We do not come to this world with a suitcase full of different emotions. We develop them in time along with our life experience. We use emotions to express ourselves and we use them to influence others.
Society cultivates humans and their emotions through a life-long learning process that begins in the family. It models their values, beliefs and attitudes that give content and shape to their emotions, teaching them patterns to make them controllable, and, therefore, culturally acceptable.
Nevertheless, we are partly emotionally self-made as we make our own decisions, choose our beliefs and form our attitudes. Hence, our emotional response is a product of how we have been and are modified intrinsically and extrinsically.
What Shapes Our Emotions
There are many individual factors that shape our emotions such as our genes, brain physiology, upbringing, as well as learned and impersonated behavioural patterns. They make us emotionally rich and complex. They are created and developed. Emotions can be taught, tempered and balanced, as well as shaped to change intensity and frequency.
Emotions can be controlled. We are trained to control them from an early age. Each of us can choose the level of control and the intensity. Sometimes we are in control and sometimes we get overwhelmed with them. Although we are given certain control, sometimes they control us from an unconscious level. Moreover, our emotional responses are triggered by the stimuli that come from the environment.
Emotions and Interpersonal Relationships
Science suggests that emotional expressions are crucial to the development and regulation of interpersonal relationships. By using words, facial expressions, our tone of voice, we express ourselves and also influence others by triggering their emotional response. Hence, the emotional interactions at work significantly influence our performance and relationships.
How do you feel when a colleague or an employee missed an extremely important deadline? Do you stay in control over your emotions? Do you shout? Do you reprimand them? What is your emotional response to their misconduct? How do they feel and respond to your shouting, reprimands, threats? Certainly not in a positive way. Luckily, emotions can be controlled and shaped to stimulate positive emotional response crucial for building positive interpersonal relationships.
Positive Emotional Culture and Well-being
Emotions can be influenced, altered and improved in anyone and at all levels in the organisational hierarchy. However, to be able to manage emotions in the workplace effectively, people first need to understand them and then to develop adequate skills.
Leadership should pay more attention to whether the emotional interactions of employees promote health and well-being and whether their contribution to high performance and motivation is ensured. While on the one hand, it depends on the individuals how they choose to behave and influence others, leadership, on the other, can streamline emotions and build a positive emotional culture as part of a wider organisational culture framework.
Words play an essential role in the way we emotionally interact in the organisation. If you use words that cause a positive emotional response, you will have positive interactions and stronger influence on people’s performance. To quote Sigmund Freud: “Civilisation began the first time an angry person cast a word instead of a rock.”