Emotional Intelligence, or EI, can have a significant impact on your career as a business professional. Part of mastering your emotions is the ability to take responsibility for your own behaviour, which is known as self-management.
Self-management is the way you maintain control of your conduct in the workplace to ensure that you’re highly productive and inspiring others.
Here are 8 ways to help you improve this important skill to develop a keen sense of positive professional behaviour.
(1) Know you have a choice
When anything happens to us, we always have a choice on how we react. We can choose to become emotional and explode, or we can actively take a moment to think about the right course of action and decide how to behave.
By embedding the belief in your mind that you always have a choice, then you’re always in control because you know you can be.
(2) Impulse control
Building on the previous point, a big part of self-management is the ability to be aware of our levels of emotion and be highly attuned to them. This means that, should a situation occur which triggers a large emotional response, we can prevent ourselves from an inappropriate display.
To do this, it’s important to reflect on our desires, impulses, drives and urges, and be mindful of what “pushes our buttons”, so that if these occur, we can control ourselves and continue to act professionally.
(3) Shake up your routine
When your day-to-day becomes the same over and over, you can slip into a state of comfort. While this is not so much a problem in general, it can make it tricky to evaluate your emotional self. So, try a different type of exercise or undertake something mentally stimulating to break your routine and get more in touch with yourself.
(4) Convert emotional energy
When you feel a sense of heightened emotion, such as anger or sadness, it may cause you to experience an outburst that is considered inappropriate in the workplace. However, this vented energy can actually be harnessed and converted from a negative scenario into a positive one instead.
Next time you feel overwhelmed, mad or frustrated, take a breath and redirect it into motivation instead; motivation to fix the problem and be better.
(5) Keep a strict calendar
A calendar will help you focus on your productivity while avoiding procrastination, especially when you make the decision to commit to whatever you plan without compromise.
By developing a schedule that you stick to, it can really help you gain better control over your goals and output every day.
(6) Be mindful of reality
Understand that people can make mistakes and most of them aren’t intentional. It sounds simple, but often in the heat of urgency and deadlines, when someone makes an error, it can be hard to remember that some things don’t always go to plan.
When the unfortunate happens, stop and re-evaluate the circumstances before you let your emotions take over.
(7) Maintain a healthy diet
Your personal well-being has a direct impact on your emotional health, which means that it’s important to eat well and drink plenty of water.
If you’re surviving off several cups of coffee and sugary biscuits, you’re going to be in a completely different state to when you’re eating balanced meals, several times a day and keeping hydrated.
Starting with the basics can help you manage your emotions.
(8) Focus your interest levels
Self-management takes a level of focus and an active mind to control your emotions. You can’t do this successfully if you’re scattered or distracted. Instead, be patient and take the time to show interest in the topic at hand. When your mind is present, you can manage your emotions far better.
Self-management is a way to best leverage your emotional intelligence and improve your professional conduct. It’s worth investing time into developing it as it can help you focus on your goals towards achieving success.
How can Lifeology Help You?
Having years of experience assisting people to understand and enhance their Emotional Intelligence, I have helped many people discover their true potential in both their working and personal lives.
Although our Emotional Intelligence becomes more ‘set in’ with age, it is malleable and, along with self-awareness and coaching, can be focused on and enhanced in an effective way, to improve career growth and success.
Feel free to contact me to find out how!
For more information, contact Kerryn at info@lifeology.com.au to unlock your emotional potential today.
