Emotional Intelligence and Leadership: the Role of Emotional Intelligence in the Quality of Leader-follower Relationship

This study has been divided into two stages. The first stage was developing a validated measure of Islamic respect in leadership. In this stage, focus group sessions were conducted to generate the items for Islamic respect. Those items generated from the focus group sessions were further used in instrument development in an online survey questionnaire for scale reduction and validation. The second stage of this study used a cross-sectional design and measures collected through the use of a questionnaire. The participants were 203 matched leader-subordinate dyad in a Malaysian Islamic Insurance company. The results showed that the combination of both leader and follower emotional intelligence moderated the relationship between Islamic leader-member exchange and a number of important work related outcomes. The results suggest that emotional intelligence can help leaders and subordinates to facilitate stronger identification and emotional attachments with each other.