EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AND EMPLOYEE’S JOB PERFORMANCE IN THE NIGERIAN BANKING INDUSTRY

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

An emerging concept fast gaining grounds and wider managerial attention seems to be the concept of emotional intelligence in a work place. The concept appears to emerge as an important but still relatively understudied element of competence. Emotional Intelligence is the abilities concerning recognition and regulation of emotions in self and others, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions.

Application of emotional intelligence will support the managers and employees to recognize and understand emotions and using emotional intelligence to manage oneself and his/her relationship with others. Emotional Intelligence, it is “people – focused”, is based on sound competency in two major dimensions: self and social. The high emotional intelligence person will have knowledge and positive attitude and will also behave skillfully in the self and social dimension (Emily, 2006).

Emotional intelligence is not a simple repackaging of the “soft skills” we so often hear about in organization. It appears to be based on research. Good managers seem to have known for years that communicating effectively, treating people well, and modeling appropriate behavior themselves make good business sense. Research linking emotions and skills on one hand and facts and figures on the other hand will obviously proof this. There’s no need to throw away cognitive (thinking) processes, but by themselves these may not be enough for success in the organization. The truth is that we will need both rational data and emotional data in our lives if we are to be successful in business. The applications of emotional intelligence in the workplace include areas like personnel selection, development of employees, teams and the organization.

Organization may coach their employees in developing their interpersonal skills, other skills and also coach them to perform effectively on the job with other employees in the work place (Reuven et al, 2007). Employees need to enhance their emotional intelligence skills, apart from technical skills, which in turn will enhance their productivity on the job. According to Bob (2008), Management of emotional intelligence by the team members will help in developing interpersonal skills of the team members. Therefore, organization to be successful needs to develop employees’ emotional intelligence skills in order to be able to work effectively in the organization. It is not surprising that empirical research seems to establish a linkage between emotional intelligence and employees performance (Cote and Miners, 2006; Robins and Ferris, 2006). Simply processing emotional intelligence may lead to higher performance in the service industry unless if it affects how people use their emotions at work setting. Apparently, employees may handle their emotions accurately and use certain behaviours in the organization that allow them to gather better information, grid other’s behavior or make better decisions about their activities, that result in better performance in the job (Klim et al, 2009).

The Nigerian financial market was hitherto dominated by small assets – base banks that were not internationally competitive. Ovia (2002) noted that in repositioning the Nigeria financial market for competitiveness in the 21st century the deployment of information technology would play dominant catalytic role in growing the market. Thus, in the eye of the keen competition in the service industry, market competition in the banking industry, market players needs to devise new survival strategies. Financial institutions world-wide seem to be compelled by the emergence of emotional intelligence to fast-forward to more radical transformation of business systems and models.

In the same view of Bill Gates (2001) noted that the successful banks of the next decades will be the ones that use emotional tools to re-invent the way they work. These banks may take decisions quickly, act efficiently and directly touch their customers in positive ways. Going emotional may put banks on the edge of the shock wave of change. That may shatter the old ways of doing business. Thus, this study examines the impact of emotional intelligence on employees’ performances in the Nigerian banking industry.

1.2 Statement of Problem

Managing workers’ emotions correctly appear to be a 21st century challenge to the managers. Although past researcher established a relationship between emotional intelligence and performance in the organization, little evidence is known about how employees translate their emotional intelligence into enhanced work outcomes in the banking industry.

In workplaces where people are constantly afraid and insecure, employees are at risk of “turning numb” to protect themselves. These are clearly seen in the black faces of sub staff the lack of enthusiasm by front line workers, and in the remarkably incentive ways managers and employees treat each other.

The mechanism which allows a person to survive an emotionally painful environment also makes it difficult for them to respond sensitively and empathetically towards others. Some staff in the banking industry seems not to be socially aware of the emotions and concerns of others. They do not know what is socially acceptable from them in society and how they should act in that manner.

At work place, interaction with other people seems to be critical which may require the competency of empathy for better performance. Most banks’ employees are not socially competent employees. They lack the idea of putting themselves in others’ position and then may proceed to certain inappropriate action.

Socially competent staff have the ability of understanding the overall psyche of an organization and political realities in groups, but most employees seem not be aware of this. They lack the ability to create organizational awareness that may enhance networking and coalition building which may make them to wield influence irrespective of their professional role. Organizations regardless of size, technology and market focus are facing employee retention challenges. Few organizations believe that the human personnel and employees of any organization are its main assets which can lead them to success or if not focused well, to decline.

1.3 Research Questions

This study is guided by the following research questions:

(i) What is the impact of self-control on employees’ performance in the Nigerian banking industry?

(ii) Does self-awareness have any impact on employee’s performance in the Nigerian banking industry?

(iii) What is the impact of social competencies on employee’s performance in the

Nigerian banking industry?

(iv) To what extent does managing emotion of leaders’ affect employee’s performance in the Nigerian banking industry?

1.4 Objectives of the Study

The general objective of this study is to ascertain the impact of emotional intelligence on employees’ performance in the Nigerian banking industry. The specific objectives are to:

(i) Investigate the impact of self-control on employees’ performance in Nigeria Banking Industry

(ii) Find out the impact of self-awareness on employee performance in Nigeria

Banking Industry.

(iii) Examine the impact of social competency on employee performance in Nigeria banking industry.

(iv) Ascertain the extent to which managing emotion affect employee performance in

Nigeria banking industry.

1.5 Research Hypotheses

H0₁: There is no relationship between self-control and employees performance in the

Nigerian Banking Industry.

H0₂: There is no relationship between self-awareness and employees performance in the

Nigerian Banking Industry.

H0₃: There is no relationship between social competencies and employees performance in the Nigerian Banking Industry.

H0_4: Managing emotion of leaders do not positively affect employees performance in the

Nigerian Banking Industry.

1.6 Significance of the Study

This study examines the impact of emotional intelligence on employees’ performance in the Nigerian banking industry. The study will have great impact on the management of banks and also show the relevance of emotional intelligence on the performance of banks’ employees.

This study on emotional intelligence in the banking industry helps to identify some of the problems of their customers which are attributable to lack of emotional intelligence in the industry.

The study provide ways in which bank employees assist their customers since the study will help the banks managers to train their staff on how to attend to customers.

Other business organizations in the country will also benefit from this study because it will help them to realize that emotional intelligence is a kind of tool and asset in the organization, which enables the employees to work in harmony and the organizational productivity will increase as well.

1.7 Scope of the Study

This study covers the impact of emotional intelligence on employees’ performance in the

Nigerian banking industry. It covers only selected banks in Asaba, Oshimili South Local Government Area of Delta State. The banks in Asaba was chosen because the researcher can easily get information needed for his research since the researcher resides in Asaba and can have access to the staff of the banks.

The study is limited to Asaba in Oshimili South Local Government Area of Delta State due to the fact that many indigenous and non-indigenous people live there and also for the fact that Asaba is the state capital. Other areas were not explored.

The population for this study is limited to employees and managers of the selected banks. The adopted indicators of emotional intelligence are limited to self-control; self-awareness; social competence and managing emotion. It was presumed that the indicators would make for easy measurement of emotional intelligence of employees and managers of the selected banks. And this study covers a period of one year (2015/2016)