Leaders without emotional awareness, do not relate well to others or engage with them, and in fact, are more likely to cause dissatisfaction, conflict and performance dysfunction. It’s less than 30 years since the idea of emotions having an impact on personal and professional success, productivity and performance was named: emotional intelligence (EI). Emotional awareness operates under the same principles as EI. Its message is simple: When you are emotionally aware, you are conscious of others’ emotions and are more able to bring out the best in their behaviour and performance.
Your thoughts are the primary trigger to your emotions (and vice versa) in somewhat of a cause and effect relationship. How you choose to think about an event or another person directly relates to the emotions triggered by those thoughts. If you change your thoughts, you will change the emotion. Research is proving over and over that an environment of positive emotional energy is needed for achieving peak performance, building strong and sustainable relationships and experiencing good health in the workplace.
A leader’s emotional awareness is important because employees relate to their leader on an emotional level. How an employee feels (e.g., awed, intimidated, indifferent, impressed) about their leader influences the way they do their job and the way they behave on the job. This feeling extends to whether they stay or leave the organization and whether they act as ambassadors (or proud advocates) of the organization.
But let’s face it, it’s sometimes a huge stretch to think and/or feel positive about your leader. Unfortunately, your mental, physical and emotional wellness depends on you being able to adjust to the positive – at the very least, it’s important to be able to ‘trick’ yourself into positive feelings and/or thoughts. Learning the skill of Positive Presence provides employees at all levels with the language, knowledge, exercises, and techniques necessary to make the adjustment and maintain mental, physical and emotional wellness throughout your organization.
CORPORATE HARMONY is grateful to Dr. Michael E. Frisina for his contributions to this entry.
Catherine is the President and CEO of CORPORATE HARMONY, providing virtual solutions for leadership development and organizational culture change. Her leadership and coaching experience as a Project Manager in an ever-changing, fast moving technological organization with unrelenting demands drove her to the realization that a positive mindset and strength-building behaviors are essential for today’s complex and chaotic organizational systems. CORPORATE HARMONY’s virtual platform of programs, coaching and performance measurement, is an innovative online technology of tested proprietary content. The world-class content of CORPORATE HARMONY’s Positive Presence Program develops the skill of ‘Positive Presence’ and the necessary ‘Positive Presence Behaviour Competencies’ for maintaining a positive and energized mindset and increased performance in today’s complex work environment, and leading to a culture of collaboration and connection. Catherine’s vision for Corporate Harmony is to bring the skill of “Positive Presence” to the corporate world as it becomes more complex, ambiguous and chaotic. Catherine is uniquely positioned to impact organizations’ productivity and long term success, with her powerful vision of eliminating bad stress from every workplace around the globe, bringing purpose into the people equation to promote healthy, productive and meaningful work cultures and turn the tide on the neglect of mental health on a global scale. Catherine is author of the book: “CORPORATE HARMONY – The Performance Link for Today’s Modern Organization” Catherine can be reached at: Catherine.Osborne@corporateharmony.ca or go to ‘contact us’ on our website www.corporateharmony.ca. Catherine is available for consultation, and can be reached by 519-695-3407.