Managing Emotions at Work

Posted by Ricki Sharpe on May 8, 2007  
Filed Under Selection, Stress, Work Behaviour

Emotional contagion is the well known tendency to express and feel emotions that are similar to those of others. It explains why a person (especially a child) appears distressed because another person is distressed, or happy because they are happy. Happy people create happy people. Sad people create sad people. Disgruntled employees create disgruntled employees. In addition, emotions are contagious. They travel from person to person like a virus, and they travel fast.

Not only does the phenomenon exist at an individual level, it is also thought to explain mob and group behaviours such as panic, fear, anger, disgust and moral outrage. So, you should not be surprised to learn that emotional contagion exists in the workplace. Employees’ moods, emotions, and overall dispositions have an impact on job performance, decision making, creativity, turnover, teamwork, negotiations and leadership.

Sigal G. Barsade of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in a recent paper titled, Why Does Affect Matter in Organizations? reviews what we know about affect in organisations, focusing on how employees’ moods, emotions, and dispositional affect influence critical organisational outcomes such as job performance, decision making, creativity, turnover, pro-social behaviour, teamwork, negotiation, and leadership.

An ‘affective revolution’ has occurred over the last 30 years as academics and managers alike have come to realise that employees’ emotions are integral to what happens in an organisation, says Barsade, who has been doing research in the area of emotions and work dynamics for 15 years. “Everybody brings their emotions to work. You bring your brain to work. You bring your emotions to work. Feelings drive performance. They drive behaviour and other feelings. Think of people as emotion conductors.”

This review highlights pervasive and consistent effects, showing the importance of affect in shaping a wide variety of organisational behaviours. It seems that it is not only important to hire primarily positive people, but to manage their emotions once they are in the work place.


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