Building Emotional Intelligence At Work: A Conversation With Ritu Mehta

No misunderstandings. No conflicts. Every interaction flows seamlessly toward common goals. As leadership coach Ritu Mehta puts it, “Imagine a world where I understand people a hundred percent. There is no ambiguity. There is no mystery.” 

Sounds perfect, right? The reality is slightly different.

It’s natural for people to: 

• Miscommunicate
• Be on different pages
• Have different emotions and states of mind
• Physically be in separate locations
• Be stressed and not listening
• Navigating cultural nuances

All of these factors (and more) can result in varying degrees of understanding and reliability. The key to navigating these inevitable issues is the use of emotional intelligence.

It’s not a magical solution but rather a practical toolkit we can all develop to navigate our wonderfully imperfect workplace relationships.

What Is Emotional Intelligence, Really?

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is your ability to recognize, understand, and manage your own emotions while effectively navigating the emotions of others. Think of it as your internal GPS for workplace relationships. It encompasses five key components:

• Self-awareness: Understanding your emotions and how they impact others
• Self-regulation: Managing your emotional responses effectively
• Motivation: Harnessing emotions to achieve goals and persevere
• Empathy: Recognizing and understanding others’ emotions
• Social skills: Building rapport, managing relationships, and influencing others positively

In the workplace, EQ helps you give feedback without creating defensiveness, manage conflict without drama, and lead teams with authenticity rather than authority.

This may mean understanding you’re stressed or burned out and being proactive in taking rest and not projecting your discomfort onto others, thus creating conflict.

Likewise, it’s being secure enough in yourself to recognize when someone else may be burned out and not getting caught up in the whirlwind of their emotions.

Why Emotional Intelligence Is Key To Successful Workplace Relationships

In today’s modern work life, everything revolves around people. 

Whether you’re in the office, working remotely, or somewhere in between, your success largely depends on how well you connect with others.

“At the heart of everything we do—what you and I are doing right now, what everyone around us is doing—it all comes down to people,” says Coach Ritu. “Whether it’s where we live, the neighborhoods we are part of, our communities, schools, workplaces, families—every part of life is deeply connected to people.”

The challenge is that we’re often misaligned in what we think, feel, say, and do. 

As Ritu puts it, “When I’m feeling something, thinking the same, saying it honestly, and acting in line with it—that’s when I’m truly aligned. But let’s be honest, that doesn’t happen all the time with any of us. And that’s where emotional intelligence comes in—it helps us notice the gaps and gently close them within ourselves and when we interact with others.”

Barriers To Emotional Intelligence

When it comes to showcasing our emotional intelligence all the time, there are several factors at play:

The self-awareness gap

For Coach Ritu, what really gets in the way is a lack of self-awareness. Many of us weren’t taught these essential life skills in school or college. “We were only taught subjects. We were not taught life skills,” she shares.

This is by far the most prominent reason why we’re not regularly practicing emotional intelligence at work. We simply lack the education, skills, and experience.

Before entering any conversation or collaboration, Ritu recommends a simple but powerful practice: “If I just take five minutes before a sensitive conversation or an important meeting to ask myself, ‘What do I really want here? And how do I want to show up?’—that small pause changes my perspective. And once one is able to do that, half the work is already done. Because when you show up consciously, the world around you responds differently. People sense it—and they meet you in a better space too.”

Systemic workplace challenges

Beyond personal barriers, our workplaces themselves can create obstacles:

• Unclear communication: When we don’t understand why we’re doing what we’re doing
• Misaligned goals: When individual, team, and organizational objectives don’t match
• Political environments: Where different agendas compete
• Remote work challenges: Where physical distance amplifies misunderstandings

Your Emotional Intelligence Toolkit

Ready to build your EQ skills? Coach Ritu breaks it down into two main categories:

1. Start with yourself

“Keep your intentions very clear,” Ritu advises. ” What do I want out of this arrangement? What are my goals to put? Why am I going to the work? Is it for fulfillment? Is it for money? Is it my ambition? What is it? So that reflection… that journaling, that thought process really helps.”

Key practices include:

• Pre-conversation reflection (the 5-minute rule)
• Understanding your goals and motivations
• Aligning your actions with your intentions
• Maintaining self-awareness in challenging situations

2. Develop empathy for others

“Going with the mindset that the whole world and organization and leadership is here to ‘get you’ is the very wrong mindset,” Ritu cautions. Instead, she encourages giving the benefit of the doubt: “Not everybody has a personal vendetta against you.”

This means:

• Building compassion for colleagues at all levels
• Understanding different perspectives
• Recognizing that everyone has their own goals and pressures
• Challenging negative assumptions

Related Reading: Achieving Emotional Intelligence

Moving From Knowledge To Action

While understanding emotional intelligence is one thing, putting it into practice is another. Coach Ritu emphasizes the importance of this final piece.

“Now you build tools and techniques to work with all kinds of people, to have difficult conversations, to give honest feedback, to take honest feedback. Now you build that courage. Now you build that muscle.”

This might mean:

• Adapting your approach for different colleagues (those who need autonomy vs. those who need guidance)
• Setting healthy boundaries 
• Advocating for yourself effectively
• Navigating organizational politics with grace

A note on navigating the remote work dynamic

With more people working remotely than ever, emotional intelligence becomes increasingly critical. “It goes from my remote setting to build rapport with each other, to work effectively, and collaboratively effectively,” Ritu explains.

Her advice for remote teams? “Give extra benefit of doubt. Because you don’t know, you are assuming so many things… we are always building these stories in our minds. Everyone is doing their best with the resources and knowledge they have. Let’s move forward with that assumption.

Moving Forward

Emotional intelligence isn’t a destination—it’s an ongoing journey. As Ritu reminds us, “We are all learning. It’s always a work in progress.”

Whether through 1:1 coaching or group sessions, developing emotional intelligence is one of your organization’s best investments.

Ready to start building your emotional intelligence toolkit? 

Remember Ritu’s key messages: 

• Start with noticing yourself. Really noticing—your thoughts, your patterns, your triggers.
• Then, start seeing others too. Their fears, their hopes, their struggles.
• And when you start putting that awareness into action——something shifts.
• Relationships get stronger and hence work gets smoother. 

“Trust me—your career will thank you for it.”

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