Why Emotional Intelligence is the Most Underrated Skill in Corporate Life

In many corporate environments, success is measured by metrics: KPIs, performance reviews, delivery deadlines, revenue targets. The assumption is clear, if you hit the numbers, you're succeeding.

But over the years I spent working in fast-paced, high-pressure teams, and now through coaching people at all levels of leadership, I’ve learned something else: what truly separates the most effective professionals from the rest isn’t technical ability or time management, it’s emotional intelligence.

The ability to understand, manage, and respond to emotions (both your own and others’) is the foundation of sustainable success in any workplace. Without it, even the most talented people burn out, break down, or get stuck in conflict cycles that derail progress.

Let’s talk about why emotional intelligence matters and why, despite being so essential, it’s often overlooked.

Emotional intelligence starts with you

When people think about emotional intelligence, they often think about being good with people. And that’s part of it. But it starts with something much closer to home: being good with yourself.

It’s hard to lead a team, manage a project, or show up in high-stakes environments if you don’t understand what’s happening inside your own head.

Self-awareness isn’t just knowing your personality type or how you like to communicate. It’s knowing what you feel and why, and being able to stay steady in the moments when pressure, fear, or frustration start to rise.

Most people aren’t taught how to do this

We’re taught how to plan, how to optimise, and how to deliver. But we’re not often taught how to feel. Or how to name what we feel. Or how to respond to emotional triggers without immediately reacting or shutting down.

So, we get good at the external stuff. We keep our inboxes under control and our meetings productive. But under the surface, we might be quietly suppressing emotion, ignoring signs of resentment, overwhelm, or disconnect until they become too big to ignore.

This isn’t about being overly emotional at work. It’s about recognising that emotions are always present, whether we name them or not. And the more aware we are of them, the less power they have to throw us off course.

What self-awareness really looks like

In a corporate setting, emotional self-awareness means:

• Recognising when you're pushing through or ignoring something instead of addressing it

• Catching the moment you start to take something personally (and stepping back)

• Awareness of how past experiences are influencing your perspective of a situation

It means being able to read your internal signals before they turn into tension, frustration, or defensiveness.

It’s not about being perfectly calm all the time. It’s about being honest enough with yourself to notice what’s going on early enough to make a grounded choice.

Managing your emotions without suppressing them

One of the biggest myths around emotional intelligence is that it's about controlling your feelings.

In reality, it's about working with them. Emotional suppression isn’t intelligence, it’s a coping mechanism. And over time, it always creates cracks: in communication, in energy, in decision-making.

Professionals with high emotional intelligence don’t ignore emotions. They stay present with them. They acknowledge them, process them, and then choose how to respond, instead of reacting impulsively or avoiding difficult conversations altogether.

This is what creates stability in leadership. Not stoicism. Not distance, but emotional agility and the ability to feel without getting derailed.

The ripple effect of emotional intelligence in teams

Once you’ve built emotional awareness in yourself, it naturally affects how you relate to others.

You start to notice things you might have missed before, like when a colleague’s frustration is actually coming from fear. Or when a team member’s silence in a meeting isn’t disinterest, but overwhelm or fear.

You don’t jump to conclusions. You ask better questions. You’re less reactive and more responsive. And that shifts the entire dynamic of your team.

Because when people feel emotionally safe, when they know they won’t be shut down or punished for expressing something difficult, they perform better. They take more ownership. They recover from setbacks more quickly. 

Conflict becomes easier to navigate

Conflict is inevitable in any working environment. But emotional intelligence completely changes the way you move through it.

Instead of blaming or withdrawing, you can name what’s happening. You can separate your feelings from facts. You can ask for what you need without making someone else wrong.

You’re also less likely to absorb someone else’s reaction as truth. When someone’s short with you, you don’t automatically take it as personal criticism. You stay curious, not combative.

That one skill, the ability to stay grounded in the presence of conflict, is often what separates great leaders from simply experienced ones. It’s something I have struggled with before, and is without doubt one of my biggest life lessons. I’m far better at staying grounded now than I was, but it’s taken a lot of work.

Emotional intelligence reduces burnout

Burnout isn’t just about overwork. It’s often the result of emotional mismanagement, saying yes when you mean no, ignoring stress until your body forces you to stop, putting everyone else’s needs ahead of your own.

When you’re emotionally intelligent, you’re more likely to:

• Catch early signs of fatigue

• Advocate for your capacity

• Choose work that energises you, not just work that pleases others

You take responsibility for your boundaries, your energy, and your wellbeing, which, in turn, makes you a more reliable and present teammate.

This is especially critical in leadership roles

When you’re managing others, your emotional intelligence doesn’t just impact you, it sets the tone for the entire group.

Leaders who haven’t developed emotional maturity often create environments of unspoken tension. Their mood becomes the team’s weather system. Their reactivity creates silence. Their avoidance sets the standard.

On the other hand, emotionally intelligent leaders create consistency. People trust them, not just because of their competence, but because of their presence. They know how to hold tension, make space for emotion, and keep momentum without glossing over the human realities of the workplace. Because that’s exactly it, we are all humans, having real life experiences. Whether we’re sitting in a minimalistic office with poor lighting, or not. 

Vulnerability is not a weakness, it’s a leadership advantage

One of the biggest myths in leadership is that showing emotion, especially vulnerability, will make people lose respect for you.

In reality, the opposite is true.

When leaders are willing to be human, to n

ame when something is hard, to own when they’ve made a mistake, to say “I don’t have the answer yet”, they don’t lose authority. They build credibility. Because honesty doesn’t signal weakness. It signals trustworthiness.

Vulnerability isn’t about oversharing. It’s not about turning every team meeting into a therapy session. It’s about making space for the truth, especially when that truth is uncomfortable.

When a leader is honest about their own learning curve, their fatigue, or the complexity of a situation, it gives everyone else permission to be honest too. It sets the tone for a culture where feedback is safe, problems are surfaced early, and people don’t have to pretend everything is fine when it isn’t.

And that's what creates loyalty. That’s what builds resilience. Not performative confidence, but emotional integrity.

Emotional intelligence builds trust

Trust isn’t built by always being right. It’s built by being consistent, clear, and emotionally steady.

When people know what to expect from you, when you can own your part in challenges without defensiveness, when you listen well, when you regulate your own stress, they feel safer around you.

That safety becomes the foundation of everything else: collaboration, innovation, honest feedback, faster decision-making.

Trust doesn’t come from perfection. It comes from humanity, backed by responsibility.

You don’t need to be a therapist, just self-aware

A common misconception is that emotional intelligence requires you to be highly sensitive, or to spend hours every week in deep introspection.

You don’t have to be perfect at this. You just need to be aware enough to notice what’s happening, early enough to course-correct.

It’s not about emotional hand-holding. It’s about emotional maturity. A grounded, grown-up way of moving through the working world, where people are treated as humans, not just roles.

Practical ways to develop emotional intelligence

So how do you actually build this? Like anything, it starts with practice.

Here are a few places to begin:

• Name your emotions during the day. Not just “stressed,” but “I’m overwhelmed because I feel behind.”

• Notice your defaults under pressure. Do you withdraw, over-explain, blame others, go silent?

• Practice responding instead of reacting. Create a pause between stimulus and response — even five seconds can shift a conversation.

• Get feedback. Ask trusted peers how you show up emotionally. What’s it like to work with you on a bad day?

• Reflect. Take five minutes at the end of the day to ask: What emotions showed up today? What triggered them? How did I respond?

The Human Design perspective

Everyone processes emotion differently. Some people experience emotions in real time, and need space before speaking. Others are more instinctual, more immediate.

Some people amplify the emotional energy of others without realising it. Some avoid emotional confrontation because it feels overwhelming.

There’s no one right way to “be emotionally intelligent.” That’s why I use Human Design in my coaching, not to label people, but to understand the patterns that drive their energy and interactions. It helps people understand their default behaviours under pressure, and how to shift them in a way that feels natural, not forced.

Emotional intelligence isn’t soft, it’s strategic

In high-performing teams, emotional intelligence is often the hidden engine. It’s what prevents miscommunication, builds loyalty, reduces turnover, and keeps collaboration fluid.

It’s also the difference between being technically brilliant and being someone people want to follow.

In a world that rewards speed, logic, and performance, developing emotional intelligence can feel optional. But the people who rise, and stay steady, are almost always the ones who’ve done this work.

Final thoughts

You don’t have to master every emotion to become more emotionally intelligent. You just have to be willing to get honest with yourself. To pause before reacting. To take responsibility for your patterns. And to make the people around you feel seen, not just managed.

It’s not a soft skill. It’s a leadership skill. And in today’s working world, it might be the most important one you have.