MENTAL HEALTH
One area of research that is showing increasing promise in helping managers and employees tackle workplace mental health-related issues is emotional intelligence. At a broad level, emotional intelligence refers to the capacity to identify, monitor and use the emotions of ourselves and others to support our thoughts and actions.
Studies have demonstrated strong links between emotional intelligence and improved mental health, improved stress management and increased employee performance within the workplace.
Furthermore, highly emotionally intelligent employees have been shown to possess superior leadership skills, better conflict resolution and stronger social connections with their colleagues; all of which are known to contribute to better mental health outcomes across all levels of the organisational hierarchy.
In fact, recent research from the domain of positive psychology has found that high levels of emotional intelligence within the workplace can lead to organisational flourishing, a state of optimal performance in both individuals and institutions.
The good news for organisations and individuals who wish to leverage emotional intelligence to achieve
better mental health outcomes is that research shows it can be trained. Recent meta-analytic studies have found that training aimed at developing an individual’s emotional intelligence can lead to reductions in stress, anxiety, depression, hopelessness and suicidal ideation all of which are key mental health targets.
There also appears to be ‘spillover’ effects, with highly emotionally intelligent employees being better able to identify and manage mental health issues not only in themselves but also in their colleagues. As a result of this, developing employees and managers to become better at recognising the emotions of themselves and the feelings of others, and finding ways to deal with those emotions could be an important step forward in creating a workforce where mental health issues are identified, discussed and managed in a positive and proactive way.
If you are interested in learning more about the psychology of emotional intelligence and how it can be applied to workplace settings, Coventry University is offering a free emotional intelligence course called ‘Emotional Intelligence at Work’ as part of its wider MSc Business and Organisational Psychology degree on the FutureLearn platform.
https://www.futurelearn.com/
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