Team Building: Emotional Intelligence and Authentic Leadership
This literature review examines the key factors that contribute to successful team building across nine studies. It explores how emotional intelligence moderates intra-team conflict, how Kotter's 8-step change model supports coalition building, and how authentic leadership fosters ethical and cohesive teams. The review covers research settings ranging from South Korean corporate teams to the Korean Army, as well as a gamification-based escape room pilot study. Alongside its analysis of theoretical frameworks, methodologies, participant demographics, and study findings, the paper integrates a Biblical worldview to reinforce themes of mutual respect, servant leadership, and collaborative unity.
- Introduction: Overview of team building success factors
- The Need for Urgency: Gamification and Kotter's model drive team cohesion
- Team Building Is About Building Relationships: Emotional intelligence reduces conflict and builds trust
- The Importance of Leadership: Authentic leadership distinguishes genuine from performative leaders
- Conclusion: Synthesis of team building factors and ethical leadership
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper synthesizes nine distinct studies into a coherent narrative, moving logically from urgency and coalition building through emotional intelligence to leadership, so each section builds on the last.
- Biblical passages are woven naturally into the analysis rather than appended as decoration, reinforcing each argument with a consistent worldview lens without disrupting the academic flow.
- The review accurately describes each study's theoretical framework, methodology, and sample, giving readers a clear picture of the evidence base without losing the thread of the overarching argument.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates effective source triangulation: it pairs empirical studies (e.g., Lee & Wong's survey of 79 South Korean teams) with conceptual reviews (e.g., Flores et al.'s systematic literature review) and critical analyses (e.g., Crawford et al.'s reconceptualization of authentic leadership), then uses Werner (2017) as a recurring bridging source to connect individual studies to broader HRD theory. This technique strengthens the review's credibility by showing convergence across methodologically diverse sources.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with an introduction that previews its central themes, then moves through three body sections organized thematically rather than study-by-study: urgency and coalition building, relationship building through emotional intelligence, and leadership quality. Each body section groups two to three studies whose findings reinforce one another, and the conclusion synthesizes across all sections while returning to the Biblical worldview introduced throughout. This thematic organization makes the literature review feel argumentative rather than merely descriptive.
Introduction
This literature review focuses on the keys to successful team building. The literature most relevant to this issue provides insight into what factors lead teams to develop well, including how team members relate to one another, how to create a sense of urgency, what Kotter's 8-step model contributes to that process, how emotional intelligence plays a part, and what leaders can do to bring it all together. The review shows that respect for team members, emotional self-leadership, and authentic leadership are all essential factors in developing a successful team.
References
Crawford, J. A., Dawkins, S., Martin, A., & Lewis, G. (2020). Putting the leader back into authentic leadership: Reconceptualising and rethinking leaders. Australian Journal of Management, 45(1), 114–133.
Flores, H. R., Jiang, X., & Manz, C. C. (2018). Intra-team conflict: The moderating effect of emotional self-leadership. International Journal of Conflict Management, 29(3), 327–346.
Johnsen, C. G. (2018). Authenticating the leader: Why Bill George believes that a moral compass would have kept Jeffrey Skilling out of jail. Journal of Business Ethics, 147(1), 53–63.
Kang, S. P., Chen, Y., Svihla, V., Gallup, A., Ferris, K., & Datye, A. K. (2020). Guiding change in higher education: An emergent, iterative application of Kotter's change model. Studies in Higher Education, 1–20.
Khosravi, P., Rezvani, A., & Ashkanasy, N. M. (2020). Emotional intelligence: A preventive strategy to manage destructive influence of conflict in large scale projects. International Journal of Project Management, 38(1), 36–46.
Kim, D., & Vandenberghe, C. (2020). Ethical leadership and team ethical voice and citizenship behavior in the military: The roles of team moral efficacy and ethical climate. Group & Organization Management, 45(4), 514–555.
Lee, C., & Wong, C. S. (2019). The effect of team emotional intelligence on team process and effectiveness. Journal of Management & Organization, 25(6), 844–859.
NLT Bible. Retrieved from https://www.biblegateway.com/versions/New-Living-Translation-NLT-Bible/
Werner, J. (2017). Human resource development (7th ed.). Cengage.
Zhang, X. C., Lee, H., Rodriguez, C., Rudner, J., Chan, T. M., & Papanagnou, D. (2018). Trapped as a group, escape as a team: Applying gamification to incorporate team-building skills through an 'escape room' experience. Cureus, 10(3), 1–10.
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