Human Relations and Development

Posted: October 17th, 2013

Human Relationships and Development

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Human Relationships and Development

Dublin (2009) describes emotional intelligence as the “ability to recognize your emotions and those people around you”. He further describes emotional intelligence as the ability to effectively work with the emotions of other people in order to sort and come with solutions to problematic situations, which include listening and empathizing. One of the main reasons behind emotional intelligence in good leadership is that it enables the leader to have a good relationship with the workers or those people he/she is leading. An intelligent leader incorporates the psychological skills as part of his/her leadership skills. In other words, a good leader with emotional intelligence is able to put the “human touch into business activities” (Dublin, 2009). He/she is able to cultivate good relationships with the employees as well as the customers.

Most people think that a leader should be someone who takes charge and is only focused on winning or attaining the targeted goal or even winning ball games if it so be required. However, this is not true. Although he should take charge and be focused on the goal, he should not do it in a dictatorial manner, having no regard for the workers’ thoughts, feelings or emotions (Reece, Brandt & Howie, 2010). Treating the workers in an inappropriate manner or disregarding manner is catastrophic. A leader may attain the needed results but lose a good worker in the process. Workers are people have emotions, and sometimes both negative and positive emotions do influence the way they work (Reece, Brandt & Howie, 2010). It is the work of a leader with emotional intelligent to know how to put the positive emotions into use, while he/she shows them how to block the negative influence from influence their work.

Nelson Mandela is an example of a leader who had good emotional intelligence. When he took up to be the president of South Africa after the apartheid era, he knew that the people were emotionally hurt, and that they were full of hate for the white race. However, he worked with their positive emotions, encouraging the people who worked for him as well as the citizens to forgive, as it was the fastest way to recovery.

References

Dublin, A. J. (2009). Human Relations: Interpersonal Job-Oriented Skills, Tenth Edition. New York, NY: Prentice Hall.

Reece, B. L., Brandt, R & Howie K. F. (2010). Effective Human Relations: Interpersonal and Organizational Applications, Eleventh Edition. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.