4 Secrets to Perfecting Emotional Management Skills
As a manager, your emotional management skills must extend beyond yourself. Your responsible for holding the office together and setting the standard for how emotions should be handled. These days most hiring managers are seeking passionate and motivated talent, but with so much personality invested in your business, it’s expected and healthy to see flairs of emotion in the workplace. Ensuring your office remains healthy means understanding how to successfully manage these workplace situations, so we’ve uncovered 4 secrets of emotional management to help you out!
Banish Mr. and Ms. Perfect From the Office
You are not superhuman and neither are your employees. Don’t expect complete perfection from your employees or yourself. They’ll appreciate if you show that you are as human as they are and allow them to make a few mistakes here and there. As a manager, you’ll feel the pressure to appear perfect or encourage perfection, but that type of ideal won’t win you extra popularity, respect or productivity. In fact when you’re honest with your employees about company struggles, it may increase their loyalty.
Furthermore, if your team understands what is causing you stress, they’ll have a better idea of how to help you in the way you need. Top emotional management skills don’t entail keeping everything bottled up or never speaking about your difficulties as a manager. When you’re open, you lighten the weight of your emotional load because you allow others to help you bare the burden.
Understand What Your Employees Go Through
When you notice your employees being emotional, one of your first steps should be to understand what is causing the reaction. Remember, you are in a professional setting, so it is extremely unlikely that members of your carefully cultivated team would exhibit emotional behavior out-of-step with the original stimulus. If you want to successfully minimize certain behaviors, you must first understand what the trigger is.
Once you understand the trigger, you develop insight into root of the issue and how to avoid danger zones in the future. Don’t pretend to empathize with your employees. Instead, take the steps necessary to understand the challenges that exist at their level. This will keep you in touch with the health of all levels of your company and help you cultivate a more supportive work environment. You can give your employees the resources they need to meet the productivity goals you require.
Use Emotional Cues to Guide Your Management Strategies
Have you ever noticed yourself or an employee displaying difficulty maintaining their composure Truthfully, it will happen to everyone a few times over the course of his or her career whether you tear up a little or clench your fists tightly around your new leather padfolio. As a manager, pay attention to these emotional cues in yourself and others. Take it a step further and understand how your employees display their emotions. For example, many introverts withdraw in response to stress while extraverts may unconsciously draw more attention to themselves.
After you identify these emotional cues, use your emotional management skills to devise and implement an effective course of action. When you notice tempers rising or devolving composure, quickly suggest everyone take a break and allow breathing room in the situation. If necessary, address issues with specific employees privately and have a discussion without making the employee feel targeted or attacked.
Manage Your Emotions in the Same Manner
If you’re a member of the management team, you’ll spend the majority of you time worrying about your workers and the health of your company. However without its leaders, your enterprise wouldn’t function or thrive as it should, so taking care of yourself is just as important as managing your employees. Know your own emotional cues and limitations. If taking a water break when tempers are rising works for your employees, use the same tactics with yourself to maintain your composure and set an example for your company.
Building a healthy support system is just as important for you emotional management skills as reacting well in the moment. Being a manager is a stressful position, so keep the lines of communication open with your management teams. Cultivate a company culture where managers can rely on each other to share both the emotional and operational workload equally.
If you are looking for a way to improve your company in a holistic way, improving your and your employees’ emotional management skills is an excellent place to start. For more information on helpful company culture cultivation tips, take a look at the many Resume Builder articles and resources.