1. “I second that emotion ” Emotions and emotional intelligence in social work Richard Ingram University of Dundee

2. Focus of the paper….. Links between emotional intelligence and social work Emotion and decision making – an uneasy alliance? Service user involvement and emotional intelligence Emotions, reflection and supervision

3. What is emotional intelligence? Self awareness Self regulation Empathy Motivation Salovey and Mayer 1990 Linked to relationships, life outcomes and success Goleman (1995)

4. Towards a link with social work…. Centrality of the social work relationship – “emotions define the social work relationship” (Howe 2009:1) Proceduralism, casework and emotional labour Seeking the service user perspective and links with empathy Underpins skills base

5. Links between EI and social work skills

6. Service user perspectives and EI Key themes from service user literature Wanting to be ‘heard’ Prefer a warm empathetic approach Workers should be respectful, purposeful and reliable Be good listeners Understand uniqueness of perspectives Timms and Mayer (1970), McNeil et al (2005), Rees and Wallace (1982), Harding and Beresford (1995)

7. Service user perspectives and EI Links with EI literature Self awareness – leads to confident therapeutic responses and in turn decision making. Managing emotions – regulate one’s emotions in order offer appropriate support and to ‘hear’ emotional cues from others. Motivation – linked to ability to focus attention on salient issues. Empathy – understand another person’s emotions, thoughts and perspectives. Recognise explicit and subtle emotional signals. Relationships – the quality of relationship building flows from the 4 key elements above. (Salovey and Mayer 1990)

8. Emotions – a help or a hindrance? Role of aphorisms – “don’t let your heart rule your head” (Howe 2009) Rationality is about achieving goals – opens way for choices and feelings (Lazarus & Lazarus 1994) Emotions result from an appraisal of a situation hence are inherently a thought process. (Morrison 2007) Emotional intelligence supports the formation and communication of theoretical stances (Ergur 2009) Suppression of emotions leads workers to not do what we might expect. (Ferguson 2005) EI helps individual assign values and meanings to emotions and hence guide decisions. Emotions are part of the social work tool kit alongside theory and skills (England 1985)

9. Reflective practice, supervision and the role of emotions Useful overlaps with reflective practice. Supervision a key forum for reflection. Need to develop a ‘language’ of emotion to overcome technicist dialogue.. (Holland 1999) Procedural approaches and the emotional labour of social work (Collins 2007) Role modelling and supervision (Cole et al 2006) Public face, emotions and professionalism. (Ferguson 2005)

10. References Beresford, P (1994) Changing culture; involving service users in social work education. Paper 32.4. London. CCETSW Collins, S (2007) Social workers, resilience, positive emotions and optimism. Practice. Vol 11, No 4. England, H (1986) Social Work as Art. London. Allen and Unwin Ergur (2009) How can education professionals become emotionally intelligent. Procedia Social and Behavioural Sciences.1.p1023-1028. Ferguson, H (2005) Working with Violence, the Emotions and the Psycho-social Dynamics of Child protection: reflections on the Victoria Climbie Case. Social Work Education. Vol 24, No 7, p781-795 Goleman, D (1995) Emotional Intelligence. London. Bloomsbury. Holland, S (1999) Discourses of decision making in child protection: conducting comprehensive assessments in Britain. International Journal of Social Welfare. 8. 277-287 Howe, D (2009) The Emotionally Intelligent Social Worker. Basingstoke. Palgrave Lazarus, R and Lazarus, B (1994) Passion and Reason. New York. Oxford University Press McNeil et al (2005) Reducing re-offending – key practice skills. SWIA Mayer, J and Timms, N (1970) The client speaks: working class impressions of casework. London. Routledge Rees, S. and Wallace, A. (1982) Verdicts on Social Work, London, Arnold. Salovey, P. & Mayer, J.D. (1990). Emotional intelligence. Imagination, Cognition, and Personality, 9, 185-211