Self-Awareness and Emotional Intelligence in Leadership

Running head: SELF-AWARENESS & EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IN LEADERSHIP 1
Self-Awareness and Emotional Intelligence in Leadership
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SELF-AWARENESS & EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IN LEADERSHIP 2
SELF-AWARENESS & EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IN LEADERSHIP
Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to fathom and manage one’s individual
emotions and acknowledge and influence the emotions of people around him. Individuals with
great extent of emotional intelligence know what they are feeling, what their emotions imply,
and how such emotions can influence other individuals. For leaders, emotional intelligence
remains necessary for success since they will be able to remain in control, and calmly assess
situation (Spano-Szekely, Griffin, Clavelle & Fitzpatrick, 2016).
Self-awareness is one of the five fundamental elements of emotional intelligence and the
more a leader self-awareness, the higher such a leader’s emotional intelligence is. A leader who
is self-aware will always know how he feels, and how his emotions and actions might affect
persons around him. Thus being self-aware when one is in leadership position implies having a
precise picture of your weakness and strengths and it implies behaving with humanity
(Vasilagos, Polychroniou & Maroudas, 2017).
According to Martin Bowles (2018) presentation, awareness of oneself or self-awareness
is extremely important in ensuring maximum contribution of a leader in organization. The
fundamental in leadership is self-awareness and emotional intelligence (Martine, 2018). This is
true because it dictates good governance whereby a leader will be able to understand the
governance side of things. Leaders must, therefore, know the people around them and trust them
for maximum contribution to be achieved in leadership position.
Martin (2018) holds that leaders must understand numbers to clearly understand the
system as this is the stepping stone towards success in leadership position. Such leaders will be
useful since they will be able to understand and appreciate the differences. By understanding the
differences, a leader will be able to appreciate the each person around him is difference. This