Abstract:
Human resource (HR) professionals in the healthcare sector are responsible for organizing its workforce
to provide a quality health service. Nurses being the largest employee category in hospitals, understanding the
factors behind improving the nursing care quality (NCQ) is vital. Emotional intelligence (EI), a trainable personal
quality, plays a major role in shaping the service quality in most professions. With the view to assisting HR
professionals in healthcare towards improving the service quality of nurses, this research determines the
relationship between EI of nursing professionals and patient care quality. This research adopted a quantitative
method, and the study population is the nursing professionals in private and public hospitals in Sri Lanka. Data
collection for two main variables, EI and NCQ was based on a sample survey. Two Likert-Scale questionnaires
comprising a 33- item each of EI scale and Karen-personnel instrument were used. Descriptive statistics and
bivariate correlation analysis were executed using SPSS to examine the relationship. The results confirmed that
there is a significant positive relationship between EI of nurses and the NCQ, measured from the perspective of
nurses. Given that EI is a trainable personal quality, the HR professionals and trainers in the health sector can use
this finding to develop strategies to improve the NCQ, which will in turn help improving the overall service quality
in this industry.
