5 EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENT TIPS TO BOOST MORALE@WORK

Low morale sucks energy out of an organisation, drains productivity and increases staff turnover and resentment. Yet,  I go into organisations where morale is low, especially during times of change, high pressure points and high staff turnover. So why wouldn't an organisation fix its low morale with more emotional intelligence?

Low morale is associated with a whole range of emotions which are destructive to your profit margin, to the health of your employees and associated with rising absenteeism.

If there is an emotional layer of destruction in an organisation then working to enhance the emotions is the most logical step to take, isn't it?

Here are 5 emotionally intelligent ways to boost morale:

1. Care about your employees' feelings: When employees feel as though their top team or change management instigators do not care about their feelings then their feelings towards the organisation become more negative. This can undermine a change process, deplete productivity and increase conflict.
2. Role-model emotionally intelligent behaviour: The emotions that you foster and give out have an influence on other people's emotions. If you want to improve the emotions of your employees then do something about those that you are role-modelling.
3. Listen to your employees and stop talking at them:If morale is low your people probably do not feel listened to, understood or heard. When employees feel that they have been heard they are more likely to go with the ideas that you want them to adopt. It's not hard to fix this, you just have to listen without belittling, ridiculing or dismissing what they say or feel.
4. Stop trying to make your employees excited about change: I have seen executives implementing change who send around upbeat memos about how wonderful the changes are or how positive the outcomes are going to be. This can alienate their employees who are feeling anxious, insecure, confused, vulnerable, overwhelmed, or exhausted. 
5. Show some humanity: It is too easy to forget that the people you employ are people and not robots. There is a limit to how much productivity you can squeeze out of someone when you remove resources and increase the workload. Helping your people know how to manage high workloads and pressure by developing their emotional intelligence can help not only your employees but the whole organisation. Most organisations that are employers of choice have high levels of emotional intelligence. Does yours?

The next steps to increasing your morale

1. If you're in a situation where your organisation has low morale and you feel helpless to do anything about it as an employee, please forward this post to your senior team.
2. Low morale can be moved by increasing emotional intelligence in your organisation.
3. If you are on the senior team or a manager, supervisor or the person implementing or communicating a change in your organisation, then provide some emotional intelligence development coaching with your top team or run the emotions of change workshop with your employees.
4. If you need to understand more about emotional intelligence so that you can lift the morale of your organisation, or to develop your own emotional intelligence skills, then join us. 

It's emotionally intelligent to care for yourself and your emotions.