THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LEADERSHIP AND EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE: A PROPOSED DEVELOPMENT MODEL FOR ENHANCING LEADERSHIP QUALITIES AMONG THE OFFICERS IN THE TURKISH NAVY

Hatice TOPUZ

Business Administration Master Program, 2005

Thesis Advisor: Prof. Dr. Murat FERMAN

Key Words: Leader, Leadership, Leadership Quality, Leadership Models, Emotion, Emotional Intelligence

The purpose of the study is to investigate the relationship between emotional intelligence and leadership behaviors and to develop a model that enhances the quality of leadership. In today’s world, inspiring people and leading them is more difficult than it has ever been before. Though the emotions of people become much more important when their basic needs are provided for; it becomes much more complicated to lead them successfully. This is the case for today’s new leaders.

Within the naval service in particular, leadership is considered a core competency. Within the military context, all leaders require emotional intelligence. There is a need to control followers’ emotions from the start to ensure obedience with orders. At a higher level in the hierarchy, Strategic Leaders need to be transformational appealing, to manipulate emotional contagion in followers in order to spread the vision and commitment to it. Also, new leaders require emotional intelligence to establish trust and commitment within the new security domain.

There are many parameters which determine the quality of leadership such as technical or social skills. These parameters have been well studied. However, emotional intelligence is a new and promising parameter which takes a leader, in most cases, to success. The military leaders must be able to manage their followers’ emotions if they are to be able to achieve strategic goals. In this regard, leaders need to display behaviors associated with emotional intelligence. Given the importance of emotions in the process of leadership, emotional intelligence training should comprise part of leadership development programs. Many models have been developed to create a successful leader. When developing such models, emotional intelligence is an important factor to be considered. This study aims to develop a new model which underlines the importance of emotional intelligence in enhancing the quality of leadership among the officers in the Turkish Navy.