Role of emotional intelligence in organisational learning: an empirical study.

Abstract

This study examines the impact of emotional intelligence on organisational learning. Based on a sample size of 280, the results depicted emotional intelligence as being positively and significantly related with organisational learning. The findings have implications for management of people towards creating and maintaining organisational learning.

Keywords: Emotional Intelligence; Organisational Learning

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An organisation learns when its individual employee learns, but learning by the individual employee does not guarantee organisational learning. For organisational learning to be a reality, the learning at the individual level has to progress to the group and finally to the organisational level. Further, organisational learning requires not only vertical integration of more than one individual learning entities, but also of its horizontal integration with other learning entities that exist side-by-side to it in the organisational cosmos. To achieve it, the human capital of the organisation may even go too far by challenging and demolishing the age old established premises and creating a vibrant and functional one in its place. Therefore, looking at the nature of mental exercise and psychic energy used while organisational members learn together, it is not only the cognitive brain but also the emotional brain that has role to play.

Further, for organisational learning to be in full swing, there is a great deal of convergent as well as divergent thinking, which is full of agony and ecstasy for organisational members. Therefore, the key to successful management is management of destructive emotions. Hence, the author believes that organisational learning can be realised successfully when the human resources are able to develop needed emotional competencies. Once this is done then it is quite possible for them to make maximum use of their mental energy to engage into the thinking mode which is more system oriented. In other words, the construct of emotional intelligence and its competencies are believed to play a relatively dominant role for learning at the individual level to reach an organisational level. This study is an attempt to understand the role of emotional intelligence of the human resources on the processes of organisational learning.

Organisational Learning: A Prerogative in the Present Millennium

The present millennium has rightly been perceived to be a new era in the evolution of organisational life and structure. As a result, organisations are forced to make significant transformations in order to adapt and survive in this new world. Revans (1983) says that in any epoch of rapid change, those organisations which are unable to adapt will soon find themselves in trouble, and adaptation is achieved only by learning, namely, by being able to do tomorrow that which might have been unnecessary today. Similarly, Zuboff (1988) observes that today's organisations may indeed have little choice but to become a 'learning institution'. Further, she adds that learning is the heart of productive activity in every organisation and learning is the new form of labour. Therefore, it may be said that today's solutions will be totally inadequate for tomorrow's challenges when the main focus of each organisation is on the 'customer' and not on 'workers', in an economy which has shifted from being 'national' to 'global'.

In this context, the only competitive weapon for organisations is 'learning at an organisational level'. It calls for the organisation to mobilise every resource to facilitate learning at an individual level to move up the ladder to the group and then to the organisational level. Therefore, for an organisation to survive and grow, it has to let all its members from the lowest rung to the top-most level to learn as one entity rather than the other way round. Hence, companies that do not become learning organisations will soon go the way of the dinosaur because they are unable to adjust quickly enough to the changing environment (Schwandt and Marquardt, 2000). Owen (1991) says that it is not that profit and product are no longer important for organisations, but without continual learning, profits and products will no longer be possible. Therefore, the business of business is learning and all else will follow. According to Dilworth (1998), "change now tends to outdistance our ability to learn and it is only by improving the learning capacity of organisations can we deal with change dynamics".

What is Organisational Learning?

The concept of organisational learning has been widely espoused. The general consensus that if organisations were to change and innovate, organisational learning has had to be addressed. Argyris and Schon's (1978) conceptualisation of double-loop and deutero learning succinctly explains what organisational learning is about.

Huber (1991) believes that organisational learning consists of four major constructs: knowledge acquisition, information distribution, information interpretation, and organisational memory. His views have been basically synthesised towards interactive systems within the organisational learning construct. Just as with individuals, organisations must always confront the novel aspect of their circumstances (Cohen and Sproull, 1991). Learning consists of two kinds of activities. The first kind of learning is obtaining know-how in order to solve specific problems based upon existing premises. The second kind of learning is establishing new premises that is, paradigms, schemata, mental models, or perspectives to override the existing ones (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995). These two kinds of learning have been referred to as "Learning I" and "Learning II" (Bateson, 1973) or "Single-Loop Learning" and "Double-Loop Learning" (Argyris and Schon, 1978) or "Adaptive Learning" and "Generative Learning" (Senge, 1990).

Organisational learning begins with double-loop learning. Most organisations tend to do well with single-loop learning but very few are effective at double-loop and deutro-learning (Dodgson, 1993). Organisational learning is 'learning by a social system' that pursues the creation of social capital (Probost and Buchel, 1997). Such kind of learning occurs when members of the organisation act as learning agents for the organisation, responding to changes in the internal and external environments of the organisation by detecting and correcting errors in organisational theory-in-use and embedding the results of their inquiry in private images and shared maps of organisation (Argyris and Schon, 1978).

Linkage between Individual and Organisational Learning

Although organisational learning is dependent on individuals, not all learning at the individual level translates into learning at the organisational level. Organisational learning is not merely the aggregate of the learning of the organisation's members (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990; Dodgson, 1993; Watkins and Marsick, 1993). Organisational learning takes place when the lessons that are salient to the interests and problems of members are learned at one point in the organisation and are then stored and diffused to others in the organisation. This, then, leads to actions that are directed towards rectifying discrepancies in the organisation (Othman and Hashim, 2004). The construct of organisational learning is independent of any specific individual. Therefore, although the leader in a large organisation may change over time, the way in which an organisation learns or fails to learn has little to do with him or her.

But it is also true that organisations might know less than their members and cannot even learn what every member knows. According to Kim (1993), individual learning affects organisational learning by influencing the organisation's shared mental model. More specifically, individual learning affects the individual's internal mental models where shared mental models reside. Consequently, as individual learning evolves to make shared mental models, the organisation's view of the world evolves. In this way, organisational routines or work procedures change over time as individual routines change and improve. Furthermore, McDougall and Beattie (1998) assert that individual learning is connected to organisational learning through such factors as positive learning climate, active informal learning, and effective communication of knowledge and skills.

Facilitators of Organisational Learning

The research literature suggests seven key factors responsible for facilitating organisational learning. These include individual learning (Argyris and Schon, 1978; Kim, 1993), team learning (Senge, 1990), knowledge sharing (Huber, 1991; McDougall and Beattie, 1998), shared vision (Senge, 1990), positive learning environment (McDougall and Beattie, 1998), change-friendly culture (Argyris and Schon, 1978), and system thinking (Senge, 1990). These factors together force people to continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire. Therefore, companies aspiring to be a learning organisation are required to invest most of their resources towards developing as well as sustaining these facilitators of organisational learning.

In summary, organisational learning (OL) involves capturing, storing and diffusing knowledge within the organisation; is a product of certain organisational arrangements and decisions; is a kind of learning that involves reassessing fundamental assumptions and values; and the result of OL is organisational adaptation and value creation (Othman and Hashim, 2004). Further, it encompasses two perspectives, namely, cognitive/conceptual and behavioural perspectives of learning and tries to integrate them towards the realisation of organisational learning. Some researchers have proposed organisational learning as a normative function (that is, it is desirable for all organisations); but there are others who have proposed it as a descriptive category, assuming that all organisations learn in their own way, and studied what and how they learn (Pareek, 2004).

This understanding of organisational learning should stretch beyond the human capital aspect of organisations, which are psycho-dynamically too complex. The author believes that the desired job behaviours required in the processes of organisational learning are not the outcome of only the cognitive brain but also of the emotional brain of the employees. In other words, it is the interplay of both cognitive as well as emotional brain that propels experimentation and innovation on the part of the employees at the workplace. Therefore, understanding the process of organisational learning requires studying not only the cognitive but also the emotional brain of humans at the workplace.

Understanding Emotional Intelligence

In the first half of the 20th century, there was a common belief that the adequate measure of intelligence was the intelligence quotient (IQ) test. But looking into the findings of current researches, it may be said that the IQ scores as the measure of intelligence need to be interpreted with caution. Academics as well as the practitioners have converyed that the intelligence of human beings and its implications for the organisation should be considered from the cognitive and emotional perspectives. They say that as compared to cognitive intelligence, it is the emotional intelligence that has greater relevance to organisational successes. Moreover, it has been accepted that the human resources in any functional department possess more or less same amount of cognitive intelligence but the star performers are those who maximise upon their psychic energy stored in their emotional cortex.

The notion of emotional intelligence can be traced to Thorndike's (1920) concept of social intelligence, Wechsler's (1940) proposition of non-intellective abilities as well as Gardner's (1983) conceptualisation of personal intelligence. However, the term of 'emotional intelligence' (EI) owes its origin to Salovey and Mayer (1990). Thereafter, it was the work of Goleman (1995) which globally popularised the concept of emotional intelligence and as a result of that that both practising managers and academia have started believing in its importance in the world of organisations.

The concept of emotional intelligence consists of three categories of abilities as appraisal and expression of emotions, regulation of emotions, and utilisation of emotions in solving problems (Salovey and Mayer, 1990). Mayer and Salovey (1990) formulated a revised model of emotional intelligence which gives more emphasis to the cognitive components of emotional intelligence and conceptualises emotional intelligence in terms of potential for intellectual and emotional growth. For Goleman (1997), emotional intelligence is about knowing what one is feeling and being able to handle those feelings without being swamped, being able to motivate oneself to get jobs done, being creative and performing at one's peak, and sensing what others are feeling and handling relationships effectively. But a more concise definition of emotional intelligence, given by Martinez (1997), conceptualises it as an array of non-cognitive skills, capabilities and competencies that influence a person's ability to cope with environmental demands and pressures.

Emotional Intelligence is an ability possessed by an individual to manage his/her own and others' emotions with whom he/she interacts. The construct of emotional intelligence contributes to 80 to 90 per cent of the competencies that distinguish outstanding leaders from average leaders, and sometimes more (Goleman et al, 2002). Moreover, emotional intelligence is related to positive outcomes such as pro-social behaviours, parental warmth, and positive family and peer relations (Mayer et al, 1999; Rice, 1999). It has also been found that emotionally intelligent leaders are those who generate positive feelings among the followers that significantly enhance collective performance (Johnson, 2002). It is interesting to note that women as compared to males are slightly superior in perceiving emotions and as a result score high on emotional intelligence (Mayer et al, 1999; Mayer and Geher, 1996).

In a number of empirical investigations, it has been observed that emotional intelligence and its related competencies are associated with excellence in personal, interpersonal, and organisational goals. Boyatzis (1982) says that in top performing managers and executives, the drive of personal ambition is held in check by strong self-control and focused towards collective goals. Highly effective managers are adept at cultivating the reservoir of goodwill and trust, whereas the less effective managers generally fail to do so (Boyatzis, 1982; Kaplan, 1991). Similarly, based on a 60-year study of more than a thousand high-IQ men and women followed from childhood through retirement, Holahan and Sears (1995) report that those most self-confident in their early years were most successful as their careers unfolded.

With regard to gender difference in emotional intelligence, there has not been so far any kind of consensus that there is really a significant difference between the male and female workforce on their level of emotional intelligence. On the other hand, previous research on gender difference in emotional intelligence have shown that in terms of total EI, men and women do not seem to differ; however, there is evidence that women and men may differ on specific competencies. BarOn (2000) analysed the scores on over 77,000 administrations of the Emotion Quotient Inventory (EQ-i) and found that while men and women did not differ on the total EI, women did score significantly higher than men on empathy, interpersonal relationships, and social responsibility, while men scored higher than women on self-actualisation, assertiveness, stress tolerance, impulse control, and adaptability. A meta-analysis of the studies conducted by Eagly and Johnson (1990) found females to have better social skills and to be described as "interested in other people." Women leaders as a group, when compared to male leaders as a group, tend to be described as more friendly, pleasant, and socially sensitive (Eagly and Johnson, 1990).

Further, Goleman (1995) believes that males and females have their own personal profiles of strengths and weaknesses for emotional intelligence capacities. But studies conducted by Mayer et al (1999) and Mayer and Geher (1996) indicate that women score higher on measure of emotional intelligence than men. While the current research findings do not provide a consistent pattern of gender effects across all raters, but females being rated significantly higher on several competencies, in particular by peer raters, is interesting.

In a nutshell, it may be asserted that emotional intelligence of the employees helps them to be productive in whatever roles and responsibilities that they have been asked to perform at workplace. It is also believed that the role of emotional intelligence in both individual as well as organisational effectiveness has started taking due importance by the top-level management across the globe.

Linkages between Emotional Intelligence and Organisational Learning

The role of emotion in organisations has been widely articulated in the literature, reflecting both the social-constructionist standpoint (Finemen, 1993, 1996; Hochschild, 1979, 1983) and the psychodynamic exploration of emotion at work (French and Vince, 1999; Hirschhorn, 1988; Hoggett, 1992; Kets de Vries and Miller, 1985; Obholzer and Roberts, 1994; Trist and Murray, 1990). Both these approaches seem to challenge the ways in which emotions in organisations have been 'narrowly perceived' (Hosking and Fineman, 1990), as well as the tendency to ignore the impact that emotions have on organisational development and design. Further, it has been observed that, at both the conscious and unconscious levels, the management of learning is a management of anxiety and of resistance arising from that particular anxiety (Obholzer, 1999). Further, anxiety has been observed as an important ingredient in managers' understanding of learning in organisations, in terms of how learning occurs and how it is perceived (Kofman and Senge, 1993; Schein, 1993a; Vince and Martin, 1993).

Any organisation wishing to thrive through change must make the choice to promote, and allow employee expressions of emotional intelligence (Hunton et al, 1998; Robertson et al, 1999). It has also been found that by demonstrating self-awareness, persistence, and leadership qualities (Cherniss, 1998) and great focus (Martinez-Pons, 1997) that emotionally intelligent employees can be a model for others and this results into developing shared mental models that are critical when individuals need to respond quickly to external organisational threats. Proponents of organisational learning claim that individuals need to take a system approach and change their mental models (Easterby-Smith, 1997; Senge, 1992) to collective mental models before a shared vision or modus operandi can be achieved.

Organisational learning aims at promoting innovation and flexibility through individual responses and decision choices at all levels so that organisations can respond proactively to change (Solomon, 1994). Emotionally intelligent employees tend to want outcomes that benefit others as well as themselves (Schutte et al, 2001). Hence, organisational learning is more effective if enacted by emotionally intelligent employees within clear operating boundaries such as those offered by participation in decision-making (Scott-Ladd and Chan, 2004).

Objectives of the Study and Hypotheses

This study has been designed to investigate the relationships as well as the contribution of emotional intelligence on organisational learning in the Indian context.

It has the following objectives:

1. To develop a profile on the level of emotional intelligence and organisational learning.

2. To investigate the relationships between emotional competencies and organisational learning.

3. To find out the contribution/impact of emotional intelligence on organisational learning.

It tests the following hypotheses:

1. There will be significant relationships between emotional intelligence and organisational learning.

2. The emotional competencies will significantly contribute to organisational learning.

Method

Respondents~Participants

The organisation studied is a leading business consulting and technology services firm functioning for the past 14 years. It helps its clients plan their investments in technology, design and implement projects that drive competitive advantage, and manage critical applications to improve business performance. The organisation studied is a multinational company and the data were collected from its India office in Gurgaon, Haryana. For the collection of the data with the help of psychometric questionnaires, the investigator first approached the human resource head of the organisation and permission was granted to conduct the study.

The investigator then sat with individual respondents and requested them to register responses to all the statements in the psychometric questionnaire with a promise that the opinions expressed will be kept strictly confidential. Initially the investigator solicited the cooperation of a sample size of 342 employees belonging to both managerial and non-managerial levels which was purely a convenient sample but at the end only 280 of them cooperated to respond to all the items of the questionnaires.

The time taken by the respondents to fill the questionnaire range from 55 to 60 minutes and it took close to two months to finish the data collection process. The average age of the sample was 38 years. The age group of sample ranges from 23 to 60 years. The sample consisted of 54 per cent of male and 46 per cent female employees. Fifty-six per cent of sample had master level education and the remaining 44 per cent had graduate level education in the field of management and technology. Further, the sample under study was selected without giving preference to their gender, age, and qualifications from across all the functional departments of the organisation. Data were gathered using standardised psychometric questionnaires designed to assess the employees' level of emotional intelligence and learning at an organisational level.

Description of Psychometric Instruments Used Emotional Competence Inventory (ECI)

The Emotional Competence Inventory Version 2.0 used in this scale was developed and standardised by the Hay Group in 2002. It uses a five-point rating scale. There are 72 items in this scale, thus, the overall minimum score obtained by an individual respondent is 72 with a maximum of 360. It may mean that the scale has a mid-point of 216. The overall score ranging in-between 216 to 324 will be considered as the above average score on the ECI.

The 72 items of the ECI consists of 18 emotional competencies and these belong to four major dimensions of self-awareness (SA), self-management (SM), social awareness (SoA), and relationship management (RM). The 18 emotional competencies are: Emotional Self-Awareness (ESA), Accurate Self-Awareness (ASA), Self-Confidence (SC), Emotional Serf-Control (ESC), Transparency (Trp), Adaptability (Adap), Achievement Orientation (AO), Initiative (Ini), Optimism (Opt), Empathy (Emp), Organisational Awareness (OA), Service Orientation (SO), Developing Others (DO), Change Catalyst (CC), Influence (Infu), Conflict Management (CM), Teamwork and Collaboration (TC), and an overall score on emotional intelligence (EI).

For self-ratings, the alpha coefficients range from 0.53 (Transparency) to 0.78 (Developing Others) with an overall average internal consistency coefficient of 0.65. On the other hand, for total others ratings, the alpha coefficients range from 0.56 (Conflict Management) to 0.94 (Developing Others) with an overall average internal consistency coefficient of 0.82. The content as well as construct validity of the ECI Version 2.0 have also been obtained by the constructer of the test. The investigator in this study calculated the Cronbach Alpha Reliability for all emotional competencies, four major dimensions of EI, and the total scale which were found in the range of 0.60 to 0.69 and they are mentioned in Table 1.

Organisational Learning Diagnostic Scale (OLDS)

Organisational Learning Diagnostic Scale was developed and standardised by Pareek (1997). This psychometric tool has Guttman split-half reliability coefficient of 0.98. The scale has both face as well as content validity. It has 23 statements to be rated by the respondents on a five-point Likert type scale. The questionnaire has been divided into three phases (innovation, implementation, and stabilisation) and five mechanisms (experimentation, mutuality, planning, temporary systems, and competency building) of organisational learning. The Cronbach Alpha Reliability coefficients of the total scale, its three phases, and five mechanisms were calculated by the investigator in this study and they were found to lie in the range of 0.65 to 0.70.

Results and Discussion

The study has been designed to first develop a profile of the level of emotional intelligence and organisational learning followed by an analysis of the relationships among them and finally, to find out the impact of the emotional intelligence on organisational learning. From Table 1, it may be said that employees in the organisation possess emotional competencies that are well above average level. This may mean that whenever employees in their organisational fives interact with others on any problems associated with formulation of tasks or deciding upon the processes to attain, they possess well-developed ability to manage any kind of unproductive emotions that they and others experience. Therefore, it may be said that such developed emotional competencies on the part of the employees will certainly prove to be a competitive advantage, especially for organisations that provide consultancy to many client organisations. The reason is that the employees in consultancies are always exposed to work on moderately challenging as well as complex tasks. These tasks require the utilisation of great mental energy that at times leads to generation of emotions in a work team which may be unproductive in nature. But people at work must be able to turn unproductive emotions into productive ones by managing the emotions in themselves as well as in others with whom they work. This is not an easy task and only those who possess at least average level of emotional competency will be able to do it successfully.

On the other hand, Table 1 also depicts findings on three phases as well as five mechanisms of organisational learning. With regard to the scores obtained for three phases of OL, namely innovation, implementation, and stabilisation, the obtained results lie in the quartile 3 and quartile 4 category. Therefore, it may be interpreted that there is a relatively high tendency for employees to invest their mental energy in the acquisitions as well as examination of new inputs (that is, new structure/technology/process), and their retention by integrating them with existing practices, and adapting the new inputs in the light of the experiences gained. These three kinds of organsational processes result in an enhanced capacity for continued self-learning and self-renewal. On the whole, Table I shows that human capital in the organisation studied are relatively high on emotional intelligence and in organisational learning.

The results in Table 2 depict the kind as well as the level of relationship between emotional intelligence and organisational learning. The correlation values between them are positive and the majority of them have been found to be significant. This indicates that emotional intelligence of the employees help them to get into a productive process of acquiring, retaining, and using new inputs for continuous learning and renewal of the organisation. To be more precise, the experimentation as well as innovation of new ideas, their implementation and usage when needed becomes more pronounced as the employees start managing their own and their coworkers' emotions in more intelligent ways.

Table 2 shows that the emotional intelligence of the employees is also positively associated with five mechanisms (that is, experimentation, mutuality, planning, temporary system, and competency) of organisational learning. Therefore, it may be interpreted that as the employees become more intelligent emotionally there is corresponding increase in positive attitudes towards experimentation and trying out new ways to deal with issues and problems. Similarly, the increment in level of emotional intelligence of employees results in more of mutual support, respect and learning from each other, use of contingency rather than the incremental mode of planning, creation of inter-functional/interdepartmental groups for generating diverse viewpoints on matters of importance, and sharing experiences with each other. In other words, the mechanisms of organisational learning, namely, experimentation, mutuality, planning, temporary system, and competency can be realised more often when the employees become intelligent emotionally.

The findings in Table 2 support the findings of past research. It is found that emotionally intelligent employees tend to want outcomes that benefit others as well as themselves (Schutte et al, 2001). Further, organisational learning is more effective if enacted by emotionally intelligent employees within clear operating boundaries such as those offered by participation in decision-making (Scott-Ladd and Chan, 2004). If the findings of Schutte et al (2001) and Scott-Ladd and Chan (2004) and also of the present investigation are to be believed, it is suggested that the process of organisational learning depends to a larger extent on the level of emotional intelligence of the employees in the organisation. Thus, it may be said that the hypothesis I of the study is accepted.

Table 3 depicts results obtained for the impact of emotional intelligence on three phases of organisational learning. It is found that emotional intelligence predicts 53.9 per cent of the variance in the total variance of Phase I, "innovation" of organisational learning. This is a significant contribution as far as understanding why and how individual employees come up with new inputs in the form of either structure or technology or processes for an effective functioning of the organisation. But it is not only emotional intelligence that predisposes any organisational member towards experimentation, innovation, and creativity as the remaining 46.1 per cent of the variance of Phase I of organisational learning is still unexplained.

Similarly, Table 3 says that the emotional intelligence of the employees contributes 22.6 per cent of the variance of Phase II of organisational learning called "implementation". It reveals that emotional intelligence helps organisational members in a significant way to integrate the acquired new inputs with the existing practices of the organisation. It is not the acquisition of new inputs and their examination for functionality which make an enterprise a learning organisation but also their retention and integration into already established practices. Finally, it shows that the emotional intelligence of the employees contributes 27.2 per cent of the variance of Phase III of organisational learning, "stabilisation". Therefore, it may be inferred that emotional intelligence also helps employees to invest their mental energies in finding ways for using acquired and retained structure/technology/processes for the overall development of the organisation resulting in enhanced capacity for continued self-learning and self-renewal.

Emotional intelligence of the employees is found to contribute 53.9 per cent, 22.6 per cent, and 27.2 per cent variance in the total variance of innovation, implementation, and stabilisation phases of organisational learning, respectively. Further, there are 46.1,77.4, and 72.8 per cent of the variances in innovation, implementation, and stabilisation phases of organisational learning, respectively. This may mean that there may be some other personal as well as organisational variables along with emotional intelligence, which may also be predicting organisational learning. Moreover, Table 3 shows that as compared to implementation and stabilisation of any new ideas into the organisational structure and processes, it is the innovation of those new ideas that are more influenced by the level of emotional intelligence.

Table 4 depicts the findings for the contribution/impact of emotional intelligence of the employees on the effective use as well as implementation of mechanisms of organisational learning. The psychometric test on organisational learning that was used in the study cites five important mechanisms for organisational learning to be a reality in any firm. From the table, it can be said that emotional intelligence of employees contribute 39, 52.2, 25.7, 40.4, and 37.9 per cent of the variance in the total variance of experimentation, mutuality, planning, uses of temporary systems, and competency mechanisms of organisational learning, respectively. Thus, the emotional competencies possessed by the employees have significant impact on employees experimenting with new ideas/practices/processes, providing mutual support to each other, taking every care while planning procedures, designing and developing uses of temporary cross-functional teams, and implanting necessary competencies for the getting the work done effectively.

Conclusion

The following conclusions may be drawn from findings of the study:

1. The employees in the study possessed above average level of emotional intelligence and the processes of organisational learning characterised by innovation, implementation, and sustenance of new ideas/processes/structures and the likes are more than satisfactory.

2. The emotional Intelligence of the employees is positively and significantly related to the processes of organisational learning.

3. The emotional intelligence of the employees contributes 53.9, 22.6 and 27.2 per cent variance in the total variance of innovation, implementation, and stabilisation phases of organisational learning, respectively.

The study has some limitations. The following are the limitations of the study along with suggestions for further research:

1. The study was conducted in one organisation and as a result of that the findings cannot be generalised across all the organisations.

2. This research investigation studied only the emotional intelligence of employees and its relationship and impact on the processes of organisational learning. It is suggested that further research should include more personal as well as organisational variables.

Implications for Management

Though there are some limitations of this study, the findings have some important implications for the management of organisations. The major implications of the study are:

1. To innovate new ideas and practices for great competitive advantages to the organisation, the employees should be aware of organisation's strategic concerns, possess attitudes of optimism and adaptability, and should provide inspirational leadership to each other.

2 Once an employee individually or in a group has come up with strategically important structure/processes/technology, they should be integrated with other established structure/processes/technology. For this to be realised, there should be a spirit of teamwork and collaboration among the employees and they should inspire each other.

3 Innovation and retention of new ideas or structures or processes or technology will not exactly culminate into organisational learning until and unless they are sustained over a period of time for continuous self-learning and self-renewal. Therefore, it is the emotional competencies of empathy as well as adaptability that have to be developed significantly for successful realisation of Phase III of organisational learning.

These three implications for management depend to a large extent on the training and development effort as well as the intention of the organisational think tank. Therefore, organisations need to continuously invest resources to provide employees with needs-based training for both development as well as sustenance of emotional competencies. The competitive edge of organisations is totally dependent on its emotionally intelligent employees.

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Table 1: Mean and Standard Deviation on Dimensions of Emotional
Intelligence and Organisational Learning (n=280)

                                       Cronbach            Standard
Variables                               Alpha      Mean    Deviation

Accurate Self-Assessment (ASA)           0.61     15.22      2.53
Emotional Self-Awareness (ESA)           0.69     13.84      2.61
Self Confidence (Scon)                   0.63     15.62      3.04
Self A wareness (SA)                     0.65     44.68      5.91
Achievement Orientation (AO)             0.60     15.24      2.32
Adaptability (Adapt)                     0.60     15.12      1.59
Emotional Self-control (ESC)             0.63     13.74      1.99
Initiative (Ini)                         0.65     14.30      2.03
Optimism (Opt)                           0.64     16.40      2.08
Transparency (Trp)                       0.66     14.90      2.35
Self Management (SM)                     0.63     89.70      7.59
Empathy (Emp)                            0.67     16.20      2.08
Organisational Awareness (OA)            0.60     13.42      2.90
Service Orientation (SO)                 0.64     15.46      2.22
Social Awareness (SoA)                   0.66     45.08      4.86
Change Catalyst (CC)                     0.66     13.94      1.99
Conflict Management (CM)                 0.65     12.18      2.88
Developing Others (Do)                   0.64     15.12      2.23
Influence (Infu)                         0.69     14.84      2.77
Inspirational Leadership (IL)            0.60     15.20      2.35
Transparency and Collaboration (TC)      0.61     15.30      2.60
Relationship Management (RM)             0.64     86.58      8.82
Emotional Intelligence (El)              0.66     266.04     23.03
Organisational Learning
Innovation (Phase 1)                     0.68     75.31      15.47
Implementation (Phase II)                0.67     78.07      15.37
Stabilisation (Phase III)                0.70     74.13      16.07
Experimentation                          0.65     76.59      15.25
Mutuality                                0.68     75.67      15.06
Planning                                 0.69     76.00      15.50
Temporary System                         0.67     74.50      16.72
Competency                               0.66     77.83      13.92

Table 2: Correlation between Emontional Intelligence and
Organizational Learning (n=280)

        Inno-     Implemen-    Stabili-     Experi-     Mutuality
        vation     tation       sation     mentation

ASA     .237 **    .284 **                  .248 **      .202 **
ESA     .230 **                 .254 **     .239 **
Scon    .248 **    .258 **      .219 **     .262 **      .249 **
SA      .283 **                 .235 **     .253 **
AO      .285 **                 .248 **
Adapt   .269 **                 .229 **                  .249 **
ESC                .264 **                  .294 **      .248 **
Ini     .238 **    .295 **      .198 **     .302 **
Opt     .402 **    .230 **      .240 **     .395 **      .338 **
                   .348 **                  .362 **
SM      .287 **                 .248 **     .299 **      .257 **
Emp     .239 **    .254 **      .428 **                  .349 **
OA      .243 **                 .288 **     .271 **      .278 **
SO
SoA     .293 **                 .242 **     .297 **      .289 **
CC      .290 **                             .294 **
CM                 .247 **                  .291 **      .247 **
Do      .308 **                 .258 **     .272 **      .282 **
Infu    .236 **    .238 **
IL      .237 **    .251 **                  .396 **      .283 **
TC      .307 **    .296 **      .282 **     .381 **      .322 **
RM      .341 **    .202 **      .263 **     .304 **      .281 **
EI      .351 **                 .303 **     .351 **      .321 **

        Planning    Temporary    Competency
                     System

ASA      .282 **                   .256 **
ESA                  .407 **       .286 **
Scon     .338 **     .272 **
SA                   .310 **       .364 **
AO       .293 **     .249 **
Adapt    .263 **
ESC                  .298 **       .249 **
Ini      .264 **                   .237 **
Opt      .232 **                   .455 **
                     .348 **
SM       .244 **                   .379 **
Emp      .238 **
OA       .264 **     .231 **       .280 **
SO
SoA      .250 **                   .356 **
CC       .255 **                   .281 **
CM                   .253 **
Do       .266 **                   .438 **
Infu     .339 **     .283 **
IL                   .254 **       .248 **
TC       .339 **     .235 **       .346 **
RM       .252 **                   .366 **
EI       .257 **     .199 **       .443 **

** p < 0.01

* p < 0.05

Where SA = Self-Awareness, SM = Self-Management, SoA = Social Awareness,
RM = Relationship Management, EI = Emotional Intelligence,
ASA = Accurate Self Assessment, ESA =  Emotional Self-Awareness,
Scon = Self Confidence, AO = Achievement Orientation, Adapt =
Adaptability, ESC = Emotional Self Control, Ini = Initiative, Opt =
Optimism, Trp = Transparency, Emp = Empathy, OA = Organisational
Awareness, SO = Service Orientation, CC = Change Catalyst, CM =
Control  Management, Do = Developing Others, Infu = Influence, IL =
Inspirational Leadership, TC = Teamwork & Collaboration.

Table 3: Impact of Emotional Intelligence on Innovation,
Implementation, and Stabilisation Phases of Organisational Learning
(n= 280)

Innovation                   R      [R.sup.2]    DR       [beta]

Organisational Awareness     0.504   0.254       0.000    -0.504
Optimism                     0.645   0.416       0.1620    0.405
Inspirational Leadership     0.701   0.491       0.0753   -0.279
Adaptability                 0.734   0.539       0.0473    0.231

Implementation
Teamwork and Collaboration   0.365   0.133       0.000     0.365
Inspirational Leadership     0.476   0.226       0.093    -0.345

Stabilisation
Empathy                      0.433   0.188       0.000    -3.297
Adaptability                 0.522   0.272       0.084     2.308

Innovation                   F       p

Organisational Awareness     4.003   0.000
Optimism                     3.578   0.001
Inspirational Leadership     2.565   0.014
Adaptability                 2.149   0.037

Implementation
Teamwork and Collaboration   2.686   0.010
Inspirational Leadership     2.354   0.023

Stabilisation
Empathy                      3.297   0.002
Adaptability                 2.308   0.026

Where R = Pearson's r, [R.sup.2] = Regression value, DR = Differential
regression value, [beta] = Directionality, F = Fischer's value,
p = Significance level.

Table 4: Impact of Emotional Intelligence on Experimentation,
Mutuality, Planning,  Temporary System, and Competency Mechanisms
of Organisational Learning (n= 280)

Experimentation                R     [R.sup.2]    DR     [beta]

Transparency                 0.507     0.257     0.000   -0.507
Optimism                     0.625     0.390     0.133    0.367

Mutuality
Teamwork and Collaboration   0.462     0.213     0.000   -0.462
Optimism                     0.576     0.331     0.118    0.345
Inspirational Leadership     0.624     0.389     0.058   -0.259
Developing Others            0.676     0.457     0.068    0.320
Adaptability                 0.722     0.522     0.065    0.274

Planning
Self- Confidence              .419     0.175     0.000   -0.419
Teamwork and Collaboration    .507     0.257     0.082    0.304

Temporary System
Emotional Self-Awareness     0.367     0.135     0.000   -0.367
Inspirational Leadership     0.455     0.207     0.072   -0.277
Adaptability                 0.569     0.323     0.116    0.364
Teamwork and Collaboration   0.636     0.404     0.081    0.339

Competency
Optimism                     0.520     0.270     0.000    0.520
Developing Others            0.615     0.379     0.109   -0.331

Experimentation                F        p

Transparency                 17.028   0.000
Optimism                      3.170   0.003

Mutuality
Teamwork and Collaboration    3.569   0.001
Optimism                      2.850   0.007
Inspirational Leadership      2.067   0.044
Developing Others             2.351   0.023
Adaptability                  2.406   0.021

Planning
Self- Confidence              3.163   0.003
Teamwork and Collaboration    2.245   0.030

Temporary System
Emotional Self-Awareness      2.706   0.009
Inspirational Leadership      2.043   0.047
Adaptability                  2.782   0.008
Teamwork and Collaboration    2.450   0.018

Competency
Optimism                      4.173   0.000
Developing Others             2.832   0.007

Where R =  Pearson's r, [R.sup.2] = Regression value,
DR = Differential regression value, [beta] = Directionality
F = Fischer's value, p = Significance level.