Emotional intelligence and leadership styles

A few decades ago, the concept of emotional intelligence was neither known nor considered particularly important. The importance of IQ and its role in business success has always been emphasized. However, over the years, that perception has changed considerably. Today, more importance is placed on emotional intelligence than IQ, more than ever before. A person can have a high IQ, but this does not guarantee long-term success in business if he does not have developed emotional intelligence. It is important to note that emotional intelligence can be developed throughout life and experiences. Leading, or managing a team of people in a small business is certainly one of the most significant challenges of every entrepreneur. It can be manifested through different styles depending on the circumstances of the situation but also the characteristics of the individual leader, which is certainly influenced by the level of emotional intelligence. The aim of the subject paper is to investigate the connection between the emotional intelligence of entrepreneurs and their leadership styles. The conducted research directly proved that there is no statistically significant connection between the level of emotional intelligence and the management styles of a small business. The respondents who participated in the research are small entrepreneurs from the area of the town of Grubišno polje and its surroundings. The work was created through empirical research in order to prove hypotheses for the needs of the thesis. In the empirical part of the work, an anonymous survey method was used, while statistical methods were used to process the research results, from which the Pearson correlation coefficient can be extracted.