The Emotional Intelligence and leadership style of IS project managers

Is project management requires both "soft" skills and technical skills for success. Researchers refer to these " soft " skills as Emotional Intelligence ( EQ) which is the ability of the project manager to manage their emotions. Previous research has determined that a project manager should possess a high level of EQ and the aim of this research was to determine if there was a correlation between the level of EQ and the leadership style of information systems project managers. A questionnaire consisting of a popular leadership style questionnaire was used in conjunction with the- General Emotional Intelligence Scale questionnaire. Forty six IS project managers completed the questionnaire. From the data, it was determined that, whilst EQ levels were consistently higher than the general population, no statistical correlation could be found between leadership style and the EQ level of IS project managers. Further no significant differences could be found with the PM EQ and the level of PM experience although the average EQ level of females was significantly higher than that of males. Whilst these results are inconsistent with previous research findings, it was concluded that the leadership questionnaire used in this research may be unsuitable as a measure of leadership style.