A model for emotional intelligence training in management education

This research has developed a theory to nurture and enhance Emotional Intelligence (El) within professional work. Predicated on this theory El training and writing exercises were devised, operationalised and applied, using management education as the target environment. Much of the research literature states that El can generate several benefits in school, organisations, and private lives. Numerous claims have been made that El can be developed through specific training programmes. In addition there are empirical studies emphasizing the importance of El for corporations and the potential of developing El, particularly within management education. However, much of this prior work has been rather commercially orientated, lacking in rigorous evaluation and not based on well-founded theoretical underpinnings. Therefore, a developmental theory, the ARM Theory (Awareness, Reflection, and Management), was devised which constitutes an approach to enhance El based on the El construct definition of Mayer, Salovey and Caruso (1999). The ARM theory incorporates a cycle of emotional Awareness-Reflection-Management to develop emotion-related abilities. A longitudinal study based on this theory was conducted to investigate whether two different El interventions were able to enhance participants' El. Both ability El and trait El measures were employed to investigate the effectiveness of the ARM theory conceptualised in two and four day El training and writing exercises. In addition, questionnaires were administered to gather further information about participants' evaluation and their self- perceived emotional abilities. This study demonstrated clear improvements in El following training and writing exercises. This suggests that the ARM theory provides a foundation for the development of training packages to nurture emotion-related abilities within management education, and by implication professional development in general.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo