Connections between emotional intelligence and workplace flourishing Nicola S. Schutte ⇑ , Natasha M. Loi Psychology, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, 2351, Australia article info Article history: Received 19 January 2014 Received in revised form 20 March 2014 Accepted 22 March 2014 Available online 19 April 2014 Keywords: Emotional intelligence Workplace flourishing Social support Perception of power abstract The individual difference characteristic of emotional intelligence may be a foundation for workplace flourishing. Responses from 319 working adults recruited from the United States and Australia showed that higher emotional intelligence was significantly related to better mental health, more work engage- ment, more satisfaction with social support in the workplace, and more perceived power in the work- place. Mediation path models indicated that more satisfaction with social support in the workplace and more perceived power in the workplace linked greater emotional intelligence to indicators of flourishing. Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction 1.1. Emotional intelligence in the workplace The individual difference characteristic of emotional intelli- gence is a useful construct in workplace research (Brackett, Rivers, & Salovey, 2011; Cherniss, 2010; Joseph & Newman, 2010; O’Boyle, Humphrey, Pollack, Hawver, & Story, 2011; Rosete & Ciarrochi, 2005; Schlaerth, Ensari, & Christian, 2013). Emotional intelligence describes and operationalizes adaptive emotional functioning. Perception, understanding, and managing emotions effectively in the self and others are described as core competen- cies in most operationalizations of emotional intelligence (Bar-On, 2000; Mayer, Salovey, & Caruso, 2004, 2008). These com- petencies are central both in the ability conceptualisation of emo- tional intelligence (e.g., Mayer et al., 2004, 2008) and the trait, or typical functioning, conceptualisation of emotional intelligence (e.g., Petrides & Furnham, 2000). Emotional intelligence is gener- ally assessed through performance tests in the ability approach (Mayer et al., 2004, 2008) and through self- or other-report in the trait approach (Petrides & Furnham, 2001). Higher levels of emotional intelligence are associated with a variety of general positive intrapersonal outcomes (Schutte & Malouff, 2013a). These outcomes include greater subjective well-being assessed through indices such as positive affect and life satisfaction (Brackett & Mayer, 2003; Brackett, Mayer, & Warner, 2004; Schutte & Malouff, 2011) and better mental health (Martins, Ramalho, & Marin, 2010; Schutte, Malouff, Thorsteinsson, Bhullar, & Rooke, 2007). Higher levels of emotional intelligence are also associated with a variety of interpersonal out- comes, including more cooperative behaviour (Schutte et al., 2001), better interpersonal relationships (Lopes et al., 2004; Lopes, Salovey, & Straus, 2003), and more relationship satisfaction (Lopes et al., 2003; Malouff, Schutte, & Thorsteinsson, 2014). Individuals with higher emotional intelligence tend to perceive having more social support and are more satisfied with their social support (Austin, Saklofske, & Egan, 2005; Gallagher & Vella-Brodrick, 2008). Meta-analyses combining the results of many studies indicate that in the workplace more emotionally intelligent employees show better work performance (O’Boyle et al., 2011) and especially tend to perform better in high emotional labour work (Joseph & Newman, 2010). Further, meta-analytic results indicate that more emotionally intelligent employees tend to show superior leader- ship (Harms & Credé, 2010), including more constructive conflict management (Schlaerth et al., 2013). Individuals with higher emotional intelligence may have both a greater sense of power in their work environment and perceive their work environment as more supportive (Houghton, Wu, Godwin, Neck, & Manz, 2012). For example, individuals with higher emotional intelligence have a greater sense of control over their work and both higher emotional intelligence and greater sense of control are associated with better mental health (Johnson, Batey, & Holdsworth, 2009). Employees with higher emotional intelli- gence build more social capital (Chun, Litzky, Sosik, Bechtold, & Godshalk, 2010), which may result in more satisfaction with social support. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2014.03.031 0191-8869/Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +61 2 67733779; fax: +61 2 67733820. E-mail address: nschutte@une.edu.au (N.S. Schutte). Personality and Individual Differences 66 (2014) 134–139 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid