The Development of Librarian Emotional Intelligence ...

2012 International Conference on Innovation, Management and Technology Research (ICIMTR2012), Malacca, Malaysia : 21-22 May, 2012

The Development of Librarian Emotional Intelligence Assessment Tool Mohamad Noorman Masrek Accounting Research Institute & Faculty of Information Management Universiti Teknologi MARA Shah Alam, Malaysia [email protected]

Mad Khir Johari Abdulah Sani Faculty of Information Management Universiti Teknologi MARA Shah Alam, Malaysia [email protected]

Abstract— While studies investigating emotional intelligence have been extensively reported in the literature, very few have focused on librarians. Hence, a study was carried out using qualitative approach to identify the dimension of emotional intelligence of Malaysian Public Librarians. Based on the findings of the qualitative study, an instrument measuring librarian emotional intelligence was developed and empirically tested using survey method involving 180 librarians. Accordingly, Librarian Emotional Intelligence Assessment Tool (LEIAT) was developed. LEIAT can be used by Malaysian public libraries to continuously assess the level of emotional intelligence among their librarians. Based on the outcome of the assessment, training needs can be identified. In addition, It can also be used as a tool during entry interview for the post of librarians. LEIAT can be commercialized as a software product. The potential clients of this product would be libraries and corporate resources centers.

measuring public librarian EI. In addition, it is also aimed at developing an automated assessment tool that will enable an on-line assessment of librarian emotional intelligence and its relationship with occupational performance. II.

Keywords ü emotional intelligence, librarian, assessment tool, Malaysia

I. INTRODUCTION In 1920, Thorndike introduced the concept of emotional intelligence (EI) as a type of social intelligence [35]. Subsequently, Salovey and Mayer coined the term EI in their article “EI,” published in the journal of “Imagination, Cognition and Personality” [32]. Five years later, Goleman introduced Emotional Quotient (EQ), which further extended the concept the concept into numerous disciplines and various occupations, including sales, hospitality, banking, education and information services [7]. Gardner [9] defined EI as “the ability to identifying and understanding the emotions in oneself and others” while Bar-On [36] defined it as “an array of non-cognitive ability, efficiencies, and skills that affect one’s ability to be successful in facing environmental claims and stress”. On the other hand, Goleman defined EI as “the ability to recognize our own feelings and others, for motivating ourselves, and for managing emotions well in ourselves and in our relationship” [32]. While studies investigating emotional intelligence have been extensively reported in the literature, very few have focused on librarians. Furthermore, study focusing on Malaysian librarians is almost unavailable. Against this concern, this paper reports a study which was conducted with the aim of developing an instrument for

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LITERATURE REVIEW

A. Emotional Intelligence in Library Services Using EI skills in the library service industry has increasingly been considered as a strategy to satisfy and retain users ([1], [10], [31], [34]). Although a few discussions on EI and library services appear in both library and information science literature ([3], [11], [25], [34]), these are non-research pieces and insufficient to promote EI skills. One must go outside of library and information management to find other empirical studies. In Malaysia, the planned development of libraries, as well as Public Libraries (PL) started in the late 1960s [37]. Today, there are about 319 PL throughout Malaysia employing a total of 248 professional librarians. The operation of PL is generally under the jurisdiction of the state government, however in terms of consultation, policy development, service and supports, the tasks are assigned to the National Library of Malaysia (NLM). As PLs, their major role is to serve the community in terms of their information needs. In addition, they are also responsible for developing and maintaining national collections from various resources, providing facilities for their user as well as providing advices in library matters. These roles are in line with the national agenda to inspire a culture of knowledge in the development of the country and to foster a reading culture among Malaysians. Shamsudin pointed out that, government servants, must possess EI skills in delivering services so as to contribute directly to the creation of a favorable environment and to demonstrate a good relationship with stakeholders [30]. Thus, PLs, who are also government servants, are also bound to this requirement. Apart from fulfilling the government’s requirements, the nature of their jobs which constantly deal with customers from all ranks and levels further signifies the need and importance of mastering the EI skills. The EI skills, combined with their


as the basis for investigating librarians’ emotional intelligence. However, we anticipated that the frameowkr would be revised after we have completed the empricial study. The Goleman’s framework consists of four dimensions which are self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and relationship management. The selfawareness dimension consists of three sub-dimensions while the self-management dimensions comprise of six sub-dimensions. The social awareness dimension contains three sub-dimensions and the last dimension which is relationship management is divided into six subdimensions.

specialized skills in librarianship, will make the PLs more productive in their jobs. B. Emotional Intelligence Scales There are numerous EI models developed by different authors and with different specifications or dimensions, which are pertinent to all kinds of disciplines such as hospitality, banking, military, salespersons, students and many more (see Table 1). However, none of the available model or scales have been empirically tested in the context of librarians. According to Zeidner, Matthews & Roberts, in order to meet organizational requirements, construction of EI instruments must identify precisely the specific contexts, needs, and purposes for which that EI test is being developed [27]. Different jobs call for varying levels of social and emotional involvement and activity. Thus, a systematic emotional task analysis needs to be done in order to match the different facets of EI.

TABLE 2 GOLEMAN EMOTIONAL INTELLIGNCE MODEL [7]

Dimension SelfAwareness concerns knowing one's internal states, preferences, resources, and Intuitions SelfManagement refers to managing ones' internal states, impulses, and resources.

TABLE 1 VARIOUS EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE SCALE

Measure

Authors

EARS (Emotional Accuracy Research Scale) EISC (Emotional Intelligence Scale for Children) MEIS (Multifactor Emotional Intelligence Scale) MSCEIT (Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test) EQ-i (Emotional Quotient Inventory) ECI (Emotional Competence Inventory)

[14] [2]

SEIS (Schutte Emotional Intelligence Scales) EI-IPIP (Emotional Intelligence- based IPIP Scales) EISRS (Emotional Intelligence SelfRegulation Scale) DHEIQ (Dulewicz & Higgs Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire)

[38] [19]

TEIQue (Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire) SPTB (Sjöberg Personality Test Battery (EI Scale)) TEII (Tapia Emotional Intelligence Inventory) SUEIT (Swinburne University Emotional Intelligence Test) WEIP-3 (Workgroup Emotional Intelligence Profile (Version 3)) EIS (Emotional Intelligence Scale) WLEIS (Wong & Law. Emotional Intelligence Scales)) LEIQ (Lioussine Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire)

[20]

[16] [17] [35] [29]

Subdimension Emotional SelfAwareness Accurate SelfAssessment SelfConfidence Emotional Self-Control: Achievement Transparency Adaptability Orientation

Initiative

[24]

Optimism

[40]

Social Awareness refers to how people handle relationships and awareness of others' Feelings, needs, and concerns Relationship Management concerns the skill or adeptness at inducing desirable responses in others

[21] [26] [4] [33] [18] [6] [8]

C. Goleman Emotional Intelligence Model Based on the review of the literature, we found that the framework developed by Goleman [7] is the most comprehensiveness. In addition, it had been used by numerous researchers (e.g. [22], [28]). It is because of these reasons, this study decided to adopt the framework

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Empathy

Organizational Awareness Service Orientation Developing Others Inspirational Leadership Influence Change Catalyst Conflict Management Teamwork & Collaboration

Definition Recognizing one's emotions and their effects Knowing one's strengths and limits A strong sense of one's self-worth and capabilities Keeping disruptive emotions and impulses in check High standards of honesty and integrity Flexibility in handling change Striving to improve or meeting a standard of excellence Readiness to act on opportunities Seeing the positive aspects of things and the future Sensing others' feelings and perspectives, and taking an active interest in their concerns Reading a group's emotional currents and power Relationships Anticipating, recognizing, and meeting customers' needs Sensing others' development needs and bolstering their abilities Inspiring and guiding individuals and groups Wielding effective tactics for persuasion Initiating or managing change Negotiating and resolving disagreements Working with others toward shared goals


III. RESEARCH METHODS Figure 1 below depicts the research methodology that was adopted in this study. In essence, the conduct of the study involved three phases, namely, theoretical study, empirical study and prototype development. As for the theoretical study, extensive review on EI literature was conducted. The aim of the review was to identity the appropriate constructs and develop framework for measuring librarians’ EI level. Using Goleman’s [7] framework as reference, an empirical study involving qualitative study was conducted. Accordingly, an instrument or measurement for each and every construct in the framework was developed and empirically tested through a survey involving professional librarians working in public libraries in Malaysia. The qualitative involved the use of Critical Incident Technique [42] and a total of 14 librarians were interviewed. The survey involved 180 librarians who was randomly chosen based on the simple random sampling technique. Prior to the actual data collection, the instrument underwent rigorous pre-testing and pilot testing with experts and 48 librarians. Based on the responses obtained in the survey, factor analysis and reliability analysis was performed so as to ensure that the instrument is highly reliable. Theoretical Study

Empirical Study

Prototype Development

Figure 2. Rapid Application Development used for developing LEIAT

IV.

FINDINGS

A. Findings from the Qualitative Study Table 3 illustrates the findings from the qualitative study. Two additional sub-dimensions were discovered from the study namely spiritual and communications. Based on the suggestion from two experts who were engaged in the study during data analysis, the spiritual sub-dimension was added into the self-awareness dimension while the communication sub-dimension was attached to the relationship management dimensions. TABLE 3 THE DIMENSIONS AND SUB-DIMENSION FOR LIBRARIAN EI Main Sub-dimensions Dimensions SelfEmotional Self-Awareness Awareness Accurate Self-Assessment Self-Confidence Spiritual SelfEmotional Self-Control Management Transparency Adaptability Achievement Orientation Initiative Optimism Social Empathy Awareness Organizational Awareness Service Orientation Relationship Developing Others Management Inspirational Leadership Change Catalyst Influence Conflict Management Teamwork & Collaboration

Figure 1. Research methodology

Based on the findings from the survey, an automated assessment tool was developed using the Rapid Application Development Approach or RAD as shown in Figure 2. According to Hoffer, George and Valacich [13] RAD is a systems development methodology created to decrease the time needed to design and implement information systems radically. RAD life cycle is divided into four phases which are requirements planning, user design, development, and cutover. During requirements planning, high-level managers, executives, and knowledgeable end users will work together to determine system requirements. During user design, end users and information systems professionals participate in JAD workshops, where those involved use integrated CASE tools to support the rapid prototyping of system design. During the construction phase, the same information systems professionals who created the design will generate code using the CASE tools’ code generator. In this study, the programming language used was Php while the database was MySQL. During cutover phase, the new system is delivered to the end users. The advantages of adopting RAD for this study include: (i) saving time, money, and human effort; and (ii) the ability to rapidly develop the systems.

Communication

B. Findings from the Survey Table 4 displays the results of the reliability analysis based on the responses of 180 librarians who participated in the survey. The factor analysis showed that two subdimensions namely initiative and developing others were removed from the framework. Overall, the reliability analysis showed that the Cronbach Alpha score for each sub-dimensions was reasonably high as suggested by Nunnally & Bernstein [5] with the lowest score was 0.70 while the highest score stood at 0.91.

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TABLE 4 THE RELIABILITY MEASURES OF THE INSTRUMENT Cronbach Main Sub-dimensions Alpha Dimensions SelfAwareness

SelfManagement

Social Awareness Relationship Management

Emotional Self-Awareness Accurate Self-Assessment Self-Confidence Spiritual Emotional Self-Control Transparency Adaptability Achievement Orientation Optimism Empathy Organizational Awareness Service Orientation Inspirational Leadership Change Catalyst Influence Conflict Management Teamwork & Collaboration

0.71 0.81 0.89 0.81 0.70 0.77 0.75 0.70 0.79 0.86 0.77 0.91 0.90 0.84 0.87 0.86 0.89

Communication

0.71

C. Librarian Emotional Intelligence Assessment Tool Figure 3 and Figure 4 show the screen interfaces of developed tool. The tool was named Librarian Emotional Intelligence Tool (LEIAT). LEIAT can be used by Malaysian public libraries to continuously assess the level of emotional intelligence among their librarians. Based on the outcome of the assessment, training needs can be identified. In addition, it can also be used as a tool during entry interview for the post of librarians. LEIAT can be commercialized as a software product. The potential clients of this product would be libraries and corporate resources centers. To date, LEIAT had participated in three Invention, Innovation and Design (IID) competitions, at the university level and South East Asian region. In all the three participations, LEIAT had won gold medals.

Figure 4. One of the outputs produced by LEIAT

V. CONCLUSION The conduct of the study has been to develop an instrument for measuring public librarian’s emotional intelligence. In the process, empirical study involving interviews and survey with Malaysian public librarians were executed. The outcome of the empirical study was the establishment of the emotional intelligence framework with corresponding measurements for Malaysian public librarians. It is based on this framework and measurements that the LEIAT has been developed. The contributions of the study could be assessed in terms of theoretical and practical significance. From the theoretical perspective, the study has developed an empirical-based framework measuring librarians’ emotional intelligence. The framework can be used by researchers to investigate other types of librarians such as academic librarians or school resource center librarians. From the practical perspective, the tool that has been developed i.e. LEIAT can be used to measure public librarians work performance and also used to identify the required trainings on emotional intelligence. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The researchers would like to extend our thanks and gratitude to Higher Education Ministry of Malaysia for sponsoring the project under the Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS). REFERENCES [1]

Figure 3. Homepage of the LEIAT

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