Your team judges you on these six emotions (and women are judged differently)
Have you received conflicting advice on how to show your emotions as a leader?
On the one hand, we are told to be authentic and transparent. Show the real you! And athletic coaches are known to motivate their teams with fiery, passionate speeches.
But on the other hand, the accepted wisdom is that being emotionally unresponsive is associated with “executive presence.” And that being emotionally resilient will transfer and calm other team members.
So what is it ? And does gender play a role?
New research shows that the emotions expressed by leaders have a big impact on how people perceive their effectiveness.
Followers Watch Six Emotions Among Leaders
The study, conducted by professor of psychology Thomas Sy at UC Riverside and professor of management Daan van Knippenberg at Drexel University, sought to understand how a leader’s emotions affect how effectively people perceive this leader. The researchers identified six patterns of emotional leadership (Cheer, Calm, Pride, Anger, Fear, and Remorse) and ranked the top three as positive; the latter negative. The authors define these schemas, or Implicit Theories of Leadership Emotions (ITLE), as “the conceptions of the emotional traits and behaviors that characterize leaders.”
Sy and van Knippenberg’s work draws on Implicit Leadership Theory (ITL), a well-researched concept suggesting that people have assumptions and implicit expectations about the traits and qualities that make a good leader.
The ITLEs, or the emotional “patterns” that people use to judge whether a leader is effective or not, are more pronounced the higher you move up the organizational chart.
“When we regularly interact with a leader, such as our boss or immediate supervisor, we have enough first-hand information to assess their effectiveness,” Sy said in a written statement. “But we generally have little contact with the leaders at the highest level and less information about them. Therefore, we tend to rely on patterns. Patterns are powerful. Even in the absence of data, they shape our behavior.
Women leaders are judged differently
The new study shows that people also have expectations about the emotions expressed by effective leaders and reveals that female leaders still struggle against age-old gender stereotypes.
Research reveals that female leaders tend to show fewer negative emotions than their male counterparts, in part because women still feel they have to overcome the stereotype that they are “too emotional” to be leaders. effective. Female leaders elicited lower levels of fear, anger, and remorse, and higher levels of joy than male leaders.
This is yet another example of the “double bind” women face at work. A 2016 study found that “women leaders can be penalized for even minor or moderate displays of emotion, especially when the emotion expresses dominance (for example, anger or pride), but being emotionally inexpressive can also result in sanctions because emotionless women are seen as failing to fulfill their warm and community role as women.
The key is emotional intelligence
The results of this research shed light on both the gender stereotypes that women still struggle to overcome and the need for emotional intelligence at all levels of leadership.
Everyone on the gender spectrum experiences emotions, both positive and negative. Not expressing emotions can also negatively affect perceptions of leadership. Robotic and emotionless leaders are likely to have a hard time building trust and inspiring their employees. Some situations also call for different emotional responses. For example, a CEO expressing remorse, even if it is a categorically negative emotion, would be appropriate and indicative of good leadership following a major disaster at the hands of his company. The key is emotional intelligence: the ability to make emotions work for you rather than against you.
Emotional intelligence begins with self-awareness. Leaders must first be able to identify various emotions within them and understand how these emotions manifest in their behaviors. The next step in becoming emotionally intelligent is learning to express these emotions in a thoughtful and intelligent way, even strong emotions like anger. Dr Cary Cherniss, co-author of Leading with Feeling: Nine Strategies for Emotionally Intelligent Leadership, put it like this:
Emotionally intelligent leaders feel anger, but they use their EQ to express it in a positive way. When we looked at this incident and others in our study where leaders got angry and expressed it, we found that there were important aspects that made it more constructive than hurtful. First, the leaders had good relationships with other people. Second, they modulated the way they expressed their feelings. Third, they only expressed their feelings when they were sure they were calm enough not to lose control. And fourth, they didn’t get angry often.
Emotions, for better or for worse, are contagious. This is why emotional intelligence is essential for successful leadership.
“Every role has emotions that need to be expressed, including leaders. To be effective, leaders have to do emotional work, ”said Sy. “Previous research shows that a leader’s emotions affect the performance of followers. The leader’s emotions spread throughout the team and affect the effectiveness of the whole group.
Kevin Kruse is the Founder + CEO of LEADx, a platform that adapts and maintains leadership habits through micro-coaching and behavioral nudges. Kevin is also a New York Times bestselling author of Great leaders don’t have rules, 15 secrets successful people know about time management and Employee engagement 2.0.