Abstract:
As human beings we all have undergone some sort of stress in our life either positively or negatively.
But unpleasant mental uncertainty may be harmful in our life if it happens continuously. Therefore, job
stress holds a dominant place among the stress types. Job stress is conceptualized as the mental,
emotional, and physical drain brought about by the perceived incongruence between job demands and
employees’ capabilities and resources. Job stress affects the employees’ performance and as a result,
employees do not work efficiently and effectively which affect to the performance of the organization at
large. Banking sector of Sri Lanka is one of the leading parts of the financial sector and it plays a vital
role in the country’s development. Like any other organization, employees of banks also suffer from the
job stress. The preliminary survey confirmed that there was a high level of job stress in Executive level
employees in NDB Banks in western province. Literature shows that employees who are having higher
level of emotional intelligence can successfully manage their job stress. Emotional Intelligence is the
capacity for recognizing our own feelings and feelings of others, for motivating ourselves and for
managing emotions well in ourselves and in our relationships.
Therefore this research aims at investigating the Impact of emotional intelligence on job stress.
Reliable and a validated questionnaire was used as the primary data collecting instrument and data
were collected from 120 respondents. Simple and multiple regression analysis were used to test the
proposed hypotheses. Findings revealed that Emotional Intelligence and dimensions of emotional
intelligence: (a) self-awareness, (b) self-management, (c) social awareness, significantly and negatively
impact on the level of job stress of executive level employees in the respective bank except the
dimension of (d) relationship management since it was positively impact on the level of job stress. Thus
it can be concluded Emotional intelligence impact on reducing job stress in banking sector employees
and people who are have high emotional intelligence can manage their stress appropriately
