By AmeriLife Editorial Team
Technical knowledge can help someone understand a problem, and experience may help them recognize what needs to happen next. But neither one guarantees that a difficult conversation will go well.
Pressure can alter how people communicate, turning a frustrating email into a rushed reply or unexpected feedback into a defensive response. During an already crowded day, even a clear message can sound more abrupt than intended.
Emotional intelligence, often called EQ, helps us recognize those reactions and choose a more deliberate response. Practicing it can improve decision-making, strengthen collaboration, build trust, and support better performance.
For leaders, the connection to performance is becoming harder to overlook. Emotional intelligence research has shown that 57% of managers say their highest-performing employees demonstrate strong emotional intelligence.
EQ shapes how leadership is experienced
Leadership is visible long before someone makes a major decision. It shows up in the tone of an email, how feedback is delivered and the questions someone asks before concluding.
“Emotional intelligence is how leadership is experienced. People notice how leaders listen, communicate, and build trust. You don’t need a specific title to be a leader. It’s all about how you show up,” said AmeriLife’s Vice President of Talent & Organizational Development, Keri Ibarra, in the latest Distribution Women’s Leadership Council (DWLC) “Sips & Strategies” session.
Four connected capabilities help determine that experience: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Together, they help people recognize their emotions, regulate their response, consider the context around others, and communicate in ways that preserve trust. Those skills are especially useful across remote and distributed teams, where a short email or Teams message may carry more weight than the sender intended.
A pause creates room for a better decision
Strong emotions can activate the brain’s fight, flight, or freeze response. During what Ibarra described as an “amygdala hijack,” options can feel narrower, assumptions can begin to feel like facts, and tone or timing can drift from our intent.
EQ helps us build that pause between how we feel and how we choose to respond. Try introducing a simple ABCD framework for creating that pause:
- Aware: Recognize what is putting you in a heightened emotional state and pause or step away.
- Breathe: Take a deep breath to restore the clarity needed to make a thoughtful choice.
- Connect: Connect with a positive emotion to counter the negative reaction.
- Discover: Ask questions that help you respond with clarity and intention.
Emotions provide useful information, while EQ helps us respond with intention. The ABCDs create space to process what we’re feeling before deciding what to do next.
Intent and impact deserve equal attention
Emotional intelligence also helps us recognize that good intent doesn’t always produce the intended impact. A message written quickly can feel efficient to the sender but dismissive to the recipient. You may intend to deliver information efficiently, but it can read to the recipient as terse or rude.
Repairing that miscommunication can begin with a straightforward acknowledgment: “I intended to help us reach a solution, but I don’t think my message landed the way I intended. Can we revisit it?” That response demonstrates awareness, accountability, and respect without avoiding a candid conversation.
EQ grows through practice
Nobody handles every pressured moment perfectly. Emotional intelligence is a set of behaviors that can strengthen with practice. Start with one observable behavior you can repeat over the next 30 days. Notice your reaction sooner, pause long enough to separate facts from assumptions, and choose a response that moves the work and the relationship forward.
Frequently asked questions
- What is emotional intelligence in the workplace?
Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize emotions, manage reactions and respond to others with clarity, awareness and intention. - Why does emotional intelligence matter for leaders?
It shapes how leadership is experienced through listening, communication, trust-building and the way leaders respond under pressure. - How can EQ help during difficult workplace moments?
EQ creates space between emotion and response, helping professionals pause, separate facts from assumptions and choose a more constructive next step. - What are the four core EQ capabilities?
The four connected capabilities are self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and relationship management. - How can someone start building emotional intelligence?
Start with one observable behavior, such as pausing before replying, asking a clarifying question or checking whether the impact of a message matches the intent.
