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40 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s
performance: a case from Romania’s public sector
Oana Matilda SABIE
1
*, Cătălin PÎRVU
2
, Ștefan Gabriel BURCEA
3
Roxana Maria BRIȘCARIU
4
, Simona Alexandra APOSTOL (VOICU)
5
Abstract:
The research aim was to analyse the relationship between emotional intelligence
and performance of public sector employees, but we also looked at correlations between
two dimensions of emotional intelligence and two particular dimensions which impact
organizational performance. This study was conducted on employees from Romanian
public sector organizations and in order to achieve the purpose of the research we
developed a quantitative methodology based on questionnaire. All the measures we used in
this study were drawn from established previous research and specially adapted and
tailored for employees from public sector. The study was conducted through a quantitative
methodology, using a conceptual deductive research approach based on conceptual
framework in order to test the hypotheses. For the statistical analysis, we used the package
SPSS Statistics 22.0, through which we generated descriptive analyses and several
parametric tests aimed at achieving the main purpose of our research. The results of our
research are relevant for leaders and human resources managers of public sector
organizations, but they can also be useful for practitioners and scientific community from
around the world. The conclusions of our research demonstrate that emotional intelligence
is important for any organization and does have a statistically significant impact on how
performance is measured and encouraged in Romanian public organizations. Although the
correlation is not the strongest, the 0,321 Pearson Correlation coefficient is enough to
warrant public organizations investing in recruiting and retaining emotionally intelligent
workforce if they care about performance.
Keywords: emotional intelligence, employee performance, public sector, strategic decision
process, relationship management, self-management.
1
PhD lecturer; Bucharest University of Economic Studies; Bucharest; Romania;
oana.sabie@amp.ase.ro, corresponding author
2
PhD assistant; Bucharest University of Economic Studies; Bucharest; Romania;
catalin.pirvu85@yahoo.com
3
PhD lecturer; Bucharest University of Economic Studies; Bucharest; Romania;
stefan.burcea@amp.ase.ro
4
PhD assistant; Bucharest University of Economic Studies; Bucharest; Romania;
roxana.briscariu@gmail.com
5
PhD candidate; Bucharest University of Economic Studies; Bucharest; Romania;
simo_apostl@yahoo.com
Sabie, O. M., Pîrvu, C., Burcea, Ș. G., Brișcariu, R. M., Apostol (Voicu), S. A. The
influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance: a case from Romania’s
public sector. Administratie si Management Public, 35, 40-57.
DOI: 10.24818/amp/2020.35-03
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
a case from Romania’s public sector
ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 41
JEL: D91, H11, O15
DOI: 10.24818/amp/2020.35-03
Introduction
Social intelligence can be considered as a precursor of emotional
intelligence (EI), speaking of theoretical terms first mentioned by Mayer &
Salovey (1993), as a subset of social intelligence. Goleman (1998, 2002) is one of
the authors that brought large visibility to EI concept, discussing about one’s
personal emotions, the way we recognize other’s emotions and how we connect
with it. As research areas describes self-management and relationship management,
inter-personal context, self-awareness and emotional traits. EI roots came from the
beginning of ’19 century, when E. L. Thorndike (1920) analysed different types of
intelligence, with specific focus on social intelligence. The research was delivered
on boys and girls studying their ‘ability to act wisely in human relations’ and was
continued (Thorndike & Stein, 1937), by dividing social intelligence in three
contemplative dimensions: individual’s attitude toward society, social knowledge
and individual’s degree of social adjustments. More recently, Bar-On (2000),
Mayer (2004), Goleman (1995) brought the concept of EI to new practices and
revitalized its importance from different life perspectives.
1. Literature review and conceptual framework
1.1 Emotional intelligence
At present, performance has become an important parameter that
determines the success of an organization. In the public sector, organizational
performance is influenced by the relationship between the organization and its
employees. Thus, the role of emotional intelligence is to consolidate, develop and
intensify this relationship, which justifies the tendency in the scientific literature to
research emotional intelligence from the standpoint of its link to organizational
behavior (Zehir et al, 2017). The concept of emotional intelligence is defined as the
capacity to reflect and distinguish one’s own feelings and emotions as well as those
of the ones around you, and to use those distinctions in the substantiation of your
own thoughts and actions (Salovey & Mayer, 1990).
Goleman (1995) also argues for the importance of emotional intelligence,
implying it is an essential ability for both social and professional life, for the
management of interpersonal relationships, and for social activities in general. The
common denominator for all the theories and attempts to conceptualize emotional
intelligence is the fact that this set of emotional competences has to be well
understood, because it constitutes the major factor which supports the adaptation
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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42 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
and development of the individual in the various situations one might be
confronted with (Durlak et al., 2011).
Researchers have developed different models in order to measure abilities,
competencies, behaviors that could define EI. Most of them have been defined to
be applied in managerial practice, but there are also other directed to family life,
having a individual perspective. The most used and influential models related to EI
measurement, were the ones of Bar-On (1997), Salovey and Mayer (1990),
Goleman (2002), Mayer, Caruso &Salovey (2000), Boyatzis, Goleman & Rhee
(2000), Petrides, Pita & Kokkinaki (2007). And is time here to mention the two
ways of modelling EI- mixed models and EI- ability models. Ability model
analysis of emotional intelligence as one type of intelligence was researched by
Mayer and Salovey (1993), Schutte et al. (1998). On the other hand, mixed models
involve different aspects of personality as skills, competencies, behaviors and the
examples of theoretical and practical approach can be found in Bar-On model
(1997), Caruso, Mayer & Salovey (2002), Boyatzis, Goleman and Rhee (2000)
papers. Clarke (2010) bring into attention other models that derivate from the
previous ones: Petrides and Furnham (2001), Dulewicz, Higgs and Slaski (2003)
mixed model and competence-based models of Goleman et al. (2002) composed by
four analysis directions: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and
relationship management.
Other studied that positively correlates EI and job performance could be
mentioned: Lam & Kirby (2002), Sy et. al (2006), O’Boyle et. al. (2011). There
also have been studies like Becker (2003), Locke (2005), Day and Carroll (2004),
Petrides et al. (2007) that suggested that there is no relation or there is an
inconsistent relation between emotional intelligence and job performance. Cherniss
(2000), on the other hand mentions that EI itself is not a good predictor of job
performance. But, attitudes like optimism, the ability to handle stress can influence
success at workplace.
1.2 Performance of public sector employee
The causes for the often-lacking performance of public organizations can
be found on many levels. Studies in the scientific literature suggest that there is a
necessity for tackling this problem on an individual level. For example, Lee et al.
(2006) considers that employees are the backbone of providing quality public
service, such that improving performance on an individual level will result in an
increase in organizational performance. Performance represents the capacity to
produce results in a clearly determined measure with regards to a clearly
determined objective (Ciobanu, Androniceanu, 2018; Javier, 2002).
Researchers show little attention to the individual dimension of employee
performance in the public sector (Johari et al., 2019), even though the most studied
consequences of emotional intelligence in mainstream publications are works
regarding workplace performance and employee satisfaction (Joseph el al., 2015;
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
a case from Romania’s public sector
ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 43
Miao et al., 2017). For example, Carmeli (2003) proves that employees with a high
EI quotient are better able to manage their emotions in order to develop positive
thinking which helps them improve workplace performance. Wu (2011) analyses
the influence of EI on professional stress and employee performance and concludes
that high EI levels lead to high levels of employee workplace performance.
Similarly, Yozgat et al. (2013) mention that public sector employees with high EI
levels register high performance in the workplace under stressful conditions.
In the eventuality of substantial public sector reforms, Johari et al. (2019)
considers that the starting point should be the evaluation of public sector positions
with regard to their attractiveness. Bryson et al. (2014) argue that the political
factor as well as the way in which public policy is written and implemented has a
large effect on public sector workplace attractiveness. Recent studies have
underlined the importance of emotional intelligence and have analysed the
relationships between its dimensions and other aspects which pertain to
organizational management (Bozionelos & Singh, 2017). Thus, the current study
focuses on aspects regarding workplace performance and the way and measure to
which it is determined by a certain level of emotional intelligence of the public
sector employees.
1.3 Relationship management
Relationship management is the most important point of strong
interpersonal relationship. When relationship is managed very well, then the
employee’s performance is being reached. Some managers cannot handle
relationship among employees. A manager with high EI will always handle
relationship in optimum way. For leaders, to manage and build successful
relationships is a must, since they need these skills in order to relate to the others
employees and to engage in a meaningful way. Managers have to be capable to
develop relationships with the members of their teams, in order to motivate them,
to reduce the stress related to work environment, to get them on bord for the entire
projects, to create and transmit their vision, to achieve objectives and drive the
entire organization to the top (Moldoveanu & Sabie, 2009; Popescu et al., 2016).
According to George (2000) emotionally intelligent managers and leaders are
capable of better interpersonal relations, of improving their decision making by
instilling a sense of trust, enthusiasm and cooperation in their subordinates and
collaborators.
1.4 Strategic decision process
The function of the strategic decision-making process is to assist
organizations and their employees in choosing the best strategic decisions out of
many available alternatives which allow for the implementation of plans regarding
the allocation of resources, the strategic direction of the organization, efficient
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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44 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
functioning and organizational development. Nooraie (2014) affirms that decision-
making is a process which involves the decision-making authority which, in the
process of making a decision identifies and compares alternatives which allow for
the fulfilment of the objectives set, picks from among the identified alternatives
and estimates the alternative considered optimal with regards to the desired
outcomes. Thus, at the organizational level, decisions have to be made so that
through them, various functions of management may be fulfilled and in order to
facilitate the focusing of activities toward the organization’s mission and objective.
Kompaso and Sridevi (2010) affirm that if employees were more involved
in the decision-making process and would receive more decision-making
autonomy, they would become more devoted to their work, would become more
productive and thus would register higher performance in the workplace. Also,
Tensay and Singh (2020) conclude that the autonomy and freedom of action
offered to public service employees contributes to the raising of the degree of their
involvement and results in increased organizational performance.
1.5 Self-management
Self-management, as indicated by Goleman (2001), is that expertise that
permits an individual to manage upsetting components, for example, nervousness
and outrage or smother enthusiastic motivations. An individual with this capacity
will have the option to remember the positive feelings that show up when he/she
accomplishes objectives or stifles negative feelings, which will help increase
motivation (Sabie et al., 2020). The ability of self-management are emotional self-
control, uplifting standpoint; genuineness and reliability, conscientiousness,
versatility, accomplishment direction/ drivers and initiative.
1.6 Performance monitoring
The axiom, “If you can’t measure performance, you can’t manage
performance”, supports the reasoning for becoming tied up with a widely inclusive
performance measurement estimation framework, for example, the Balanced
Scorecard. This methodology falls measures all through an organization to make an
interpretation of high-level targets into lower level exercises. Measures are then
forced on singular representatives to monitor their performance of these exercises
(Platts & Sobotka, 2010). Employee performance measurement is defined by Platts
and Sobotka (2010) as the process that underpins the authoritative control
framework by connecting the work of every individual worker or leader/ manager
to the general mission of the organization. Armstrong (1991) introduced the need
for a formal monitoring using a proper checking and incentive components, while
Furnham (1997) identified other ways of determining employees’ commitment to
achieve performance in an organization (positive workplace environment,
visionary leadership, empowering individuals, etc.).
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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2. Research methodology
2.1 Aim and research objectives/ hypotheses
The purpose of the research is to identify if and how emotional intelligence
affects the actual performance of employees in the Romanian public sector. For
this particular article, apart from the general consideration of whether the
emotional intelligence taken as a whole affects the performance of the public sector
employees in Romania, we also wanted to look at correlations between two
dimensions of emotional intelligence and two particular dimensions which impact
organizational performance.
We looked toward self-management and relationship management as
components of emotional intelligence and toward the inclination toward strategic
decision making and performance monitoring when it comes to factors that
influence organizational performance in the public sector.
The three main research hypotheses were:
H1: The level of Emotional Intelligence of employees affects the
performance of the public sector organizations in Romania.
H2: There is a significant relationship between relationship management
and the strategic decision process in public sector organizations.
H3: There is a significant relationship between self-management and
performance monitoring in public sector organizations.
2.2 Research design and data collection
Starting from empirical data and previous research, the current study
propose is an extensive analysis of the dimension of emotional intelligence in
relation to performance in public sector organization. To achieve the purpose of the
research we developed a quantitative methodology based on questionnaire the main
reason being to investigate a large population. The questions in the survey ranged
from measuring the dimensions of emotional intelligence using a wide array of
questions, to questions about the organizational reality in the public sector, and of
course demographic data that was of interest to the research. All measures used in
this study were drawn from established previous research and specially adapted
and tailored for employees from public sector.
The Emotional Intelligence of employees was measured through a 54-item
composite index each indicating either the presence of emotional intelligence (for
which the item received 1 point for a positive answer and 0 for a negative answer),
or the absence of emotional intelligence which was scored in the opposite way,
with the negative answer scoring 1 point and the positive answer 0 points.
Thus, the maximum possible score for the Emotional Intelligence Score
was 54, in the eventuality that the respondents answer positively at all the questions
describing the presence of emotional intelligence, and negatively at all the
questions describing the absence of EI.
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
a case from Romania’s public sector
46 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
In order to test the hypotheses, we followed a conceptual, deductive
approach to design, based upon the frame-work and model derived from the review
of the literature. A non-probabilistic sampling was used, the data being collected
through the convenience sampling method (Acharya et al., 2013), following two
criteria: respondent to be employed in public sector and having at least one year
experience. For the statistical analysis, we used the package SPSS Statistics 22.0,
through which we generated descriptive analyses and several parametric tests
aimed at achieving the main purpose of our research.
Even though the questionnaire was designed to be applied in both variants,
face-to-face and online, because the data collection period coincided with the
national lockdown due to the pandemic COVID19, the questionnaire was applied
exclusively online. E-mails and newsletter databases were sent to key contacts who
work in the public sector and they were asked to distribute the link to the survey we
conducted to their co-workers. The questionnaires were administered during April-
July 2020.
The online survey has some advantage, the main being the relatively low
costs and in a small amount of time reach and gather answers from a greater
number of employees in the public sector than using research operators in the field.
Not only that, but to an extent using a self-administered survey also eliminates
some degree of observer effect which would have caused respondents to answer
with socially acceptable answers instead of what they actually thought or felt.
2.3 The main characteristics of the sample
The sample was compiled through the convenience sampling method,
which led us to the following main characteristics of the public servants who
participated in the study. The sample size for this research was 394 employees in
the Public Sector in Romania, 79.1% from urban area and 20.9% from rural area.
The distribution of employees from public sector included in the study: 189 (48%)
were female, 175 (44.4%) were male, and 30 (7.6%) didn’t declare their sex; ages
ranging between 19 years and 64 years, with the average age of participants of 37
years (SD 11.88). The educational level of public sector employees indicates a
distribution close to the distribution of education at the national level: 34.8%
employees have the level of high school and professional school; 32.6% have
higher education level, 22.4% they have completed a master's program and 10.2%
have finished postgraduate studies.
Table 1. The main characteristics of the sample
Item
Categories
Percent
Mean
SD
Gender
Feminine
48.0 %
Masculine
44.4 %
Not reported
7.6 %
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 47
Item
Categories
Percent
Mean
SD
Age
Minimum 19 years – Maximum 64 years
36.99
11.88
Education
(range 1-10)
High school and professional
34.8 %
Bachelor degree
32.6 %
Master degree
22.4 %
PhD and post-university
10.2 %
Organization size
Between 1-49 employees
27.6 %
Between 50-250 employees
29.7 %
More than 250 employees
42.7 %
Tenure in
organization
(years)
Minimum 1 year – Maximum 41 years
9.87
9.04
Position in
organization
Management level
29.4 %
Non-management level
70.6 %
Experience years
in position of
Management level
8.03
7.46
Non-management level
9.72
9.63
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
In additional we measured the principal aspects of the public organizations
that employees belong as size, position in organization, tenure, experience in
position of management level and executive. Selected items are shown in Table 1,
size of public organization indicates us that our survey was available to employees
from all types of public sector from the small ones to the big ones, such as the city
hall to the ministries, 42.7% of participants are employees in big public
organization with more than 250 employees, 29.7% of participants are employees
in middle pubic organization with 50-250 employees, and 27.6% of respondents
are from small pubic organization with less than 50 employees.
Data on the profile of respondents also show us an average of 10 years of
experience in public organization with standard deviation of 9.04, and a
distribution between management position (29.4%) and executive level (70.6%).
2.4 Data analysis and research findings
As we’ve outlined previously, we posed 3 hypotheses which we wanted to
verify: H1: The level of Emotional Intelligence of employees affects the
performance of the public sector organizations in Romania.
H2: There is a significant relationship between relationship management
and the strategic decision process in public sector organizations.
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
a case from Romania’s public sector
48 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
H3: There is a significant relationship between self-management and
performance monitoring in public sector organizations.
H1 – The relationship between Emotional Intelligence of employees and
Performance of the public sector organizations. For the Emotional Intelligence
scale, as we said previously, we used a 54-question composite index, with a
maximum score of 54 and for the measuring of Performance, the index had 10
items scored on a scale from 1 to 5, so a total maximum score of 50.
Figure 1 illustrates the distribution of Emotional Intelligence among valid
answers from the participants. The maximum score was 53, and the minimum
was 21, with the average Emotional Intelligence score being 43.94, which is 88%
out of the maximum of 54.
Figure 1. Emotional Intelligence Histogram
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
Figure 2 is the histogram of how much the respondents think performance
is evaluated and encouraged in their own organizations. With a maximum of 50,
the mean was 38,30. There were 2 respondents who gave the minimum score of 10,
while 41 respondents gave the maximum 50.
Figure 2. Performance Histogram
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
a case from Romania’s public sector
ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 49
When it comes to correlating Emotional Intelligence and the measurement
and encouragement of Performance in the public sector in Romania, we notice in
Table 2 a significant and medium correlation, with a Pearson Correlation
Coefficient of 0.321, and a Sig. of 0.
Table 2. Correlation between Emotional Intelligence and Performance
in the Public Sector
Emotional Intelligence
Performance
Emotional Intelligence
Pearson Correlation
1
.321**
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000
N
224
223
Performance
Pearson Correlation
.321**
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000
N
223
377
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
So, we can say that Emotional Intelligence does have a statistically
significant impact on how Performance is measured and encouraged in Romanian
public organizations. Although the correlation is not the strongest, the 0,321
coefficient is enough to warrant public organizations investing in recruiting and
retaining emotionally intelligent workforce if they care about performance.
H2 – The relationship between Relationship Management and the Strategic
Decision Process in public sector organizations. Out of the questions in the survey,
10 total questions were about relationship management. We had to recode some of
them to either indicate a positive or negative capacity toward relationship
management, so the overall indicator of relationship management has a maximum
score of 10 and a minimum score of 0. For the strategic decision process, the score
is a minimum of 7 and a maximum of 35, and was calculated by summing the
scores on a scale from 7 questions regarding strategic decision-making practices in
the organization, all rated on a scale from 1 to 5.
Table 3. Correlation between Relationship Management
and Strategic Decision-Making
Relationship
Management
Strategic Decision
Making
Relationship
Management
Pearson Correlation
1
.208**
Sig. (2-tailed)
.001
N
294
253
Strategic Decision
Making
Pearson Correlation
.208**
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.001
N
253
322
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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50 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
With a Sig of 0.001 and a Pearson Correlation intensity of 0.208, presented
in Table 3, the hypotheses that relationship management correlates positively with
an organization’s inclination toward strategic decision making is confirmed at a
99% confidence level. Though statistically significant, the correlation is not very
high, indicating that persons with good relationship management skills also tend to
see the leadership of their organization as having both a better use of and a greater
propensity toward strategic management. However, something interesting happens
when we split the groups of respondents into leaders and employees in executive
functions with regards to this correlation (Table 4; Table 5).
First, here is a breakdown of the two groups:
Table 4. What is your position in the organization? - Leaders
Frequency
Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
Top Management Leadership
22
21.8
21.8
21.8
Middle Management Leadership
36
35.6
35.6
57.4
Leadership function with a
maximum of 5 persons in the
team
43
42.6
42.6
100.0
Total
101
100.0
100.0
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
Table 5. What is your position in the organization? – Execution Functions
Frequency
Percent
Valid Percent
Cumulative Percent
Valid
Execution Function
243
100.0
100.0
100.0
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
As it can be seen, there are 101 leaders and 243 employees with executive
functions. There were 50 persons who did not declare their position, for a total of
394 respondents. When we split the groups and study the same correlation between
Relationship Management and strategic decision making, in Table 6 and Table 7
we can observe other results:
Table 6. Correlation between Relationship Management
and Strategic Decision-Making for Leaders
Relationship
Management
Strategic Decision
Making
Relationship
Management
Pearson Correlation
1
.158
Sig. (2-tailed)
.196
N
81
69
Strategic Decision
Making
Pearson Correlation
.158
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.196
N
69
82
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 51
Table 7. Correlation between Relationship Management and Strategic Decision-
Making for employees with an execution function
Relationship
Management
Strategic Decision
Making
Relationship
Management
Pearson Correlation
1
.191*
Sig. (2-tailed)
.016
N
181
159
Strategic Decision
Making
Pearson Correlation
.191*
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.016
N
159
199
*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
The correlation does hold up in the case of employees with an execution
function, but even there it has a lower intensity (0.191 compared to 0.208 in the
overall sample), and the sig is 0.016, which still keeps the correlation significant
but this time not at a 0.01, but only at a 0.05 level. This indicates not only a
weaker, but also a more unreliable correlation when referring only to employees
with execution functions.
But where things differ significantly is when Leaders are concerned. As we
can see from Table 6, not only is the Pearson Correlation coefficient lower (0.158
compared to 0.191 or 0.208), but the Sig is significantly higher, having a value of
0.196, which indicates only a 80,4% confidence interval. What this indicates is that
when it comes to what employees in execution functions think of how strategic the
leaders of the organization are, those with higher relationship management skills
tend to have somewhat of a better opinion of the strategic prowess of their leaders.
On the other hand, even though the Pearson Coefficient indicates a positive
correlation between the relationship management skills and attitudes of leaders and
their opinion of how strategic the overall leadership is, that correlation is both
lower and not statistically significant.
So, what we can conclude based on these numbers is that Relationship
Management skills and attitudes impact the person’s opinion of how strategic the
leadership of their organization is differently, depending on whether they’re a part
of the leadership or they are the ones being led. Leaders high in relationship
management don’t necessarily think themselves and their leadership colleagues are
more strategic. This is likely because being on the inside of the group they are
judging (the leadership), they tend to differentiate between their own subjective
projection of who someone is and what their capacities are on the one hand, and the
metrics and results that person gets, which is a much more objective criterion for
measuring strategic inclination or not.
Those in positions of execution don’t really understand or have any inside
view of what it means to actually be in charge of the strategic aspect of the
organization, so the only criterion they have to judge the strategic inclinations of
their leaders by is what informal opinion they form about those leaders. And since
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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52 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
persons who are high in relationship management tend to have more faith and as
such an overall better opinion of others than those with lower relationship
management scores, some of that faith and goodwill translates via the halo effect to
a better opinion of how strategic their leaders are, which may or may not be the
case in objective terms.
H3 – The relationship between Self-Management and the Performance
Monitoring in public sector organizations. The index for Self-Management
contained 10 items, each adding a score of 1 to the overall index if it indicated
positive Self-Management tendencies or 0 if it didn’t, so the maximum possible
score was 10. To measure the degree to which performance is monitored within the
organization, we had 4 questions with scales from 1 to 5, so here the minimum
score was 4 and the maximum was 20.
Looking at results, respondents rated themselves highly in measures that
related to self-management, the overall mean of the distribution being 8.56. Values
are clearly clustered toward the right of the distribution, with only 36.3% of valid
responses scoring under 9 points. When it comes to the Performance Monitoring
score, we observed it was also clustered toward the right of the distribution, but
does not have the same uniform ascending scaling of the Self-Management
distribution. Here we have a mean of 16.17, which considering the maximum score
for this indicator was 20 is 0,475 lower than 8.56 out of 10, which is the mean for
self-management.
Table 8. Self-Management – Performance Monitoring Correlation
Self-
Management
Performance
Monitoring
Self-Management
Pearson Correlation
1
.222**
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000
N
300
275
Performance
Monitoring
Pearson Correlation
.222**
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000
N
275
347
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
(Source: Authors results, 2020)
In Table 8, we see that between measures of Self-Management and
Performance Monitoring there is a significant correlation, albeit it again, a
somewhat weak one, with the Pearson coefficient being only 0.222. If we split the
overall group into the same two subgroups as in the last hypotheses, there is again a
visible split, with the respondents in leadership positions showing a correlation of
0.268 with a Sig of 0.18, while for the employees in execution positions, the
correlation coefficient is only 0.176 with a Sig of 0.22. Still, unlike the correlation
between Relationship Management and Strategic Decision Making which broke
down in terms of significance when applied to the Leadership subgroup, in the case
of Self-Management and Performance Management, the correlation holds
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ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020 53
significance at a 0.05 level both for the Leaders and for the employees in execution
functions subgroup.
3. Conclusions and limits of the research
The research hypothesis have all been confirmed, but in the case of H2
when we split the total group into two groups, one with only leaders and one with
only workers in execution positions, the significance of the relationship between
relationship management tendencies and practices regarding strategic decision
making for the organizational leaders broke down in the case of Leaders judging
themselves and their peers. What is the exact cause for this difference in
significance remains to be further researched, but one hypothesis that may warrant
some attention is that it has to do with the Halo effect leaders project.
Another possible explanation and a limit of the research, would be that
even though the survey was anonymous, employees in non-leadership positions
could tend to give a more favourable response for fear of being discovered and
punished by their leaders for daring to think less of their leadership. Even though
this is not a rational belief to hold given the anonymity of the study, bounded
rationality theories have shown that while people tend toward rationality, they are
not entirely rational beings, and as such are prone to biases and irrational beliefs.
The most significant correlation out of the 3 proposed hypotheses was for
the first hypothesis, with Composite Emotional Intelligence having a 0.321 Pearson
Correlation Coefficient with Performance monitoring and encouragement. We all
know Emotional Intelligence is important for any organization. While there will
always be the problem of devising adequate scales to measure it, and also the
problem of subjectivity when answering self-report emotional intelligence surveys,
researchers all across the world, present team of authors included will still attempt
to construct questions and scales to measure EI and also its effects on
organizational life and results.
What is exactly the impact of EI, actually is quite hard to say. It’s not a
variable that exactly lends itself to easy quantification and there are effects of EI
that are far from being obvious, even to the trained eye. But what we know, and
what this research has also proved is that it has an effect and it is a positive one.
4. Future research
Far from being an exhaustive research, the study this research team
conducted was our attempt to add another page in the already vast thesaurus of
research on EI. Our conclusion? When it comes to the public sector in Romania,
we could use more emotionally intelligent leaders and employees. The effect of
such people on the overall performance not only of individual public organizations,
but of the public sector itself is positive. And while it has not been the aim of this
study to answer this research question, we can keep an open mind and wonder if
The influence of emotional intelligence on employee’s performance:
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54 ADMINISTRAȚIE ȘI MANAGEMENT PUBLIC • 35/2020
the presence of a Critical Mass of truly and objectively emotionally intelligent
leaders and workers in public organizations might not lead to an exponential effect
in the quality of service rendered for the general public. Have we already reached
that critical mass? That’s the topic of a possible future study.
Authors Contributions
The authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual
contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.
Conflict of Interest Statement
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any
commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict
of interest.
Acknowledgement and research funding
This work was supported by a grant of Bucharest University of Economic
Studies for institutional projects, project number PI – 2019 – IEIPA –
1838/30.07.2019, project title “Assesing the Impact of Emotional Intelligence on
the Performance of Employees in the Public and Private Sectors/ Evaluarea
Impactului Inteligentei Emotionale asupra Performantei Angajatilor din Sectoarele
Public si Privat” (IEIPA).
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