Self versus employees’ Appraisal of managers’ emotional intelligence: the case of Gweru and Kwekwe city councils, Midlands Province, Zimbabwe

Abstract

Emotional Intelligence has become increasingly popular as a management tool for boosting performance at work. Despite this popularity, there is no sustained research in Zimbabwe that substantiates the efficacy of emotional intelligence especially within municipality environments. Using Goleman’s four clusters of emotional intelligence self-awareness, emotional intelligence self-management, emotional intelligence awareness of others and emotional intelligence management of others managers rated themselves high as compared to employee ratings. The results indicate that managers may be clueless as to employee perceptions of their behaviour. It is important that managers constantly get feedback from those they lead so that they improve their attitude and behaviour. Using purposive and stratified sampling techniques, 32 managers and 400 subordinates participated in the study. The instrument that measured Goleman’s emotional intelligence through self-rating was reliable with Cronbach’s Alpha reliability coefficients ranging from emotional self-awareness 0.846, emotional self-management 0.886, emotional awareness of others 0.939 and emotional intelligence management of others 0.960. The instrument used by employees to rate managers was also reliable with the Cronbach’s Alpha reliability coefficients ranging from emotional intelligence self-awareness 0.807, emotional intelligence self-management 0.834, emotional intelligence awareness of others 0.858 and emotional intelligence management of others 0.945. The hypothesis that self rating and others’ rating can-not be same was validated.