A study on the interaction of emotional intelligence, organizational silence and emotional labor behaviour of university members at higher education institutions: Anadolu University and Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University sample

Employees may prefer to remain silent rather than sharing information, ideas and thoughts that can contribute to the organization. The losses that silence creates are increasingly emerging. On the other hand, the importance of emotional skills and the effects of the emotions displayed in the working life is becoming increasingly understood. The purpose of this study is to examine the interaction of the emotional intelligence, emotional labor and silence behaviors exhibited by the lecturers of Anadolu University and Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University. Particularly factors that can reduce silence behavior, which is a big problem for organizations, are being investigated. For this purpose, it was investigated whether emotional intelligence and emotional labor factors have a reducing effect on silence. As a result of the study, it was revealed that there are both pozitive and negative relations between these variables and sub-dimensions of these variables at different levels. Emotional labor does not reduce silence. In fact, the superficial emotional labor, which is a subdimension of emotional labor, promotes the accepting silence, which is a subdimension of organizational silence. Emotional intelligence has the effect of reducing some of the types of silence. Emotional intelligence reduces the accepting and defensive silence that are subdimensions of organizational silence. Finally, emotional intelligence increases the protective silence, which is a subdimension of organizational silence.