting —and still under study— field of industrial psychology. Let’s start by explaining what we really mean when we talk about EI.

What is emotional intelligence?

According to the definition by Reuver Bar-On —one of the most reputable EI experts— emotional intelligence is the set of interrelated emotional and social dexterities, abilities and non-cognitive skills that determine how we understand and express ourselves, how we understand and relate to others and how we deal with daily demands, challenges and pressures.

Can emotional intelligence be measured?

At first glance, it would seem that IE cannot be measured as we are arguably talking about subjective qualities and capacities. But you should know that there are three models for the analysis and measurement of EI. One of the most outstanding is the one by Reuver Bar-On which after more than 33 years of research allows us to obtain a measure of EI, through the analysis of 5 skills and 15 factors.

The five skills in the Bar-On model

The model is made up of five skills:

  1. The abilityof self-perception. The ability to understand our own emotions, express our feelings and describe ourselves.
  2. Theinterpersonal  The one which allows us to comprehend the feelings of other people and relate to them.
  3. The ability to make decisions. The ability to manage and control our emotions so that they work for and not against us.
  4. The ability of self-expression.The ability to manage changes and solve problems of self and interpersonal
  5. The abilityto manage stress. Our ability to generate a positive mood and be a motivated person.

Very soon we will be talking about the factors that make up each of these skills and how to evaluate them.

If you want us to supply more information, if you wish to suggest a topic for future posts, or if you want to tell us about your experiences, please do leave us a comment.