Why Leadership Falters in Critical Moments: Emotions and the Impact on Cognitive Abilities

Abstract

This study looks at the impact of emotions on the cognitive ability of the leader to manage himself/herself under stress. The findings show that emotions have a notable impact on the cognitive performance of an individual. Further findings reveal that physical senses; what you see, hear, feel, taste and smell; are strong triggers in activating emotions. When emotions are triggered, cognitive ability is disabled and an automatic knee-jerk reaction occurs from the individual’s subconscious programming; based on the individual’s perception and belief system that surrounds the incident or event. The study also indicates subconscious programming; i.e. beliefs and perceptions come from repeated past experiences, types of movies watched, songs listened to or books read. This research will shed light on why leaders can’t practice the learnings from leadership and management courses, especially under stress. The ability to manage emotions determines whether the manager goes into an automatic reaction, where cognitive abilities are shut down and the manager acts out from his/her subconscious programming or the cognitive ability kicks in, and the manager can access and apply the newly learned information, eventually creating new habit patterns, resulting in the application of the knowledge learned. Further, this paper presents a methodical approach to managing emotions called SIEP; abbreviated for Spirit, Intellect, Emotions and Physical Senses; the conceptual model and its effectiveness in managing emotions, amongst entrepreneurs in a social business incubator, called ET Ideas in Malaysia.