The Influence of Emotional Intelligence and Personality Traits on Effective Leadership

Abstract

Ineffective leadership contributes to organizational problems and business failures. The negative effect of poor leadership in health services is a prominent issue in today’s health services workforce and is exacerbated by the challenges posed by the Affordable Healthcare Act of 2012. This study investigated the impact of emotional intelligence (EI) and personality traits, two variables commonly linked to effective leadership, within healthcare. It also examined the influence of EI and the Big Five personality traits on leadership effectiveness within a healthcare institution. The study assumed that EI and the Big Five personality traits would positively link to each other and leadership effectiveness and predict a negative relationship between neuroticism and leadership effectiveness.