Effects of Emotional Intelligence Information Acquisition and Utilisation on Policy Making of Senior Civil Servants in South Eastern State of Nigeria

Policy making is concerned with the formulation of general statements or understandings that guide or channel governmental decisions on how best to improve quality of life of the citizens. Senior civil servant participated in policy making in order to ensure that government achieves its laudable objectives and goals. This study investigated the effects of emotional intelligence, information acquisition and utilisation on policy making of senior civil servants in southeastern states of Nigeria. The ex-post facto research design of the correctional type was adopted. The stratified random sampling technique and coupled with the questionnaire were used to collect data from a sample size of 916 out of a population of 1,526 senior civil servant (92.1% response rate). The findings revealed that the respondents had high emotional intelligence, and good policy making behaviour. There were significant positive relationships of emotional intelligence, information acquisition and utilisation with policy making of the respondents. There were significant joint and relative effects of emotional intelligence, information acquisition and utilisation on policy making of the respondents. Recommendations were made on how best to improve the policy making behaviour of the senior civil servants in southeastern states of Nigeria.