Leaders’ emotion perception, understanding and management abilities differentially relate to followers’ work outcomes

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Leaders’ emotional intelligence (EI) abilities are important in shaping subordinates’ work outcomes yet the research base testing this conjecture is limited. Research on the topic mostly adopted a traits approach of EI and did not consider different effects leaders’ EI abilities can have for follower work outcomes. The present study tested whether and how leaders’ three key EI abilities (emotion perception accuracy, emotion understanding and management) were associated with subordinates’ emotional and attitudinal outcomes at work. Results from multilevel random coefficient models analyses found that leaders’ EI abilities had unique and differential relationships with subordinates’ work outcomes. Supervisors’ emotion perception accuracy and emotion management were positively related to followers’ job satisfaction, positive affect and perceived group cohesion; supervisors’ emotion perception accuracy was negatively related to subordinates’ stress and emotional burnout and supervisors’ emotion management was negatively related to subordinates’ negative affect, stress, and burnout. However, supervisors’ understanding of emotion was negatively related to followers’ positive affect and perceived group cohesion and was positively related to subordinates’ stress. The findings highlight the positive and negative effects leaders’ EI abilities can have on followers’ emotion and attitudes at work and support a social interactionist perspective of emotion abilities in leader-follower interaction.