COLAISTE NA hOLLSCOILE CORCAIGH

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE CORK

AN INVESTIGATION IN TO THE EFFECT OF EMOTIONAL

INTELLIGENCE (EI) ON INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE AT WORK

AND CAREER ADVANCEMENT

A Management Report submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for award of

HIGHER DIPLOMA in PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT 2006/2008

FROM

THE DEPARTMENT OF ADULT CONTINUING EDUCATION UNIVERSITY COLLEGE CORK

BY

JENNIFER Mc EVOY

BA (HONS) Applied Psychology DIPLOMA Life & Business Coaching

Student ID: 97327697 Management Research Report AD2812

28TH MAY 2008

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Certification

I, Jennifer Mc Evoy, declare that this management report, submitted in fulfillment of the

requirements for award of Higher Diploma in Personnel Management, by the Department of

Adult Continuing Education, University College Cork, is wholly my own work unless

otherwise referenced or acknowledged. The document has not been submitted for

qualifications at any other academic institution.

Jennifer Mc Evoy

May 2008

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Dedication

Dedicated to my late Granny, Catherine Bardon, who instilled in me her passion for

education and learning and how important it is in the search for an exciting, happy and

fulfilled life. How lucky I am to have inherited such avid curiosity for that which I do not

already know, such sheer amazement at what fascinating lessons the world can teach us and

such good fortune at being given the opportunity to appreciate it all.

“……LIFE IS BUT A WONDERMENT AT HOW LITTLE ONE CAN K NOW AND

HOW MUCH WE HAVE YET TO LEARN……”

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Table of Contents Page Certification ...............................................................................................................................ii

Dedication .................................................................................................................................iii

Table of Contents...................................................................................................................... iv

List of Tables ............................................................................................................................vi

List of Appendices ...................................................................................................................vii

Abstract ...................................................................................................................................viii

Chapter One: Introduction .....................................................................................................1

Purpose and Organisational Context.....................................................................................2

Significance of the study.......................................................................................................3

Research Questions...............................................................................................................3

Summary of the Methodology ..............................................................................................4

Structure of the Report..........................................................................................................4

Chapter Two: Literature Review ...........................................................................................5

Introduction...........................................................................................................................5

Defining Emotional Intelligence...........................................................................................5

Emotional intelligence and performance at work.................................................................9

Individual advancement and emotional intelligence...........................................................12

Chapter Three: Methodology...............................................................................................15

Research aims and objectives .............................................................................................15

Philosophical position.........................................................................................................16

Research approach ..............................................................................................................18

Research methodology........................................................................................................19

Research sample..................................................................................................................20

Data collection ....................................................................................................................22

Research instruments and administration ...........................................................................22

Hypotheses..........................................................................................................................25

Chapter Four: Results...........................................................................................................26

Description of the sample ...................................................................................................26

Response rate ......................................................................................................................26

Demographics .....................................................................................................................26

Data analysis methodology.................................................................................................28

Descriptive statistics ...........................................................................................................30

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Reliability and validity of measures ...................................................................................31

Inferential statistics .............................................................................................................33

Chapter Five: Discussion.......................................................................................................39

Introduction.........................................................................................................................39

Emotional intelligence and performance at work...............................................................39

Emotional intelligence and individual advancement ..........................................................40

IQ vs. emotional intelligence ..............................................................................................42

Chapter Six: Conclusion.......................................................................................................43

Implications for practice .....................................................................................................44

Limitations and implications for future research................................................................45

Personal Reflections.................................................................................................................47

Bibliography ............................................................................................................................49

Appendices...............................................................................................................................55

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List of Tables Page Table 1: TEIQue factors & facets ............................................................................................23

Table 2: Demographic information..........................................................................................23

Table 3: Demographic characteristics of the sample ...............................................................27

Table 4: Bank of Ireland performance management system ratings description.....................29

Table 5: Descriptive statistics ..................................................................................................31

Table 6: Reliability statistics of current study .........................................................................32

Table 7: Pearson correlation coefficients between variables...................................................33

Table 8: Pearson correlation coefficients between average performance ratings & TEIQue

Global Trait EI and factor scores ...............................................................................34

Table 9: Pearson correlation coefficients between career advancement and Global Trait EI

Controlling for the variables Age, Gender, level of education & Tenure..................35

Table 10: Descriptive statistics of normal distribution for relevant variables .........................36

Table 11: Multiple regression analysis attributing amount of individual career advancement

to Global Trait EI and educational attainment........................................................37

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List of Appendices Page Appendix 1: Covering letter.....................................................................................................55

Appendix 2: TEIQue v.1.50.....................................................................................................56

Appendix 3: Demographic information form ..........................................................................59

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Abstract This study examined whether emotional intelligence (EI) has an influence on an individual’s

level of performance at work and their career advancement within an organisation in a below

manager population. The sample consisted of 132 adult employees working mainly in below

manager roles in a leading financial institution. The study utilised the Trait Emotional

Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue) to measure EI along with demographic information and

measures for performance, career advancement and educational attainment. Statistical

analysis of the results indicated that emotional intelligence was positively correlated with

both an individual’s performance and career advancement, however EI did not influence

career advancement to a greater degree than intelligence as hypothesised.

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Chapter One

Introduction

Research has suggested that some people are more successful in their careers than others even

when they have had Equal educational and experiential opportunities (Stuller, 1997). There

are two main concepts, intellectual intelligence (IQ) and emotional intelligence (EI) that have

been posited to explain this inconsistency, each of them having some degree of influence on

exactly how successful an individual is going to be at their job and in their career. Bar-On

(1997) describes IQ as a measure of academic competencies or one’s ability to use

knowledge in making decisions and adapting to new situations. Emotional intelligence (EI) is

a measure of social and emotional competencies and can be defined as “the ability to monitor

one’s own and other’s feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them, and use this

information to guide one’s thinking and actions” (Mayer & Salovey, 1990, p.189).

It is through Goleman’s work that EI has been popularised as a learned skill that is a better

predictor of life success than intellectual attainment or technical ability (Goleman, 1995).

This has sparked the belief that EI may also be a better predictor of work and career success

and although both IQ and EI have a role to play in influencing individual performance

Goleman has asserted the extraordinary claim that 80% of superior performance can be

attributed to EI and not IQ in top line leaders (Goleman, 1998). Such claims, even though not

empirically supported, have led to much speculation in the evolving worlds of business and

research about the degree to which these factors influence individual job performance and

career progression. In the past it was believed that IQ and technical ability contributed the

most to performance at work and career success but now it is the emerging construct of

emotional intelligence which is causing the most excitement in relation to this conjecture.

It is now widely accepted in business that the only sustainable competitive advantage in the

modern economic world is the effective use of human resources and the ability to harness

talent to deliver results. It is not surprising then that so much interest has been generated by

the suggestion that 80% of emotional intelligence can be attributed to EI; top organisations

looking for that elusive edge over their competitors are hungry to find out how to measure EI,

how to develop EI and how to use EI to their advantage. However, before they plough

inordinately large sums of money in to implementing new EI initiatives they want to have

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proof that their money will be will spent and will in fact yield the company valuable profits

and a more effective workforce.

Researchers speculate to try to uncover a deeper understanding of the construct of EI and

what implications this may have for developing a more robust theory, one that is reliable and

valid in the never ending scientific search for truth and knowledge. And so, for differing

purposes, both organisations and researchers are searching for something similar; what is it

exactly that makes a person an occupational success? In order to answer this question

researchers are currently looking to EI to explain the influential factors which go beyond

what cannot be explained by cognitive intelligence and personality traits (Zeidner, Matthews

& Roberts, 2004).

Purpose & Organisational Context

Despite the claims that Goleman has made, while they have had a significant impact on the

corporate world, they are in fact in the most part empirically unsubstantiated. This has led

both himself and other researchers in the field to conduct extensive research in to the

relationship between emotional intelligence and individual performance and career

progression. The empirical evidence in this area has so far very much focused on managers,

their performance at work and their progression within a company (e.g. Dulewicz & Higgs,

2000 & Bar-On, 1997).

The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of EI on individual performance and

career progression. As most of the research in this field to date has focused on manager and

leader populations the first purpose of this study is to address this gap in the literature,

therefore this study will explore the effects of EI on individual performance and career

progression on a below manager population.

The researcher works in Human Resources within the Bank of Ireland which is one of the

leading financial institutions in the country. As a market leader it is of the utmost importance

that the company keep up to date with the most effective way to get the most from their staff

to enable maximum return on investment. A sizeable portion of the Bank of Ireland’s

business is dealt with through personal interaction and it is suggested that EI positively

contributes to job performance when the maintenance of positive personal commitments is

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important to success (Mayer, Salovey & Caruso, 2004). As success in this type of industry

depends so heavily on positive personal interactions the second purpose of this study is to

attempt to provide evidence that higher levels of EI are a valid indicator of higher levels of

individual performance and career progression.

Significance of the Study

It is the intention of the researcher to be able to provide tangible scientific support to add

weighting to the business case for investing in emotional intelligence testing within the Bank

of Ireland. Should the study be successful it will demonstrate that by training staff to increase

their emotional intelligence performance can be enhanced and employees will become more

effective and cost efficient. By demonstrating that EI is a determining factor in career

progression this study should also help to establish the value of using EI as a tool to help in

the recruitment process, promotion, talent measurement, talent identification and succession

planning.

Research Questions

This study is an investigation into the relationship between emotional intelligence, an

individual’s performance and their career advancement within an organisation. Specifically,

the study was designed to address the following three research questions:

1) Does emotional intelligence influence an individual's performance within an

organisation?

2) Does emotional intelligence influence an individual's career advancement within an

organisation?

3) Does emotional intelligence influence individual advancement to a greater degree

than intelligence?

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Summary of Methodology

Due to the purpose and objective of this research, the fact that all three of the variables are

quantitative variables and as the researcher has chosen to adopt an objective, positivist,

deductive approach to the research, a quantitative methodology will be applied. The study

will be conducted on employees from the Bank of Ireland with data being collected by means

of a questionnaire incorporating the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue), a

work performance measure, a career advancement measure and a measure of educational

attainment.

Structure of the Report

This study is reported in six chapters. Chapter One provided an introduction to the topic to be

studied, a purpose statement, the research questions posed in the study, and the significance

of the study. Chapter Two offers a literature review on issues related to EI, individual

performance and career progression. The research design and procedures for conducting the

study are discussed in Chapter Three. The findings are presented in Chapter Four. Critical

discussions of the findings of this study in the context of previous literature are put forward in

Chapter Five. And finally conclusions, along with limitations and implications for future

practice and research are discussed in Chapter Six.

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Chapter Two

Literature Review

Introduction

It has been widely hypothesised that individuals who have a high level of Emotional

Intelligence (EI) are expected to accomplish higher levels of achievements both in their

personal life and their work place (Goleman 1995, 1998; Bar-on et al., 2006) and that they

contribute significantly to the performance of the organizations within which they work

(Carmeli & Josman, 2006; Sala, 2006). In my review of the literature surrounding this topic I

intend on demonstrating that many researchers have empirically supported the claims that

emotional intelligence effects both individual work performance and individual advancement.

The concept of emotional intelligence is an elusive one and I will start by taking a look at the

current understanding of what the top researchers in this field have deemed it to be. Due to

the youth of this topic most of my research is taken from the previous 10 years and as there

has been so much interest in emotional intelligence and it’s influence on performance in all

aspects of life I will only review the current literature which specifically links EI to

individual work performance and finally, more specifically, to an individual’s career

progression within an organisation. I am focusing on these quite narrow topics as my own

research will attempt to demonstrate that emotional intelligence does have a positive

correlation with both work performance and an individual’s career progression. This is based

on the premise that individuals who possess and display higher levels of emotional

intelligence perform to a higher level at work and theoretically should progress more quickly

in an organisation.

Defining Emotional Intelligence

The development of the term “emotional intelligence” and its definition

The roots of emotional intelligence can be traced back to the work of Charles Darwin & his

belief that emotional expression has a vital role to play in survival and adaptation (Darwin

1872/1965). Throughout the 1900’s several intelligence researchers theorised that non-

cognitive aspects were hugely important in constructing a comprehensive model of

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intelligence (Thorndike, 1920; Weschler, 1940). Howard Gardner (1975) built on these

beliefs and introduced the idea of multiple intelligences, including Interpersonal Intelligence,

the ability to understand other people’s desires, intentions and motivations and Intrapersonal

Intelligence, the ability to understand one’s own feelings, motivations and fears.

Even though the term “emotional intelligence” had been around for some time - it was coined

in 1966 by Leuner (Bar-On, Handley & Fund, 2006) - it was not until 1990 that a definition

and comprehensive framework for this concept was given. Mayer & Salovey (1990) defined

emotional intelligence as “the ability to monitor one’s own and other’s feelings and emotions,

to discriminate among them, and use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions”

(Mayer & Salovey, 1990, p.189). The framework they developed is built around emotion

related cognitive abilities and their ability model divides the skills and abilities of emotional

intelligence in to four branches:

The ability to:

a) Perceive emotions

b) Use emotions to facilitate thought

c) Understand emotions and

d) Manage emotions

Models of emotional intelligence

Even though Mayer & Salovey (1990) devised an initial concept to encapsulate emotional

intelligence, it is Daniel Goleman (1995) who is accredited with bringing emotional

intelligence to the masses. His book, Emotional Intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ,

widely popularised the term and his combination of science and human potential captured

both the media’s and the public’s attention. Goleman applied emotional intelligence to both

personal life and the work environment and argued that we are not just assessed on how

intelligent we are or on our technical ability; there are many softer skills and traits that are

crucial to success and being an excellent employee. These traits underlie what he terms

emotional intelligence and they focus on personal qualities such as initiative, empathy,

adaptability and persuasiveness (Goleman, 1995; 1998). Building on Mayer & Salovey’s

ability based model he developed a mixed model that explicitly combined both ability and

non-ability traits together to form an expanded concept of emotional intelligence (Mayer,

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Salovey & Caruso, 2000). Goleman (1995) posits that emotional intelligence relates to a set

of competencies and that these competencies can be grouped into 5 constructs;

1) Knowing one’s emotions

2) Management of emotions

3) Motivating oneself

4) Recognizing emotions in others and

5) Handling relationships

In contrast to the mixed model, Petrides & Furnham (2001) have proposed that there are 2

conceptually different and separate types of emotional intelligence which differ based on the

measurement methods used to operationalise them. Trait EI "encompasses behavioural

dispositions and self-perceived abilities and is measured through self-report questionnaires.”

Ability EI “concerns actual abilities and ought to be measured with maximum-performance

rather than self-report tests." (Petrides & Furnham, 2001, p.426)

The Trait emotional intelligence model groups the traits in to four factors (Petrides, 2001):

1) Well–being – reflects the general sense of well-being, from past achievements right

through to future expectations

2) Self-control – assesses the degree of control someone has over their urges and desires

3) Emotionality – measures the level of perception of emotions internally and the

expression of emotions externally

4) Sociability – focuses on the individual’s ability to interact socially emphasising both

social relationships and social influence

They argue that the measurement of ability EI is problematic due to the subjectivity of

emotional experiences which is difficult to measure using a maximum performance test.

Measurement of Trait EI is much more straightforward as it measures self – perceptions and

dispositions which lend it self to the subjective nature of emotions (Petrides et al., 2007).

Self-reports have their merits; they are relatively easy to administer, they tap into internal

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experience and assess current conscious processes related to emotions (Mayer et al., 2000).

However, like most self – reports, responses to a trait EI questionnaire are susceptible to

social desirability; the inclination to answer in such a way that would make you appear more

favourable to others (Mikolajczak et al., 2007).

Maximum performance tests also have their problems; Freudenthaler & Neubauer (2005)

have recently argued that maximum performance tests do not actually measure the subject’s

typical behaviour but rather their individual knowledge of how they should act given certain

situations, indicating what they are capable of only when highly motivated. Individuals do

not use this capacity fully and only use it to a certain extent when behaving typically in any

given situation (Wilhelm, 2005). A recent study conducted by Freudenthaler & Neubauer

(2007) empirically supports this hypothesis; their results demonstrated that participants

attained lower scores on an emotional management ability (EMA) test when EMA was

measured using a typical performance evaluation compared to when EMA was measured

using a maximum performance evaluation.

While there are similarities between all three models, they all recognise the basic factors of

emotion management and emotion perception in self and others, EI seems to be an elusive

construct and research has been limited due to the many debates focusing on the

measurement and conceptualisation of Emotional Intelligence (Davies, Stankov & Roberts,

1998). Some adhere to the theoretical concept that EI is made up of emotional abilities (e.g.

Mayer, Caruso & Salovey, 1999) while others believe EI is comprised of a variety of

emotional skills abilities and personality traits (e.g. Bar-on, 1997; Goleman, 1995) with the

remainder of academics deeming that EI solely consists of traits (Petrides & Furnham, 2000).

Emotional Intelligence and performance at work

The unsubstantiated popular claims

In 1995 Time magazine published an article on emotional intelligence (EQ) which claimed

that “In the corporate world........IQ gets you hired but EQ gets you promoted” (Gibbs, Parks

& Birnbaum, 1995, pg.67). This article coincided with the release of Goleman’s hugely

xvii

popular book on emotional intelligence and together their claims that emotional intelligence

had a large influence on performance at work stimulated the interests of many.

From research on over 500 organisations by the Hay Group, IQ was shown to account for

20% of the variance in life success, from these results Goleman (1995) surmised that EI

rather than IQ accounted for up to 80% of superior performance in top line leaders. This

rather aggrandised claim caused quite a stir but it seems that Goleman had misinterpreted the

results as he fails to take in to account any other possible influential factors and offers no

empirical evidence to support his declaration (Day & Carroll, 2004).

Goleman (1998) also claims that EI affects almost every aspect of work life and that those

with high levels of emotional intelligence are “star performers”. He refers to employees as

being judged by a new yardstick; it’s not just about intelligence, training and expertise

anymore, employees are now appraised on both how they handle themselves and how they

handle and interact with others.

The claims that Goleman has made, while they have had a significant impact on the corporate

world, were in fact empirically unsubstantiated. This led both himself and other researchers

in the field to conduct extensive research in to the relationship between emotional

intelligence and performance at work.

The relationship between Emotional Intelligence and performance at work

It is thought that the abilities and traits associated with emotional intelligence influence

people’s aptitude to relate to and interact well with others, communicate, influence &

negotiate effectively, manage stress and conflict, perform in pressurised environments and

create positive, supportive working conditions. Lopes, Cote & Salovey (2006) believe that all

of these processes are likely to contribute to elevating performance at work.

Many studies have attempted to prove that EI is a good predictor of job performance:

Bar-On, Handley & Fund (2006) Conducted a study on 1,171 U.S. air force recruiters and

found that those who met 100% of their annual recruitment target (high performers) had

significantly higher emotional intelligence scores (EI) than those who met less than 80% of

their annual recruitment target (low performers).

Building on this they conducted a further study on 335 combat soldiers in the Israeli army

and they found that not only was the total EI score significantly higher for the high

xviii

performers compared to the low performers but they demonstrated that 30% of the variance

in their performance (measured over a period of 6-12 months) could be accounted for by

emotional intelligence, however it is unclear from the study what accounted for the remaining

70% of variance.

Performance indicators for combat soldiers are significantly different to performance

indicators used in a high technology, capital intensive environment such as the petroleum

industry, Mount (2006) conducted research in such an industry. Terpstra & Rozelle (1993)

have claimed that capital intensive industries place much less of an emphasis on the potential

for humans to affect their organisations performance. However, Mount (2006) found a

definitive relationship between emotional intelligence competencies (EI) and performance at

work; he found that EI competencies accounted for 44% of overall work performance, while

cognitive ability (IQ) only accounted for 19% while skills and knowledge accounted for 38%

and that superior performers typically scored higher than average performers on many of the

emotional intelligence competencies. These are similar results to those found from research

conducted by Bar-on et al. (2006) even though the types of work performance are

significantly different.

Sala (2006) makes a strong case for the value of emotional intelligence competencies in what

could be deemed as a more customer focused service driven industry, one which requires a

higher degree of social interaction and one who’s performance depends more heavily on

these customer facing encounters. He synthesised findings from 3 empirical studies; research

from employees of a call centre situated in South Africa, sales agents in a company in the

U.K. and Turkish business school graduates working across a variety of fields. Emotional

intelligence levels were measured using the Emotional Competence Inventory (ECI) and

measures of workplace performance were obtained for all 3 groups. In South Africa the

results showed significant correlation between the employee’s ECI ratings and their

performance at work. In the U.K. the results showed a strong relationship between both self

and managerial ECI ratings and the sales agent’s performance. And finally, results from the

Turkish business school graduates showed a relatively consistent pattern between self and

managerial ECI ratings and success in their careers.

All of the above studies have focused on employees but the same results can be found for

managers. Langhorn (2004) undertook research with a sample of restaurant general managers

which examined the relationship between emotional competence and their performance at

xix

work. Langhorn found that the emotional intelligence of a manager could not only predict the

performance of the manager, as measured by performance appraisal, to a significant degree

but he also found that emotional intelligence could predict team satisfaction and team

turnover, however, it could only moderately predict customer satisfaction and profit growth.

While there have been many more studies which support the claim that individuals with high

levels of emotional intelligence are more likely to perform to a higher level at work (e.g. Sy,

Tram & O’Hara, 2006), not all of the research has indicated a significant link. In contrast,

both Goleman (1998) and Mayer, Salovey & Caruso (2000) have argued that by itself EI does

not reliably predict job performance; rather it provides a foundation for competencies that

can.

Janovics & Christiansen (as cited in Lopes et al, 2006) conducted a study on a group of 69

students who had part time jobs, with job performance being rated by their supervisors. Their

results demonstrated that emotional intelligence significantly predicted job performance after

controlling for cognitive ability, however, when they analysed the results controlling for

conscientiousness, emotional intelligence did not significantly predict job performance.

These results indicate that while emotional intelligence plays a role in job performance there

are other factors, such as personality traits, which can affect a person’s ability to perform at

work. Rode, Mooney, Arthaud-Day, Near, Baldwin, Rubin & Bommer (2007) also found that

EI alone was not a strong predictor of individual performance but the presence of both EI and

conscientiousness demonstrated a strong positive relationship with individual performance.

While these results may be mixed, a study by Slaski (cited in Zeidner et al. 2004) indicated

that performance only very modestly related to emotional intelligence in a sample of 224

middle and senior managers from the UK’s largest supermarket chain.

Results from the above studies and others have shown some considerable variance in

outcomes depending on the control variables included in the research (Rode et al., 2007).

Some have found that EI is a valid predictor of job performance (Bar-on et al, 2006;

Langhorn, 2004; Law, Wong & Song, 2004; Sala, 2006) however in these studies neither

personality nor general mental ability was taken in to account. This is significant as both of

these variables have strong, established relationships with individual performance (Hurtz &

Donovan, 2000).

However, as the majority of the current research suggests that emotional intelligence is a

good indicator of job performance, I hypothesise that:

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1) An individual's emotional intelligence score will positively correlate with their

performance (as measured by performance ratings for previous 3 years)

Individual Advancement and emotional intelligence

Following on from the premise that individuals with a high level of emotional intelligence are

expected to perform to a higher standard at work, Carmeli & Josman (2006) have asserted

that employees who are high in emotional intelligence are expected to not only perform but

achieve more in both the workplace and their personal life. Inherently, they are also expected

to contribute more significantly to the performance of their organization. Similarly, Cooper

(1997) has claimed that research in the area of EI has proven that individuals with high levels

of emotional intelligence experience a higher level of success in their career than those with a

low EI.

A number of authors (Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Goleman, 1995, 1998; Akers & Porter, 2003)

have specifically hypothesised that emotional intelligence is predictive of an individual’s

advancement and their career success. However, many of these claims have been made

without being backed up by empirical evidence. (Donohue & Stevenson, 2006)

Individual advancement within an organisation has been found to involve at least one or more

of the following factors: progression to a higher organisational level i.e. promotion (Metz &

Tharenou, 2001) greater responsibility at work either in terms of people, projects or finances

or an increase in pay (Pergamit & Veum, 1999). Using these factors as a measure for

advancement a number of authors have asserted the hypothesis that there is a positive

correlation between emotional intelligence and career advancement:

Dulewicz & Higgs (2000) have found a definite relationship between emotional intelligence

and Manager's career advancement over a 7 year period. They surveyed over 100 managers in

the UK in terms of their competencies, their EI their IQ and advancement in the company

over a 7 year period. They found that EI accounted for 36% of the variance in organisational

advancement where IQ only accounted for 27%. Zeidner et al. (2004) point out that in this

study, intelligence levels were self reported and the measure of Emotional Intelligence they

used did not include some core facets of EI such as emotion awareness and emotion

xxi

regulation. This indicates that the levels of variance allocated to EI and IQ are dubious as

they have not been measured effectively.

In a more controlled study Donohue & Stevenson (2006) looked to find a positive correlation

between emotional intelligence and career advancement in a study involving 140 people in a

range of occupations when the effects of age, gender, length of time in an organisation and

educational level were all accounted for and held as constant. Even taking in to account all of

the above variables they concluded that individuals with a higher level of emotional

intelligence were more likely to advance within their career, however controlling for

educational level does not necessarily control for IQ.

Similarly, in an unpublished study by Lopes, Cote, Grewal, Kadis, Gall & Salovey (cited in

Lopes et al. 2006) emotional intelligence was measured in a group of 44 employees of a

fortune 400 company. The results showed that emotional abilities positively correlated with

percent merit increases, rank in the company and peer and supervisory ratings. These results

remained significant after controlling for education, demographics, personality and verbal

ability but as the sample is very small, inferences cannot be drawn until the study is

replicated on a larger scale (Lopes et al. 2006)

Bar-On (1997) conducted research on individuals from the Young President’s Organization;

members must have reached a top level of leadership in their organisation before they can

join. He found that they obtained high scores on nearly all sub scales of the EI-i, exceeding

the average by significant amounts. However, Zeidner et al. (2004) have highlighted that

those performing well in their job are more likely to report high levels of emotional stability

which could account for a percentage of the exceptionally high EI scores.

In the study conducted by Sala (2006) the Turkish business school graduates who rated

themselves highly in emotional intelligence also had higher salaries, a higher level of job

satisfaction, higher satisfaction with their career goals and career achievement to date, higher

satisfaction with the respect shown by peers and superiors and a higher level of satisfaction

with their lives in general.

All of the above studies have found that emotional intelligence is a predictor in an

individual’s advancement within an organisation although some limitations in the studies

must be taken in to account. For example, self reports of IQ, invalid sample size and not

controlling for highly influential variables must be taken in to consideration when

xxii

interpreting the results of these studies (Donohue & Stevenson, 2006). Despite the limitations

and according to the findings of Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Donohue & Stevenson, 2006; Bar-

on 1997 & Sala, 2006 I hypothesise that:

2) Emotional Intelligence will positively correlate with individual advancement while

controlling for the variables of age, gender, educational level & length of time in the

organisation (tenure)

In 1995 Time magazine published an article on emotional intelligence (EQ) which claimed

that “In the corporate world........IQ gets you hired but EQ gets you promoted” (Gibbs, Parks

& Birnbaum, 1995, pg.67). I intend to investigate this claim and therefore hypothesise that:

3) Emotional intelligence will influence individual advancement to a greater degree

than intelligence (measured by education level and leaving certificate points)

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Chapter Three

Methodology

Methodology is a term which describes how we come to know in a very practical manner, it

focuses on the specific ways and means of obtaining knowledge through which we can try to

understand our world better (Trochim, 2006).

In this section the researcher will present the type of information sought and the steps that

were taken to obtain the information.

Research Aims & Objectives

The aim of this research is to ascertain if there is a relationship between emotional

intelligence, individual performance and career advancement and the researcher is looking to

establish the magnitude of these relationships. This study is a correlational research study,

which by definition “attempts to discover or establish a relationship between two or more

aspects of a situation” (Kumar, 1999, pg. 9). An influential relationship is sought and an

objective of the research is to be able to generalise the results to a larger population and use

the outcome of the research to predict work performance and career advancement in the

future based on emotional intelligence scores.

Applied research is where the research methodology is applied to a collection of information

on various aspects of a situation so that the information gathered can be used in other ways

(Kumar, 1996). As the research will be conducted in my own organisation the information

gathered and the results from the research can be used to help determine whether testing for

Emotional Intelligence is a valuable tool when recruiting new employees, promoting

employees and in talent identification and succession planning.

In order to investigate the relationship above, certain objectives need to be set to describe in

more detail the intent and direction of this research and to ascertain whether a relationship in

fact exists. By the end of this study I hope to be able to:

• Have demonstrated that there is a relationship between Emotional Intelligence and

Individual Performance at work.

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• Have demonstrated that there is a relationship between Emotional Intelligence and

Individual Advancement within the Organisation.

• Have demonstrated that Emotional Intelligence influences Individual Advancement

within the Organisation to a higher degree than Educational Level.

• Intelligently predict work performance and career advancement from emotional

intelligence scores.

Philosophical Position

Research Philosophy

A research philosophy is a belief about the way in which data about a phenomenon should be

gathered, analysed and used. It is the philosophy behind how to gain knowledge on a certain

subject. In this case the subject is that of emotional intelligence and its impact on the work

outcomes of individual performance and career advancement.

All research is based upon certain assumptions about how the world is perceived and how it

is that we can best understand it. There are 2 main philosophical paradigms that form the

basis of all research and they underpin the decisions as to the most appropriate methods to

gather, analyse and use data.

Positivism

The first paradigm is rooted in the physical sciences and is termed the positivist approach or

positivism. The core argument of positivism is that “the social world exists externally to the

researcher and that its properties can be measured directly through observation” (Grey, 2004,

pg. 18). The purpose of science is to stick exclusively to that which we can objectively

observe and measure. Reality consists of what is available to the senses and inquiry should be

based on scientific observations and not on philosophical speculation. That is not to say that

value is not important, only that it does not belong in scientific research; there is a

fundamental difference between fact and value and science only deals with fact (Grey, 2004).

The determination of empirical facts should be a separate process from the evaluation of

these facts (Weber, 1949).

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The positivist approach focuses on facts and tries to find causality between variables,

understanding such causal links are necessary for prediction and control. Empiricism is a

second focus of positivism; this is the collection of verifiable empirical evidence in support of

theories or hypotheses. The common methods used for the collection of data using the

positivist approach are quantitative methods. This allows for the sampling of a large portion

of a population so that the findings can be generalised to the population.

Positivism has historically been associated with the physical and natural sciences but has an

important role to play in the social sciences. There has, however, been much debate on the

issue of whether or not the positivist paradigm is entirely suitable for the social sciences due

to its subjective nature (Grey, 2004).

Interpretivism

The second paradigm, Interpretivism or anti-positivism, contends that reality can only fully

be understood through subjective interpretation. Human experience is a process of

interpretation rather than just sensory reception – we must understand and interpret what we

see/touch etc it is not just a sensation. There is no direct relationship between ourselves and

the world, the world is interpreted through the classification schemas of our minds (Williams

& May, 1996).

The interpretivist approach focuses on meaning and tries to understand what is happening

through interpretation. From the data collected theories and models are constructed which are

used to explain the phenomena. The common methods used for the collection of data using

the interpretivist approach are qualitative methods. Small samples are used but are researched

in depth or over a long period of time.

Philosophical Position of this Study

Most of the research in the area of emotional intelligence and it’s impact upon workplace

outcomes such as performance at work and career advancement has been governed by the

positivist approach; constructing and testing hypotheses, objectively observing and

measuring, collecting verifiable data through quantitative methods, finding causality between

variables and generalizing the results to the population (Bar-On, Handley & Fund, 2006;

Mount, 2006; Sala, 2006; Langhorn, 2004; Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Donohue & Stevenson,

2006; Bar-On, 1997).

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One of the aims of positivist research is to offer explanations that lead to predictability

(Blaxter, Hughes & Tight 2001). The aim of this study is to investigate a relationship

between a number of variables with a view to being able to predict one variable (individual

performance at work and individual advancement within an organisation) from another

(emotional intelligence) which is conducive to this principle of predictability. The aim of

trying to discover a causal relationship between variables is correlative in nature and it is

recognised that the most effective methodology for this type of research is a quantitative

study based on the principles of replicability, validity and objectivity (Kumar, 1999). Due to

the aforementioned and the personal belief of the researcher that it is possible to measure an

objective truth a positivist approach will be taken in this study.

As the research is being informed by a positivist stance the study’s epistemological position

is objectivist; the researcher will remain objective throughout the study, offering no bias to

the results and outcomes.

Research Approach

There are 2 ways to approach any type of research, the deductive approach or the inductive

approach. Deductive reasoning works from the more general to the more specific; explicit

hypotheses are proposed based on a theory and these hypotheses are tested through

observation in an attempt to verify the theory. Inductive reasoning works the opposite way

moving from specific observations to general theories; the theories are generated from the

observations made throughout the research (Trochim, 2006).

The deductive approach, rather than the inductive approach, will be adopted for the purposes

of this study. A great deal of research has already been carried out in the field of emotional

intelligence and its impact on work outcomes meaning many useful theories have already

been developed (e.g. Goleman, 1995, 1998; Bar-On et al., 1997; Petrides & Furnham, 2001)

Deductive reasoning applies general principles to reach specific conclusions therefore using

the deductive approach will be of more benefit in an area where theories abound. The results

will attempt to corroborate what the theory proposes providing empirical evidence to support

the claims of the existing theory. The deductive approach also offers researchers a relatively

easy and systematic way of testing established ideas on a range of people, increasing the

range of people will again help to substantiate the claims made by the existing theories.

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In the context of this applied research, validating existing claims and theories is also

beneficial for presenting information to organisations in the “real” world as they invariably

look for proof that the theory is substantiated. The deductive approach can deliver tangible

results which support the theory and help to present a more persuasive argument for the

introduction of a new tool, e.g. in this case using an emotional intelligence test as part of the

recruitment process, talent identification and succession planning.

Research Methodology

Due to the purpose and objective of this research, the fact that all three of the variables are

quantitative variables and as the researcher has chosen to adopt an objective, positivist,

deductive approach to the research, a quantitative methodology will be applied. Quantitative

research is the systematic scientific investigation of properties and phenomena and their

relationships with the ultimate aim being quantification of the variation between the

phenomena (Kumar, 1999). The fundamental tenant of a quantitative methodology is that of

measurement which is crucial to this study as it provides the connection between empirical

observation and the mathematical expression of the relationships.

The type of research question, the approach taken by the researcher and the methodology

adopted influences the choice of data collection method utilised. A research interview seeks

to describe the meanings of central themes in the life of the world of the subjects and the

main function is to understand this meaning (Grey, 2004). Focus groups are a specific type of

interviewing which allows for understanding of meaning in multiple participants

concurrently. It is appropriate as a technique for generating ideas rather than testing

hypotheses (Brewerton & Millward, 2001). Observation allows the researcher to directly

observe the lives and behaviours of the participants being studied; looking, listening,

enquiring and recording in a bid to understand how interaction patterns are linked (Ackroyd

& Hughes, 1992). The major advantage of this method of data collection is that it allows for

the simultaneous generation and verification of theory (Denzin, 1978).

All of the above methods focus on the generation of theory and the understanding of meaning

which are more appropriate for qualitative research using inductive reasoning. They are much

less appropriate for quantitative research and therefore for use in this current study due to the

intention of this research to test hypotheses in a bid to verify existing theory and the

xxviii

numerous ways in which bias of the researcher can be introduced through these methods,

affecting the objectivist and positivist stance of the study.

For this research it was decided that the best way to gain the information was through a

questionnaire as they attempt to test a theory in a chosen field through exploration of

relationships between variables (Grey, 2004). Analytical questionnaires are highly structured,

they have a strong link to the positivist research position and their purpose is to generalize

from a sample to a population so that inferences can be made about an aspect of this

population (Babbie, 1990). They emphasize a number of principles: a deductive approach, the

careful random selection of samples to allow for generalizing of results to larger populations,

control of variables and the generation of quantitative data (Grey, 2004) making it a very

suitable choice for this particular study.

Research Sample

The population from which the sample was drawn consisted solely of employees from the

Bank of Ireland, from branches in the Cork and West Munster areas. The Bank of Ireland is a

widely known Financial Services Company established in 1783 in Dublin. It is currently one

of the major Banks in Ireland which also has substantial niche businesses in both the United

Kingdom and the rest of the World. There are approximately 11,000 employees working for

the Bank of Ireland in Ireland at present with 5,000 of these working in the Branch Network.

The sample population range in age from 21 – 35 and have between 4 and 14 years

experience within the Bank of Ireland. This is an example of both convenience and purposive

sampling. I am conducting this study on Bank of Ireland employees as I work in the Human

Resources Department of Bank of Ireland and it is convenient to ask employees in my own

organisation to participate and much cheaper to send and return completed questionnaires in

the internal mailing system.

To minimise bias from controlling variables (e.g. age & tenure) I have deliberately utilised a

purposive sampling method for a number of reasons. I wanted to conduct research on a non-

management population due to most previous research, in terms of EI and career

advancement having been conducted on managers (Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Donohue &

Stevenson, 2006 & Bar-on 1997). Most of the management population would have more than

xxix

14 years experience and would be over the age of 35 which, using the chosen age and tenure

constraints, would automatically rule them out as candidates for the study. The sample does

not however exclude all managers but this will give a small sample of employees who have

progressed in their career very quickly.

I purposely included a tenure and age maximum due to a change in promotion policy within

Bank of Ireland. Up until 15 years ago all staff members with 5 years experience were

automatically promoted to the next level from Bank Assistant to Senior Bank Official

therefore promotion was based on service and not performance. This would have had a

significant effect on the data due to the minimal number of ranks (3) within the below

manager job range in Bank of Ireland.

I purposely included a tenure and age minimum due to the fact that most promotions are not

given until after the first 3-4 years and the minimum entry requirements to Bank of Ireland is

completion of leaving certificate (generally people are at least 17 when they complete their

leaving certificate).

The Regions of Cork and West Munster were chosen as the researcher is the HR Adviser for

these Regions and works with the branches in the area. Through recognition of the researcher

it was hoped that participants would be more likely to respond to the questionnaire.

The names and locations of appropriate candidates for the sample were retrieved from the

Bank of Ireland Human Resource Information System using the variables Region (location),

Date of Entry and Date of Birth to generate the report. The report generated a total sample of

265 appropriate candidates.

Data Collection

Data was collected by means of a questionnaire. Questionnaires are commonly used in formal

analytical surveys and are a widely used research tool in the current research domain of this

study. This in part is due to the fact that they can be developed to explore or measure

attitudes, opinions, behaviour, level of knowledge, life circumstances or other issues and they

can provide quantitative and/or qualitative data (Babbie, 1990). This data collection method

was operationalised due to the quantitative nature of this study, the ease of administration to a

large number of people with wide geographical locations, the relatively low cost of

administration, the anonymity of this method, the lack of researcher bias or influence on

xxx

responses and the aptitude of questionnaires for the measurement of the variables in this

research.

Research Instrument & Administration

Many emotional intelligence research instruments were investigated however the cost to

administer the test from various companies contacted were beyond the scope of the

researcher’s budget. After further investigation the Trait Emotional Intelligence

Questionnaire (TEIQue) was discovered which is available free of charge for academic

research purposes by members of recognised universities (including currently supervised

undergraduate and postgraduate students). The researcher emailed the developers of the

TEIQue to gain further information and rEIuest permission to use their instrument in the

current study; this permission was granted.

TEIQue v. 1.50

The TEIQue v.1.50 (appendix 2) was the version utilised in this research, as this is the most

up to date, long form, self-report, adult version of the instrument available currently. This

questionnaire comprises of 153 items, 15 facets and 4 factors which loaded on to the total

global trait EI score. Items are responded to on a 7 point Likert Scale ranging from “Disagree

completely” to “Agree completely”. The average completion time is 20 minutes. The four

factors and fifteen facets are listed in Table 1 below:

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Table 1

TEIQue Factors and Facets

FOUR FACTORS OF BROADER RELEVANCE

FIFTEEN SPECIFIC FACETS

Well-being Adaptability

Self-control Assertiveness

Emotionality Emotional appraisal (self & others)

Sociability Emotion control

Emotion expression

Emotion management (others)

Low impulsiveness

Relationships

Self-esteem

Self-motivation

Social awareness

Stress management

Trait empathy

Trait happiness

Trait optimism

Table 2

Demographic Information

Personal Details Branch Details Career Details Performance Details

Age Type of Branch (commercial/Retail)

Tenure (year of joining BOI)

Performance rating 2005

Gender Location of Branch (Urban/Rural)

Current Rank Performance rating 2006

Education Level Length of time at current branch

No. of years at current rank

Performance rating 2007

Points in Leaving Certificate

No. of branches worked in to date

No. of subordinates

No. of promotions

Current salary

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Demographic Information

Table 2 above displays the basic demographic information which was collected from each of

the participants (appendix 3).

Administration

The researcher sought permission from the Human Resources Department in Bank of Ireland

to use contact information and the internal mailing system in order to conduct the research on

the employees before gathering data. Once approval was obtained, the sample was selected

and the data collection began.

A covering letter, the TEIQue v.1.50 and the demographic information sheet (see appendices

1 – 3) were sent via the internal mailing system to each of the eligible candidates (total N =

265) for this study over the course of three days. The covering letter (appendix 1) addressed

issues like the nature of the study, confidentiality, sample selection reasons, applications of

the research, assured anonymity, participation entailment, contact details of the researcher

and the assurance that the Bank of Ireland is in no way associated with the research. The

participants were asked to have the questionnaire returned to the researcher in the internal

mailing system by a date which was two weeks from the date of issue of the letters.

Concurrently an email was sent to the Branch Managers, Customer Service Managers and

Regional Managers within the Regions involved outlining the study and asking them to

inform their employees of the questionnaires being sent to them.

Over the course of the two weeks emails were sent to all participants to thank those who had

replied and to prompt those who hadn’t to do so if they wished to participate in the study.

Managers were also emailed to ask them to mention the return of questionnaires to employees

at meetings and to support the researcher by endorsing the completion of questionnaires.

At the end of the two week period the response rate was only 38% and the researcher decided

to extend the deadline by a further two weeks. All participants were emailed again to

encourage them to take part in the research. By the end of the second two week period the

response rate had risen to 50% with the total number of valid respondents being 132.

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Hypotheses

This study is proposing that there is a causal relationship between emotional intelligence and

individual performance at work and a causal relationship between emotional intelligence and

individual career advancement. It is thought that the abilities and traits associated with

emotional intelligence influence people’s aptitude to relate to and interact well with others,

communicate, influence & negotiate effectively, manage stress and conflict, perform in

pressurised environments and create positive, supportive working conditions (Lopes et al.,

2006). People who have a higher aptitude for the above behaviours are thought to perform to

a higher standard at work (Lopes et al., 2006, Goleman, 1998) and are expected to advance to

a higher level in their career (Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Goleman, 1995, 1998; Akers &

Porter, 2003). Using deductive logic, there is a causal relationship between emotional

intelligence and performance at work and emotional intelligence and individual career

advancement. Therefore,

Hypothesis 1 states:

An individual's emotional intelligence score will positively correlate with their

performance (as measured by performance ratings for previous 3 years)

Hypothesis 2 states:

Emotional Intelligence will positively correlate with individual advancement while

controlling for the variables of age, gender, educational level & length of time in the

organisation (tenure)

In 1995 Time magazine published an article on emotional intelligence which claimed that “In

the corporate world........IQ gets you hired but EI gets you promoted” (Gibbs, Parks &

Birnbaum, 1995, pg.67). I intend to investigate this claim and therefore hypothesise that:

Hypothesis 3 states:

Emotional intelligence will influence individual advancement to a greater degree than

intelligence (measured by level of education and points in the leaving certificate)

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Chapter Four

Results

Description of the sample

The population from which the sample was drawn consisted solely of employees from the

Bank of Ireland Branch Network which has in the region of 5,000 employees. Of these 5,000

employees there are approximately 1,451 between the ages of 21 & 35, the chosen age range

for this study, and with between 4 – 14 years service, the chosen tenure for this study. A total

of 132 Bank of Ireland, adult employees participated in the study. The participating sample of

132 employees represents 9.1% of this population.

Response Rate

The Questionnaire was sent to 265 employees, which was all of the employees in Cork and

West Munster Regions within the ages of 21 – 35 and with 4 – 14 years service. A total of

153 employees returned the questionnaire giving a response rate of 57.7% however, 21

respondents had not fully completed either the TEIQue or the demographics information

sheet and due to the anonymous nature of the study could not be identified to request that

they do so. In these cases the listwise deletion approach was utilised and these responses were

eliminated from the total sample. The remaining sample consisted of 132 employees which is

a response rate of 49.8%.

Demographics

The demographic characteristics of the sample are provided in Table 3.

Participants ranged in age from 21 to 35, with 4 – 14 years of service (tenure), 106 (80.3%)

of which were female, while 26 (19.7%) were male. This accurately reflects the approximate

female to male employee ratio within the Bank of Ireland i.e. 80:20. Of these participants

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Table 3

Demographic Characteristics of the Sample (N=132) Characteristics/Groups n %___________________ Age 21 – 23 2 1.5% 24 – 26 16 12.1% 27 – 29 41 31.1% 30 – 32 46 34.8% 33 – 35 27 20.5% Subtotal 132 100% Gender Male 26 19.7% Female 106 80.3% Subtotal 132 100% Educational Level Leaving Certificate 42 31.8% Diploma 48 36.4% Honours Degree 33 25.0%

Postgraduate Diploma 5 3.8% Masters 4 3.0% Subtotal 132 100%

Tenure 4 Years 14 10.6% 5 Years 6 4.5% 6 Years 12 9.1% 7 Years 14 10.6% 8 Years 18 13.6% 9 Years 22 16.7% 10 Years 15 11.4% 11 Years 11 8.3% 12 Years 3 2.3% 13 Years 4 3.0% 14 Years 13 9.8% Subtotal 132 100% Rank Bank Assistant 60 45.5% Senior Bank Official 54 40.9% FA/CSM/S&S Mgr 12 9.1% Retail Branch Manager 6 4.5% Subtotal 132 100%

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31.8% had achieved an Honours Degree or higher in terms of their level of education while

68.2% had achieved a Diploma or higher and all participants had achieved their Leaving

Certificate (this is an entry requirement of the Bank of Ireland). The highest number of

respondents were ranked as a Bank Assistant (45.5%), with the next highest being Senior

Bank Officials (40.9%). There are much fewer numbers of participants above these ranks

with 9.1% of respondents ranked as a Financial Adviser (FA), Customer Services Manager

(CSM) or Sales & Service Manager (S&S Mgr); all 3 of these positions being of Equal status,

and 4.5% ranked as Retail Branch Manager – this was the highest rank that any of the

participants had achieved and is the only rank that is considered as “Manager” in the Bank of

Ireland, all other ranks are considered “Below Manager”.

Data Analysis Methodology

This study was designed to explore the relationship between emotional intelligence,

individual performance at work and individual career advancement. The aim of trying to

discover a causal relationship between variables is correlative in nature and it is recognised

that the most effective data analysis methodology for this type of research is quantitative

based on the principles of replicability, validity and objectivity (Kumar, 1999). A

Quantitative analysis approach was taken to analyse the data which was conducted using

SPSS statistical software.

Measures

The four main variables in this study are emotional intelligence, performance at work,

individual career advancement and educational attainment.

Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence has been measured using the TEIQue v.1.5 which gives an overall

Total Global Trait EI Score and scores for each of its four factors; Sociability, Emotionality,

Self-Control & Well Being. The maximum score attainable is 7 and the minimum is 1.

xxxvii

Performance at Work

Performance at work has been measured using the Bank of Ireland Performance Management

System Ratings for the last 3 years. Performance is measured on a five point scale as outlined

in Table 4.

Table 4

Bank of Ireland Performance Management System Ratings Descriptions

Rating Standard Brief description of Standard

1 Inadequate Job holders have achieved few of their agreed goals and

performance falls clearly short of an acceptable level

2 Adequate Job holders have achieved most of their goals but fall short in a

number of their key responsibilities

3 Good Job holders have achieved all of their goals and performance is

at a fully acceptable level

4 Superior Job holders have achieved all their goals and have significantly

exceeded a fully acceptable level in a number of the most

important responsibilities

5 Outstanding Job holders have significantly exceeded all their goals and have

performed exceptionally well throughout the year

The mean score of the previous three years has been used to measure performance at work for

the purposes of this study.

Individual Career Advancement

The variable individual career advancement has been measured using the mean of 3 items

assessing the individual’s rank within the Organisation, the number of promotions they have

received and their current annual salary. This measure was based on the three-item reliable,

validated measure for career advancement in Australian Managers (Tharenou, 1999).

xxxviii

Educational Attainment

As a valid and reliable Intelligence measure was not used it was decided that the measure of

intelligence would more accurately be termed educational attainment, which would give an

indication of an individual’s level of intelligence but would not actually measure IQ.

Educational attainment was measured using 2 items which assessed the individual’s level of

education (coded 1 – 5 with the Leaving Certificate being coded as 1 and having a Masters

Degree coded as 5) and the number of points they received in their Leaving Certificate

Examinations (coded 1 – 6 with less than 100 points being coded as 1 and between 500 – 600

points being coded as 6).

Descriptive Statistics

Means, standard deviations, minimum & maximum data was computed to gain insight in to

demographic differences. The descriptive statistics are shown in Table 5.

Age was measured by category rather than actual figures and the mean age of 3.61 indicates

that the mean age of the respondents in this study falls in to the category 27 – 29, with the

minimum age being 21 and the maximum age 35. Norms are not freely available for the

TEIQue Scores so it is impossible to report whether the Global Trait EI mean of 4.94 is high

or low compared to an external population. The average performance rating of the

respondents, 3.79, indicates that those who responded perform to a level which is above

average.

The means of the Individual Career Advancement measures of rank (1.73) and number of

promotions (0.77) indicate that a high percentage of the sample population are either Bank

Assistants (coded as 1) or Senior Bank Officials (coded as 2) who have either never been

promoted (coded as 0) or have only been promoted once (coded as 1). These figures also

indicate that the sample limitations were successful in capturing a below manager population.

The average number of Leaving Certificate points that were attained by this sample lies

between 300 & 400 points and the sample mean level of education is to Diploma level.

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Table 5 Descriptive statistics

Variable Mean SD Min Max

Age 3.61 0.994 1 5

Tenure 8.63 2.878 4 14

Global Trait EI 4.94 0.580 3.03 6.14

Sociability 4.65 0.723 1.92 6.04 Emotionality 5.06 0.783 2.69 6.72 Self-Control 4.59 0.718 2.78 6.11 Well Being 5.46 0.714 2.98 6.84 Average Performance Rating 3.79 0.611 1.67 5.00

Career Advancement 2.10 0.873 1.13 5.37

Rank 1.73 0.811 1 4 No. of Promotions 0.77 0.921 0 5 Annual Salary 37,947 9,863.43 24,000 81,000 Educational Attainment 6.15 1.521 3 10

Leaving Cert Points 4.05 0.785 2 6 Level of Education 2.10 0.995 1 5

Reliability & Validity of Measures

Reliability

Reliability is the consistency of a set of measurements or measuring instrument. Cronbach’s

Alpha coefficients were calculated to measure the internal consistency of the TEIQue, the

Performance at Work Measure, the Career Advancement Measure and the Measure of

Educational Attainment which were used for this study. Table 6 indicates that the TEIQue (α

= 0.786), the Performance at Work Measure (α = 0.742) and the Career Advancement

Measure (α = 0.957) are statistically reliable as when interpreting Cronbach’s Alpha

coefficient, a value > 0.70 reflects good reliability/objectivity. However the Educational

xl

Attainment measure (α = 0.611) is not a statistically reliable measure of Educational

Attainment, this could in part be due to the fact that there are only 2 items being measured.

Table 6

Reliability Statistics of current study Survey Instrument/Scale Cronbach's Alpha N of Items__________

TEIQue 0.786 153 Performance at Work 0.742 3 Career Advancement 0.957 3 Educational Attainment 0.611 2

Reliability from previous research using the TEIQue & the Career Advancement Measure

also indicate statistical reliability for both of these instruments/scales; Mikolajczak, Luminet,

Leroy, & Roy (2007) found that TEIQue scores were globally normally distributed and

reliable (α = 0.94 for men & α = 0.95 for women) and Therenou (1999) found that the Career

Advancement Measure was reliable (1st time α = 0.80, 2nd time α = 0.78 with a test-retest

correlation of 0.90).

Validity

As Trait Emotional Intelligence is an emerging paradigm, research in to the Concurrent

Validity and Construct Validity of the TEIQue is only in its infancy. The operationalisation

of a new construct, when properly conducted, requires a painstaking validation process

(Cronbach & Meehl, 1955). However the TEIQue has been found to have criterion

(predictive & concurrent) validity and incremental validity with personality & mood

dimensions (Petrides, Perez-Gonzalez & Furnham, 2007) which aids this construct validation

process. Mikolajczak et al. (2007) have also found preliminary evidence of convergent and

discriminant validity with various personality dimensions.

xli

Inferential Statistics

Inferential Statistics are used to investigate questions, models and hypotheses. They allow the

researcher to reach conclusions that lie beyond the data itself (Trochim, 2006). As the study

was designed to explore relationships between variables the Pearson Correlation Coefficient

has been calculated to determine whether correlations between relevant variables (Emotional

Intelligence, Career Advancement, Performance at Work, Educational Attainment, Age,

Gender & Tenure) are significant or not. Table 7 specifies significant correlations between

the variables.

Table 7 Pearson Correlation Coefficients between Variables (N=132)

Career

Advance- ment

Educational Attainment

Global Trait EI

Age Gender Tenure Rating Average

Career Advance-ment

1.000 Sig 0.000

Education-al Attainment

0.233 Sig 0.004**

1.000 Sig 0.000

Global Trait EI

0.184 Sig 0.017**

0.031 Sig 0.362

1.000 Sig 0.000

Age

0.404 Sig 0.000***

-0.107 Sig 0.112

0.009 Sig 0.460

1.000 Sig 0.000

Gender

-0.014 Sig 0.436

-0.114 Sig 0.097

-0.031 Sig 0.361

0.015 Sig 0.434

1.000 Sig 0.000

Tenure

0.450 Sig 0.000***

-0.263 Sig0.001***

0.065 Sig 0.229

0.770 Sig0.000***

0.016 Sig 0.430

1.000 Sig 0.000

Rating Average

0.582 Sig 0.000***

0.216 Sig 0.007**

0.255 Sig0.002**

0.144 Sig 0.50

0.033 Sig 0.354

0.360 Sig0.000***

1.000 Sig 0.000

***. Correlation is significant at the 0.001 level (1-tailed). **. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed). *. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (1-tailed).

All of the variables with the exception of gender have a positive significant correlation with

Career Advancement. This indicates that higher levels of Educational Attainment, higher

levels of emotional intelligence, the older an individual is, the longer an individual has

worked in the organisation and the higher an individual’s performance levels at work are the

higher the level of Career Advancement will be.

xlii

Educational Attainment has a significant negative correlation with Tenure suggesting that the

longer the individual is in the Organisation the lower the level of Educational Attainment is

i.e. the individual is less likely to have reached a high level of education and a high level of

points in their Leaving Certificate. Educational Attainment is significantly positively

correlated with Rating Average indicating that individuals with higher levels of Educational

Attainment are more likely to perform to a higher standard at work.

Emotional Intelligence & Tenure also significantly, positively correlate with Rating Average

which suggests that more emotionally intelligent individuals perform to a higher standard at

work and the longer an individual is in the Organisation the more likely they are to perform

to a higher standard.

Hypothesis 1

An individual's emotional intelligence score will positively correlate with their

performance (as measured by performance ratings for previous 3 years)

Pearson Correlation Coefficients were computed for Global Trait Emotional Intelligence

Scores & Average Performance Rating Scores to determine if the above hypothesis is true,

details of which are found in Table 8.

Table 8 Pearson Correlation Coefficients between Average Performance Rating & TEIQue

Global Trait EI & Factor Scores (N=131) Variable Pearson Correlation Sig. (1-tailed)

Coefficient with Average _______________________ Performance Rating_________________________________ Global Trait EI 0.216 0.007** Sociability 0.172 0.025* Emotionality 0.209 0.008** Self-Control 0.165 0.030* Well Being 0.138 0.058

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed).

*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (1-tailed).

The statistically significant Pearson Correlation Coefficient of 0.216** provides support for

Hypothesis 1, which indicates that an individual’s emotional intelligence score positively

correlates with their performance at work. The results of this test also indicate that three out

of the four factors of emotional intelligence (sociability, emotionality & self-control)

xliii

significantly, positively correlate with performance at work suggesting that individuals who

are more sociable, those who are better at perceiving internal emotions and external

expression of emotions and those who display higher levels of self-control are more likely to

perform to a higher level at work.

Hypothesis 2

Emotional Intelligence will positively correlate with individual advancement (measured by

rank, no. of promotions & annual salary) while controlling for the variables of age,

gender, educational level & length of time in the organisation (tenure).

Partial Correlation Analysis was conducted on the dependent variable, career advancement

and the independent variable, Global Trait EI. The Partial Correlation technique was used to

allow for the controlling of other independent variables; Age, Gender, Level of Education &

Tenure. Table 9 shows the result from this analysis.

Table 9 Pearson Correlation Coefficients between Career Advancement & Global Trait EI, Controlling for the variables Age, Gender, Level of Education & Tenure (N=131)

Control Variables Career Advancement

Global

Correlation 0.176

Trait EI

Significance (1-tailed) 0.024*

Age & Gender & Level

of Education & Tenure

Df 126

Significance denoted as: * p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001

The statistically significant positive correlation coefficient of 0.176* provides support for

hypothesis 2 which indicates that Emotional Intelligence will positively correlate with

individual advancement while controlling for the variables of age, gender, educational level

& tenure. This denotes that individuals with a higher level of emotional intelligence are more

likely to advance to higher levels in their career. This result is significant and can be held to

xliv

be true even when influential factors such as age, gender, educational level and tenure are

accounted for.

Regression Analysis

Regression Analysis is a statistical technique that examines the relationship between a

dependent variable and specified independent variables. When paired with assumptions in the

form of a statistical model, regression can be used for prediction, inference, hypothesis

testing, and modeling of causal relationships (Aron & Aron, 1994). Hypothesis 3 of this study

can be best tested by conducting Regression Analysis on the relevant data.

Prior to this data analysis tests were carried out to check the theoretical assumptions

underlying regression analysis; normality, linearity and Homoscedasticity.

One of the main assumptions is that the residuals are normally distributed. Histograms

appeared normal for both Educational Attainment & Global Trait EI and skewness (0.506 & -

0.457 respectively) & kurtosis (-0.194 & 0.370 respectively) figures (outlined in Table 10)

are close to zero so it is assumed that the data is normally distributed for both of the

independent variables. However, skewness (1.380) and kurtosis (2.175) figures for Career

Advancement are not close to zero and the histogram does not appear to have a normal

distribution therefore the Career Advancement data is not normally distributed.

Collinearity exists when 2 variables are near perfect linear combinations of each other. If this

were to happen the estimates for a regression model could not be uniquely computed. The

Table 10

Descriptive Statistics of Normal Distribution for Relevant Variables

N Tolerance VIF Mean

Std.

Deviation Skewness Kurtosis

Statistic Statistic Statistic Statistic Statistic Statistic

Std.

Error Statistic

Std.

Error

Educational

Attainment 132 0.999 1.001 6.1515 1.52077 .506 .211 -.194 .419

Career

Advancement 132 6.2947 2.61783 1.380 .211 2.175 .419

Global Trait EI 132 0.999 1.001 4.9445 .57984 -.457 .211 .370 .419

xlv

independent variables Global Trait EI & Educational Attainment were tested with Career

Advancement; no tolerance levels were found to be less than 0.1 (all values were close to 1.0)

and no VIF (Variance Inflation Factors) values were found to be greater than 10 (all values

were close to 1.0).

Homoscedasticity refers to the assumption that that the dependent variable exhibits similar

amounts of variance across the range of values for an independent variable. A Scatter plot

depicting the relevant variables displayed Heteroscedasticity due in part to the non-normal

distribution of Career Advancement.

In conclusion all of the assumptions necessary for Regression Analysis could not be taken to

be true and therefore the results of the Regression Analysis are considered to be weaker than

if the assumptions of normality, linearity and homoscedasticity could in fact be held to be

true. However Tabachnick & Fidell (2001) have stated that multiple regression is quite robust

to any violations of the assumptions and therefore the results of the regression analysis will

be taken to be statistically viable.

Hypothesis 3

Emotional intelligence will influence individual advancement to a greater degree than

intelligence (measured by level of education and points in the leaving certificate)

Multiple Regression Analysis was conducted on the dependent variable Career Advancement

and the independent variables Global Trait EI and Educational Attainment. Multiple

Regression Analysis was used as it is capable of robustly testing causal relationships and

indicating degrees of influence as it allows for several predictive variables to be tested

simultaneously. Global Trait EI was entered as the variable in step 1 and Educational

Attainment was entered as the variable in step 2.

xlvi

Table 11 Multiple Regression Analysis attributing amount of variance of Individual Career

Advancement to Global Trait EI & Educational Attain ment

Unstandardised Coefficients Standardised Coefficients

Model B Std. Error Beta (β) t Sig.

(Constant) 2.188 1.938 1.129 0.261 1

global trait EI 0.830 0.389 0.184* 2.134 0.035*

(Constant) -0.061 2.068 -.029 0.977

global trait EI 0.799 0.380 0.177* 2.100 0.038*

2

Educational Attainment

0.391 0.145 0.227** 2.698 0.008**

a. Dependent Variable: Career Advancement

R-Squared for Step 1 = 0.034

R-Squared for Step 2 = 0.085

N=132

Significance denoted as: * p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001

Examination of Table 11 demonstrates that the R-Squared value for step 1 is 0.034 which

indicates that Global Trait EI accounts for 3.4% of the variance in Individual Career

Advancement. The inclusion of Educational Attainment at step 2 resulted in a change in the

R-Squared value to 0.085 which is a difference of 0.051 indicating that Educational

Attainment accounts for 5.1% of the variance in Individual Career Advancement. From these

results it can be concluded that hypothesis 3 is not supported, Emotional intelligence does not

influence individual advancement to a greater degree than intelligence (measured by

educational attainment). In this study it is in fact intelligence, measured by educational

attainment, which influences Individual Career Advancement to a greater degree than

Emotional Intelligence.

The statistically significant Beta value (β) of 0.177* obtained for Global Trait EI further

supports the hypothesis that Emotional Intelligence scores positively correlate with Individual

Career Advancement.

xlvii

Chapter Five

Discussion

Introduction

It has been widely hypothesised that individuals who have a high level of Emotional

Intelligence (EI) are expected to accomplish higher levels of achievements both in their

personal life and their work place (Goleman 1995, 1998; Bar-on et al., 2006) and that they

contribute significantly to the performance of the organisations within which they work

(Carmeli & Josman, 2006; Sala, 2006). The purpose of this study was to examine the effect

of Emotional Intelligence on work achievement, more specifically the relationship between

Emotional Intelligence & work performance and Emotional Intelligence & individual career

advancement. It was also the intention of this study to investigate whether emotional

intelligence would in fact influence individual advancement to a greater degree than

intelligence as suggested by Gibbs, Parks & Birnbaum, 1995, pg.67 in the Time magazine

article where they advocate that “IQ gets you hired but EQ gets you promoted”.

Emotional Intelligence and performance at work

The first purpose of this study was to investigate whether an individual's emotional

intelligence score would positively correlate with their performance. Extensive research in to

the relationship between emotional intelligence and performance at work has been carried out

ever since Goleman (1995) claimed in his hugely popular book, “Emotional Intelligence”,

that emotional intelligence had a large influence on performance at work.

In many of the previous studies in this area researchers have found that Emotional

Intelligence is in fact a valid predictor of job performance (Bar-on et al, 2006; Langhorn,

2004; Sala, 2006) which supports Goleman’s claims. This has been demonstrated to be true

across a wide variety of industries; air force recruiters, combat soldiers, restaurant managers

& customer service industry workers respectively and has been found to be true across a

spectrum of worker levels i.e. from part time casual workers (Janovics & Christiansen as

cited in Lopes et al, 2006) to managers (Langhorn, 2004).

xlviii

This study demonstrates support for the previous studies and the premise that an individual’s

emotional intelligence score positively correlates with their work performance which is

evident from the strong correlation coefficient of 0.216 (p < 0.01). As the study was

conducted on such a small percentage of the total number of employees working within the

financial services industry and was conducted on a specific sample of largely below manager

employees it could not be concluded that the result could be generalised and taken to be true

for all employees within this industry or even within this company. This study provides

indicators which need to be explored through further research in a more comprehensive study

across the organisation.

Lopes, Cote & Salovey (2006) believe that the abilities and traits associated with emotional

intelligence influence people’s aptitude to relate to and interact well with others,

communicate, influence & negotiate effectively, manage stress and conflict, perform in

pressurised environments and create positive, supportive working conditions. All of these

processes are likely to contribute to elevating performance at work. As the financial services

industry relies heavily on the interpersonal skills of their employees to generate business it is

not surprising that having a higher level of emotional intelligence would be associated with

higher levels of performance within this industry.

Emotional Intelligence and Individual Career Advancement

The second purpose of this study was to examine whether Emotional Intelligence positively

correlated with Individual Career Advancement. A number of authors (Dulewicz & Higgs,

2000; Goleman, 1995, 1998; Akers & Porter, 2003) have specifically hypothesised that

emotional intelligence is predictive of an individual’s advancement and their career success

and this study was conducted to try to generate some support for this hypothesis.

There have been a number of studies that have found that emotional intelligence is a predictor

of an individual’s advancement within an organisation; Donohue & Stevenson (2006) found a

positive correlation between emotional intelligence and career advancement in a study

involving 140 people in a range of occupations when the effects of age, gender, length of

time in an organisation and educational level were all accounted for and held as constant.

Dulewicz & Higgs (2000) have found a definite relationship between emotional intelligence

and Manager's career advancement over a 7 year period; they found that EI accounted for

xlix

36% of the variance in organisational advancement. Similarly, in an unpublished study by

Lopes, Cote, Grewal, Kadis, Gall & Salovey (cited in Lopes et al. 2006) emotional

intelligence was measured in a group of 44 employees of a fortune 400 company. The results

showed that emotional abilities positively correlated with percent merit increases, rank in the

company and peer and supervisory ratings.

In an attempt to overcome some limitations present in some of the previous research factors

such as age, gender, tenure & level of education were controlled for when carrying out the

statistical analysis. The current study provides support for the previous research in this area,

the significant positive correlation coefficient of 0.176 (p < 0.05) demonstrates that

Emotional Intelligence positively correlates with individual advancement while controlling

for the variables of age, gender, educational level & tenure. This denotes that individuals with

a higher level of emotional intelligence are more likely to advance to higher levels in their

career.

Many researchers have devised arguments as to the reasons behind the fact that emotional

intelligence is an important factor in determining career success (Akers & Porter, 2003;

Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000; Goleman, 1995, 1998; Donohue & Stevenson, 2006). They argue

that performance at work and career advancement are very much dependant on displays of

interpersonal workplace behaviours that occur as a result of high levels of emotional

intelligence such as effective interpersonal relationships, adaptability, empathy and tolerance.

As the focus shifts to the differentiation of people becoming the only sustainable competitive

advantage so too does the emphasis on “people” or “soft” skills when it comes to

advancement. Those people who display these “people” skills, which are very much akin to

emotional intelligence, on top of their technical ability to actually do their job will be

promoted over those who do not display these skills.

A further reason could be that as individuals who display high levels of emotional

intelligence are capable of regulating their own emotions and are sensitive to the emotions of

others, it is likely that they will have developed their impression management skills and

social capital skills (Donohue & Stevenson, 2006). Therenou (1997) has found that these

social skills are more important than technical skills when it comes to promotion.

l

IQ vs. Emotional Intelligence

In 1995, Time magazine published an article on emotional intelligence (EQ) which claimed

that “In the corporate world........IQ gets you hired but EQ gets you promoted” (Gibbs, Parks

& Birnbaum, 1995, pg.67). The third and final purpose of this study was to investigate the

claim that Emotional intelligence would influence individual advancement to a greater degree

than intelligence.

There has not been much previous research in to this particular claim, however, one study

conducted by Dulewicz & Higgs (2000), has found that Emotional Intelligence (EI)

accounted for 36% of the variance in organisational advancement where IQ only accounted

for 27%. This study implies that EI had more of an effect on career advancement than IQ.

In contrast to the Dulewicz & Higgs study, the researchers current study does not support the

claim made by Gibbs, Parks & Birnbaum in the Time magazine article in 1995 and has found

that intelligence actually influenced individual career advancement to a greater degree than

Emotional Intelligence. In this study Emotional Intelligence accounted for 3.4% of the

variance in Individual Career Advancement while Intelligence, measured by Educational

Attainment, accounted for 5.1% of the variance in Individual Career Advancement indicating

that the researcher’s third hypothesis is not true. One possible reason for this is that the

measure of intelligence used in this study was not actually a measure of IQ but rather a

measure of the level of education achieved by the individual which could have a profound

effect on the outcomes reported.

Zeidner et al. (2004) point out that in the Dulewicz & Higgs (2000) study, intelligence levels

were self reported and the measure of Emotional Intelligence they used did not include some

core facets of EI such as emotion awareness and emotion regulation. This indicates that the

actual levels of variance allocated to EI and IQ are dubious as they have not been measured

effectively. While Dulewicz & Higgs’ study and this present study both purported to measure

intelligence levels, it could be rightfully argued that the measures used did not effectively

measure cognitive intelligence (IQ) and therefore further research would need to be

conducted to successfully support or dismiss the claim that Emotional Intelligence will

influence individual advancement to a greater degree than intelligence.

li

Chapter Six

Conclusion

The current study examined the relationship between emotional intelligence and individual

performance and career advancement. The researcher adopted an objective, positivist,

deductive approach to the research and a quantitative methodology was applied. The study

was conducted on employees from the Bank of Ireland with data being collected by means of

a questionnaire incorporating the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue), a

work performance measure, a career advancement measure and a measure of educational

attainment. The total sample consisted of 132 adult employees from branches of Bank of

Ireland with 95.5% being classed as below manager rank.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of EI on individual performance,

the influence of EI on career progression and whether EI influenced career advancement to a

greater degree than IQ. As most of the research in this field to date had focused on manager

and leader populations the first purpose of this study was to address this gap in the literature

by exploring the above influences on a below manager population. The second purpose of

this study was to provide evidence that higher levels of EI are a valid indicator of higher

levels of individual performance and career progression. It is the intention of the researcher to

provide tangible scientific support to add weighting to the business case for investing in

emotional intelligence testing within the Bank of Ireland and helping to establish the value of

using EI as a tool to help in the recruitment process, promotion, talent measurement, talent

identification and succession planning.

Specifically, the study was designed to address three research questions and the findings

suggest the following:

1) Within the population sampled, individual’s with higher levels of emotional

intelligence were more likely to demonstrate higher levels of performance at work.

2) Within the population sampled, individual’s with higher levels of emotional

intelligence were more likely to have progressed to a higher level in their career.

3) Within the population sampled, emotional intelligence did not influence individual

advancement to a greater degree than intelligence (measured by educational

attainment).

lii

Implications for practice

Information that helps an organisation to improve performance is always desired and the

results from this study provide several implications for organisations as well as for those

individuals who wish to improve their performance at work and consecutively their chances

for career advancement.

This research provides support to the growing body of empirical evidence that the higher an

individual’s EI is the more likely it is that they will perform to higher level at work. As a bid

to try to win the war on talent organisations develop a series of assessment measures in their

recruitment and selection process to facilitate the employment of the most effective people. In

light of the findings of this body of research organisations should incorporate an emotional

intelligence measure to assist in the recruitment of individuals who are more likely to perform

to a higher level.

Large companies such as Bank of Ireland often only recruit externally for entry level

vacancies preferring instead to develop and promote talented and motivated individuals

internally to fill most of the more senior positions. The results of this study in terms of the

influence that EI has on both performance and career advancement should imply that an

organisation would benefit from employing an emotional intelligence measure not only as a

recruitment tool for new entrants but also as a component of the internal recruitment and

promotion assessment process and as a talent identification tool.

Thirdly this research supports the strategy of developing a more effective and competent

workforce throughout an organisation from the front line upwards and not just from manager

level and above. This can be achieved by integrating emotional intelligence development into

training programs for all levels of workers not just management or leadership training.

Lastly, for those individuals seeking promotion in their organisation the findings of this

research would suggest that they should attempt to develop their emotional intelligence traits

to increase their level of EI and thus increase their chances of career advancement.

liii

Limitations and implications for further research

Despite the contributions of this management report, the results need to be interpreted with

caution due to some methodological limitations.

As discussed in Chapter Six, the measure of intelligence used in this study did not actually

measure IQ but rather measured the educational attainment level of the individual i.e. it

measured the number of Leaving Certificate points achieved and the level of education

reached after secondary school. In an attempt to better understand the degrees of influence of

IQ and EI on career advancement further research would need to be conducted with the use of

a valid and reliable measure of cognitive intelligence such as the Wechsler Adult Intelligence

Scale.

Secondly, the study was limited to only one private organisation and having such a small

percentage of the overall population of this Organisation as a sample limits the

generalisability of the results. Thus the results may not be valid in other private or public

organisations or indeed even generalisable to the whole of Bank of Ireland. For example, the

current study’s results may be due to the amount of social interaction within this industry.

Validation through further research in other industries will help to exclude industry type as a

contingency factor (Delery & Doty, 1996) and improve the extent to which the findings can

be generalised beyond the study sample.

Thirdly, although this study did control for many influential variables such as age, gender,

tenure & educational level it did not control for conscientiousness. This is an important

influential factor identified by previous research (Janovics & Christiansen as cited in Lopes et

al, 2006) as eliminating Emotional Intelligence as a significant variable in influencing job

performance when controlling for conscientiousness. Further research should include a valid

and reliable measure of conscientiousness and control statistically for this variable when

analysing the results.

Fourthly, all of the assumptions necessary for Regression Analysis could not be taken to be

true and therefore the results of the Regression Analysis are considered to be weaker than if

the assumptions of normality, linearity and homoscedasticity could in fact be held to be true.

However Tabachnick & Fidell (2001) have stated that multiple regression is quite robust to

any violations of the assumptions and therefore the results of the regression analysis in this

study should be taken to be statistically viable even if they cannot be taken to be as reliable as

liv

if all assumptions could be held. One possible reason for this digression from normal

distribution could be due to outliers being left in with the data when it was analysed.

In conclusion the results from this research paper make a valid contribution to the study of

emotional intelligence in the workplace, but leave a number of important questions

unanswered. Further research needs to evaluate why emotional intelligence influences

individual performance and career advancement. Secondly it needs to establish whether

emotional intelligence predicts these variables or simply co-occurs with them and whether it

is in fact higher performance levels and career advancement which leads to higher levels of

emotional intelligence rather than the contrary as was suggested in this study. And finally,

further research is needed to determine whether the results established in this study generalise

across different industries and to ascertain whether EI is only an influential factor in

industries which require a large amount of interpersonal interaction.

lv

Personal Reflections

It has been a difficult but extremely fulfilling journey from the day I first looked in to the

subject area that I wanted to research to today – the day I print my final version of the

management report and hand it in to be bound. When I first started out I knew I wanted to

research an area that was related in some way to my previous qualifications, utilising my

knowledge of psychology, development and human resources. Emotional intelligence was an

area of avid interest to me as I have a strong personal belief in the power of building strong

relationships and interacting competently and agreeably with others, in knowing oneself and

one’s strengths and weaknesses for happiness and success in both personal and work lives.

Even though I had a subject area of interest devising a feasible research question proved to be

quite difficult – I had so many ideas but could not translate them in to a workable empirical

study; ethical, practical and cost issues abounded but were eventually overcome with some

hard work and much research. This initial stumbling block paved the way for a smoother

journey throughout the research as thinking through the study at the beginning made it easier

for me to ensure that I could see the research right through to the end without running in to

brick walls.

The writing of each chapter of the report was one area that personally challenged me as I

found it difficult to write in so many different styles – from omitting personal opinion,

writing solely using other people’s findings for the literature review to the justification of

methodology choice in chapter three, the reporting of factual statistics in the results section

and the critical analysis, comparison and personal opinion in the last chapters. I feel I have

developed my ability to write scientifically, objectively and critically which has not only

helped me in my pursuit of this qualification but has also helped me in my role as HR

Adviser and will assist me in the future courses that I intend on taking.

lvi

From start to finish this study has been one of continuous learning; learning about the topic to

be researched, learning about the method of how to conduct research and learning about my

own capabilities, motivations and drive to complete a piece of work, of which I am very

proud. I have been afforded an excellent opportunity to develop my skills, knowledge and

aspirations and as such I am very grateful to all of those people, both inside and outside of the

University who have helped me to achieve this. I have been challenged intellectually in terms

of the scope of the research, I have been challenged in terms of the time and effort that was

given to conducting the research and writing up the report and I have been challenged

personally in terms of mentally being able to motivate myself throughout the last year.

I feel that I have developed my knowledge base and through this my confidence in my own

ability to advise others in a professional capacity has been greatly enhanced. I also feel that I

have improved my own emotional intelligence through the interactions with others that this

course has helped to facilitate, having to assess my own strengths and capabilities in terms of

studying and working concurrently and finally in having to learn to control and funnel

emotions to dedicate so much free time to succeeding in this course, getting the most from

myself and developing my own potential.

I hope to work with this experience as I continue in my career in HR. I intend on moving to

London in the autumn to progress my career to the next level and to expose myself to

different organisational cultures from that which I have experienced in Ireland. London can

also offer me the further education options which I am looking in to currently. I hope to

continue with my learning in psychology, coaching and HR and apply for a place on a

Masters programme in Occupational Psychology within the next 18 months.

Doing this research has taught me many things but above all it has taught the value of

research in an organisational context and the value of continuing my education concurrently

while working in that field. Overall the learning, insight and extensive experience that this

last year has provided makes all of those long hours of research and writing well worth it.

lvii

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