Management institutes are high-contact knowledge organizations, the faculty and academic administrative bodies of which positively must continually strike a balance between pedagogical rigor, student apprenticeship, interface with industry, accreditation pressures, and internal regulation. This, in Maharashtra, is further orchestrated by the high competition towards student enrolments, focus on placement results, quick curricular changes in line with industry demands and growth of compliance requirements in relation to quality assurance frameworks. In this framework, content delivery is not the only scope of teaching performance, as it extends to classroom climate, interaction with students, quality of feedback, mentoring, and management of emotionally-marked situations (e.g. evaluation controversy, student stress and cohort dynamics). Administrative performance is also not limited to day-to-day coordination, but to making decisions constrained, managing conflicts, quality of communication, and capability to maintain collaboration with faculty, staff, and external stakeholders.

The concept of EI is theoretically justifiable to be used in explaining the difference in performance with such emotionally taxing roles. In conceptual terms, EI encompasses abilities touching on perception of emotions, emotional application in making thinking, understanding, and regulating in individuals and others (Salovey and Mayer, 1990). The connection between EI and job performance and other work-related outcomes is not new in organizational research, and meta-analytic studies have further shown that EI provides meaningful explanatory variance in job performance compared to traditional predictors in most contexts (O'Boyle et al., 2011). Notably, other mechanisms are also related to EI and likely contribute to performance in the educational workplace, such as better work resources and work attitude (Miao et al., 2017), and enhanced leader impact on subordinate task performance and organizational citizenship behavior (Miao et al., 2018). In the case of teaching positions, EI is often placed at the center of successful class operation and long-term professional health, both in the form of decreased exposure to stress-related effects (Pandey & Sharma, 2024).

Although the EI research has been increasing internationally, there are very few empirical studies that have co-researched the performance of teaching and administration in management institutes, and particularly in a local ecosystem like Maharashtra. Most researchers concentrate on school settings or on representative samples of employees, whereas in management institutions, the role hybridity is much more conspicuous: faculty members tend to have a large amount of administrative work (committees, admissions, placements, accreditation documentation) in addition to teaching. It is thus the aim of the proposed study to investigate the impact of EI on teaching and administrative performance in administrative management institutes in Maharashtra, in addition to providing context-specific findings and more encompassing performance perspective that is in tandem with the actualities of work design in the area of higher education.

EI became a widely discussed area of scholarly discussion by introducing the concept of ability-based approaches that highlight emotion perception, understanding and control as functional skills (Salovey and Mayer, 1990). Later studies in the workplace have generalized EI to various functionizations, such as self-report and mixed models, and has consequences in terms of identified relationships with performance outcomes. In meta-analysis, EI, regardless of measurement methodology, has been positively associated with job performance and EI can be incrementally predictive on specific jobs due to the nature of the work and specification of a criterion (O'Boyle et al., 2011). In jobs such as work involving interpersonal intensity and emotional labors (such as teaching, student services, and academic administration) EI should demonstrate greater performance relevance since demands of emotional regulation and expression are incorporated in the day-to-day completion of task.

Other than direct relationship between performance and EI, EI is also linked with pathways that indirectly reinforce performance. However, a meta-analysis shows that EI has a positive correlation with job resources and that job resources can mediate EI-job satisfaction relationship, which represents a resource-based process through which emotionally intelligent persons can create more supportive social and task environment (Miao et al., 2017). These avenues are relevant in the academic work environment whereby coordination, peer support, and joint problem-solving are the most important in the smooth management and stable teaching standards.

The concept of EI has been linked to occupational performance across a wide range of occupational fields both by broad meta-analytic syntheses and studies focused on contextual moderators. O'Boyle et al. (2011) give meta-analytic evidence which is a comprehensive reflection on EI as positively related to job performance and validate the importance of EI as an ability that has a complementary role to cognitive and personality elements in most work situations. In addition to fixed individual differences, there is also research evidence that the implementation of behaviors that are emotionally intelligent, especially being sensitive to the feelings of others, is associated with job performance in social jobs (Pekaar et al., 2017). This difference plays an important role in the roles of management institute, whose performance may not only rely on the ability to regulate emotions internally and in the correct point of view concerning the interpretation of the emotional state of students and their peers, as well as stakeholders.

The administrative-performance argument has been reinforced with the help of leadership research. A meta-analysis conducted across cultures demonstrates that leader EI is a predictor of both subordinate task performance and company citizenship behavior that is independent of significant dispositional predictors, indicating that EI will have a role in successful influence procedures and cooperative climates (Miao et al., 2018). The experimental results in administrative settings have shown coordination outcomes such as an improvement in the timely performance of the academic processes, interdepartmental operations, and conflict reduction, thus making leader EI a logical source of administrative effectiveness.

The emotional demands of teaching and academic work are further complicated by the constant contact, the pressure to be evaluated and frequent role changes as one does the work of depending on teaching, mentoring and institutional duties. In academic institutions, EI has been studied as a characteristic that is linked to professional performance and service. India, for instance, evidence shows that EI levels vary based on higher education teachers and that exposure to professional development may be relevant to increased EI, which explains how an institutional investment is relevant in emotional ability development (Joshi & Bisht, 2019). Although this article does not explicitly model the performance as the measure, it would be important in the management institutes, as it indicates that EI is not just an individual trait, but could be influenced by organizational practices prevalent in the academic institutions.

The conceptual model of teaching outcomes is also supported by direct evidence which relates EI to teacher job performance in higher education. One of the studies within the higher education sector indicates that EI positively influences the job performance of teachers, with particular emotional skills being variations in the performance (Asrar-ul-Haq et al., 2017). Even though this evidence is based on a different national setting, the performance mechanisms underlying such (emotion regulation during instruction, constructive management of conflict, and productive interactions with others) are easily applicable to management education situations.

The literature of teacher well-being also sheds more light on why EI might be relevant in terms of long-term teaching performance (Pandey and Sharma, 2024). The findings are applicable since stress, workload, and the risk of burnout can often limit teaching and administrative performance in management institutes; EI can be used as a defensive factor stabilizing performance by increasing coping and emotional regulation under stress.

Administration performance of educational institutions is linked to planning, coordination, communication and resolving conflicts which leads to behavior strongly associated with emotional and social skills. Field experience in university administration shows that EI may have a significant positive or negative effect on the performance of administrators, although the results can have various orientation, depending on the measurement, context, and operationalization of performances (Sadeghi et al., 2018). The mixed specimen nature of this kind of evidence highlights the importance of criterion design used in an environment of management institutes--making a distinction between the task performance (timeliness, accuracy, completing the process) and contextual performance (cooperation, citizenship behaviors, de-escalating conflicts). Studies on leadership are also highly engaged with the significance of EI in administrators in dictating the organizational climate that facilitates the undot wage work of teachers and overall school performance, which is also similar to management institutes, where committee participation and shared implementation are of the essence (Hsieh et al., 2024).

Research Gap

In general, literature confirms that EI is a performance relevant ability and there is strong evidence of general performance at the job correlation, resource and attitude mediation (Miao et al., 2017), and performance results associated with leadership (Miao et al., 2018). Even EI-oriented research also reports that it is relevant to teaching performance and professional functioning (Asrar-ul-Haq et al., 2017; Joshi and Bisht, 2019) and to the aspects of teacher well-being that have the potential to support long-term performance (Pandey and Sharma, 2024). Nevertheless, the suggested research has three gaps that are still relevant: (i) no combined analysis of educational workforce and administration performance related to a common set of indicators, (ii) the lack of region-specific evidence that could be positive in management institutes in Maharashtra where the performance is closely connected to the results of employability, and (iii) inconsistency in the operationalization of administrative performance Acts in academic settings that can lead to inconsistent findings (Sadeghi et al., 2018). To fill these gaps, the study at hand makes EI an important explanatory variable of dual-role performance (teaching and administration) in management institutes in the state of Maharashtra, which can be applied to the development of the faculty, leadership, and the management of performance in the institutions.

Objectives:

The main goal of the research is to analyze the impact of EI upon teaching and administration at the faculty and academic level among management institutes at Maharashtra region with the particular emphasis on how EI has been found to play out in relation to the instructional performance, administrative performance, interpersonal relationship, and general functioning of an institution within a competitive setting of higher educational institutions.

The study design applicable in the study is the descriptive and analytical research design in order to explore the effects of EI to performance in individuals teaching and management administration in management institutes in Maharashtra. Primary data are obtained with the help of a structured questionnaire provided to a sample of 300 participants, including faculty members and academic administrators of the selected management institutes that are selected with random sampling based on the stratification with the needed representation of the public and the private institutions. The standardized EI scale is used to measure EI whereas validated self reported performance measures are used to measure teaching performance and administrative performance. The secondary dates are obtained in the form of published journal articles, reports and institutional documents used to enhance conceptual framing.

The analysis of data will be made on the grounds of the answers received on a questionnaire of faculty members and the administrators in the management institutes all over Maharashtra (n=300). EI was scaled in four dimensions which are self-awareness, self-regulation, social awareness and relationship management and performance was measured in two broad constructs namely teaching performance and administrative performance.

According to the percentage analysis, most of the respondents (54%), are of high EI with only 32% of the respondents having moderate EI level. The low EI is reported by just 14% of the faculty and administrators. This distribution shows that most of the management institutes in Maharashtra utilize academically and administratively capable professionals having well developed emotional abilities as a result of which may positively impact the performance outcomes at the institutional level.

The findings show that a majority of 60 percent of the respondents consider their teaching performance as being at high performance and a set of 28 percent describe their performance as average. The percentage of low performance in teaching is only 12%. It implies that the majority of the faculty working in management institutes believe in their effectiveness in instruction, classroom interaction, and mentorship skills.

Almost fifty per cent (48) of the respondents note high administrative performance and 36 percent note moderate performance. The percentage of those who report low performance in administration (16) is a relatively higher percentage compared to those who report of low performance in teaching which is due to the extra workload, time constraints and role conflict that is usually incumbent of administrative responsibilities within the management institute.

Table 1 Relationship between EI and Performance Variables

Results of the correlation show that EI has a positive correlation to teaching performance (r = 0.62) and administrative performance (r = 0.58). This confirms that the faculty and administrators who have stronger EI work better in handling the classroom dynamics and administration duties. The close relationship between teaching and administrative performance also brings out clearly the dual role of academic personnel in management institutions.

Hypothesis: Emotional intelligence has no significant influence on teaching and administrative performance in management institutes of Maharashtra.

The regression analysis shows that EI has a significant effect on teaching and administrative performance. EI illustrates 38 percent of the difference in teaching performance and 34 percent of the variance in administrative performance. The p-values of 0.03 and 0.03 show that the null hypothesis is rejected due to less than 0.05, but the effects of EI on the outcome of the performance are statistically significant.

In the joint numerical, percent, and regression analysis, it is well illustrated that EI is a significant parameter affecting the performance of teaching and managing management institutes in Maharashtra. Prevalence of high EI and high-performance categories supports the thesis statement that faculty and administrators with high EI better address the needs of their academic roles, the relationships with their colleagues, and the issues of their community. The outcomes of this research have a great sticking power in supporting the need to incorporate EI development initiatives into the faculty training programs, leadership development programs and performance management systems, in management education programs.

Discussion

The study findings are a clear-cut empirical support of the high role of EI in teaching as well as administrative performance in management institutes of Maharashtra. The descriptive and percentage analysis shows that a significant percentage of faculty staffs and academic administrators demonstrate high conditions of EI, which are manifested by equal high percentages of teaching effectiveness and administrative efficiency. The alignment would imply that EM people are in a position to handle emotionally the demands and needs of management education e.g., student engagement, classroom, teamwork, and institutional coordination.

These high positive relationships between EI and teaching performance support previous empirical research that emotionally intelligent teachers have better teaching practices, learning climate in classrooms, and students mentoring (Asrar-ul-Haq et al., 2017). EI skills like self-regulation and social awareness seem to enable positive interplay and long-term motivation in students in the backdrop of management institutes where experiential learning, case-based discussions, and ongoing assessment are mainly practiced. The regression findings also support this correlation by indicating that EI contributes a significant percentage of variation in instructional performance, which is notable as significant non-cognitive skill that supports knowledge in the subject.

On the same note, the correlation of EI and administrative performance in a positive manner can also be compared to the previous studies that focused on the importance of EI in leadership and administrative work in educational institutions (Sadeghi et al., 2018; Miao et al., 2018). Effective emotional management, conflict management, and collaborative decision-making are needed in administrative duties in management institutes in areas such as academic planning, accreditation processes, admissions coordination, and information dissemination to the stakeholders. The research result implies that emotionally smarter people can better negotiate such tricky administrative pressures hence improving organizational efficiency and organizational permanency.

Another interrelationship that can be discussed is the relationship that is observed between administrative performance and teaching. The high rate of relationship between the two performance dimensions shows the two-role expectations of the faculty members in the management institutes where both academic excellence and administrative contribution are highly regarded. It seems that EI acts as a kind of integrative capacity that helps faculty and administrators better balance the roles of a faculty member and an administrator, eliminating role and conflict, and promoting performance stability across areas. The observation can be echoed with meta-analytic data that contributes to the beneficial effects of EI on accumulating job resources and developing positive work attitudes that subsequently translate to beneficial overall performance outcomes (Miao et al., 2017).

Contextually, the ecosystem of management education in Maharashtra is defined by the high levels of competition and regulatory challenges as well as the increased expectations of the stakeholders. Under these conditions, the capacity to react to emotions in a constructive way will prove a competitive benefit. The results of the research thus add to the body of existing literature on the subject of interest by giving a region-specific evidence of how EI does not only outperform physical relevance but also throws significant contents in influencing performance outcomes in management institutes. All in all, the findings support the existence of institutional policies, which would acknowledge EI as one of the core competencies of faculty recruitment, leadership improvement, and performance appraisal systems, and since this would help in enhancing the quality of academic and the performance of the administrations.

The current research arrives at the conclusion that EI is a major and a beneficial influence in improving the teaching as well as management performance in managing institutes of management in the state of Maharashtra. The results provided through empirical research and supported by descriptive statistics, percentage analysis, correlation, and regression findings show beyond any doubt that faculty members and academic administrators who possess higher mastery of EI are more effective in the delivery of instructions and also in the administrative duties. EI plays a key role in the efficacy of classroom settings, interaction with students, communication with other colleagues, as well as effective management of the institutional system. The close correlation between teaching and administrative performance it once again shows that EI is working as an integrative capacity, which allows academic professionals to strike a balance between dual-role demands in a stressful situation at the higher level educational setup. In general, the paper supports the thesis that EI is an important non-cognitive skill that supplements technical skills and academic credentials in the management schools.

Recommendations

Regarding the findings, it is advisable that the management institutes in Maharashtra should incorporate EI development in faculties induction, training and leadership development. Both teaching and administrative efficacy can be reinforced with the help of structured workshops, mentoring programs, and the self-awareness, emotional regulation, empathy, and relationship management modules through experiential learning. The tests based on EI can also be introduced in the process of recruiting and promoting the new applicants to determine the candidates possessing great potential in relation to interpersonal and leadership competence. Moreover, supportive work environments, which encourage teamwork, open channels of communication, emotional health, etc., should be encouraged by institutional policies, thus resulting in high performance by the faculty and administrators. This research can be expanded in the future by using longitudinal research, multi-source performance measurement, and inter-regional comparison to gain more insight about EI as a strategic resource in the management of higher education.

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