The role of emotional Intelligence in shaping quality of leadership and relationship management in military officers. The mediating role of work engagement, trust and motivation

Abstract

One of the topics that have been most lengthily researched from ancient times until now is leadership. Over the last few decades an interest in a “new element”, called emotional intelligence, has been put under the microscope of researchers and especially how emotional intelligence affects our lives, our behavior etc. Furthermore, scientists have been focused on the relationship between those two aspects and their connection with other factors. The purpose of the present thesis is firstly to explore the impact of emotional intelligence in quality of leadership and secondly if work engagement, trust and motivation have a mediating role in a leader’s action in the frame of a military environment. Following, we will study how these affect conflict management among military officers. The method used to measure all the above was quantitative research in different levels of officers’ hierarchy (Supervisors, subordinates, deputy commanders etc) in order to have a general picture from as many levels of the organization as possible. The main results of this study are that emotional intelligence positively affects both leadership styles which in turn affects the way an individual resolves a conflict. Work engagement, trust and motivation play an important role in the relationship between leadership and conflict management. The results of this study firstly aim to present the relationships between variables that have been little studied in the past and secondly to be a trigger for future studies in military leadership.