Emotional labor among school administrators

In this research, it is aimed to analyze the views of school administrators on the emotional labor they display in the school environment. The study group of this research has carried out with the qualitative research method is 30 school administrators, consisting of 15 school principals and 15 vice principals, working in the city center of Tokat, Turkey. In-depth interviews were realized with school administrators through a semi-structured interview form developed by the researcher. Content analysis process was adopted in the analysis of the research data. According to the results of the research findings, it has been determined that the emotions of school administrators are guided by informal rules such as personal characteristics and professional ethics rather than official rules such as laws, regulations or protocol rules. It has been observed that school administrators do not reflect their negative emotions such as anger, sadness and fear in the school environment and act to display the appropriate emotion for the situation. It has been concluded that they mostly use surface acting to gain students the desired behaviors and to motivate the teachers. In the meantime, it has been determined that as a requirement of the management, they use deep acting in order to treat everyone equally, to create a positive school climate, to establish healthy communication with due regard, to protect authority, to be positive and to get rid of prejudices. It has been determined that the effort of school administrators to manage their emotions in their relations with people in the working environment has negative consequences for them such as physical and psychological fatigue, weariness, unhappiness, stress, tension, nervousness, headache, regret, insomnia, not being seen as an authority, blood pressure and restlessness. It has been concluded that for school administrators the positive results of managing their emotions at school are positive communication, positive school climate, happiness, psychological relaxation, getting to know people better, success, gaining people's trust, being more cautious and foresighted, being accepted, maturity, and being a good person. Based on the results of the research, it has been suggested that practical programs and training workshops on emotion management should be integrated into the pre-service and in-service training of school administrators, and the awareness of senior management, school administrators and teachers on emotional labor should be provided and increased. Key Words: Emotion, Emotional Labor, School Administrator