Pros and Cons of Emotional Intelligence Test in Hiring

A candidate can have the right qualifications, years of experience, and technical skills and still struggle once they join a team.

They may find it difficult to handle feedback, navigate disagreements, communicate with coworkers, or stay composed when work gets stressful.

This is why more hiring teams are paying attention to emotional intelligence (EI).

Emotional intelligence describes a person's ability to recognize and manage their own emotions while understanding and responding appropriately to the emotions of others. In recruitment, it can provide useful insight into how candidates may communicate, collaborate, handle conflict, and respond to challenging situations.

However, emotional intelligence is not a perfect hiring predictor. It can be difficult to measure consistently, and poorly designed assessments can introduce subjectivity or bias.

So, what are the pros and cons of using emotional intelligence in hiring?

TL;DR

• An emotional intelligence test scores skills like self-awareness, empathy, and self-control, the traits a resume rarely shows.
• The evidence is real but modest. Across a large 2022 meta-analysis, emotional intelligence tracked job performance at about 0.30, so it explains part of success, not all of it.
• Biggest strengths: a better read on people-facing and leadership roles, calmer teams, and lower turnover when the test is used with care.
• Biggest weaknesses: self-report versions can be gamed, results can be read subjectively, and a weak design can add bias instead of removing it.
• Best practice: use an emotional intelligence test as one input beside a skills test and a structured interview, never as the only gate.

What is emotional intelligence in hiring?

Emotional intelligence in hiring is the evaluation of candidates' ability to recognize emotions, regulate their responses, understand other people's perspectives, and manage interpersonal situations effectively.

Depending on the role, this can include soft skills and competencies such as:

• Self-awareness
• Emotional regulation
• Empathy
• Active listening
• Communication
• Conflict management
• Relationship management
• Adaptability

For example, consider a customer success role.

A candidate may understand the product extremely well, but that alone does not tell an employer how they will react when an unhappy customer becomes confrontational.

An EI-focused assessment could instead explore whether the candidate can understand the customer's concern, remain composed, acknowledge the issue, and move the conversation toward a solution.

That additional information can be valuable—but only when the competency being measured is genuinely relevant to the job.

Pros of emotional intelligence in hiring

Below are the benefits of using the emotional intelligence test in hiring.

1. It reveals interpersonal skills that a resume cannot

Resumes are useful for understanding a candidate's experience and qualifications, but they provide limited evidence about how that person behaves in workplace situations.

Two candidates might have nearly identical qualifications while approaching collaboration very differently.

One might actively listen, consider different viewpoints, and address disagreements constructively. Another might struggle when challenged or become defensive when receiving feedback.

Assessing relevant emotional competencies can give recruiters another source of evidence when making that distinction.

2. It can improve how employers evaluate teamwork

Most modern roles involve some degree of collaboration.

Employees may need to work with managers, peers, customers, vendors, or teams in different departments. Their ability to understand other perspectives and manage their own reactions can influence how effectively those relationships work.

For example, a candidate may demonstrate strong collaboration by:

• Asking questions before making assumptions
• Listening to opposing viewpoints
• Addressing disagreements directly
• Accepting constructive feedback
• Adjusting their communication style when necessary

These behaviors can be more informative than simply asking whether a candidate considers themselves a "team player."

3. It can be particularly valuable in people-facing roles

Some jobs involve emotional interactions as part of the work itself.

Recruiters, sales professionals, customer support representatives, account managers, healthcare workers, and people managers may regularly need to handle frustration, disagreement, uncertainty, or emotionally charged conversations.

In these roles, emotional regulation and empathy can directly affect the quality of an interaction.

That does not mean the candidate needs to be agreeable all the time. Instead, the assessment should determine whether they can respond appropriately when situations become difficult.

4. It can provide insight into how candidates handle conflict

Conflict is inevitable in workplaces.

The more useful hiring question is not whether someone has ever experienced conflict. It is how they respond when conflict occurs.

An employer could present a scenario such as:

A colleague strongly disagrees with your approach during a project meeting and challenges your decision in front of the team. How would you respond?

The candidate's answer can provide evidence about their ability to:

• Control their immediate reaction
• Understand the other person's perspective
• Separate the disagreement from the individual
• Communicate their reasoning
• Work toward a resolution

This is more informative than asking a candidate whether they are "good at handling conflict."

5. It can complement technical and cognitive assessments

Technical ability and emotional intelligence measure different aspects of candidate capability.

A developer may need technical proficiency to perform the job, but may also need to collaborate with product managers and communicate technical limitations clearly.

Similarly, a sales professional needs product knowledge and selling skills but may also need to understand customer concerns and regulate their response to rejection.

Using multiple relevant assessment methods can therefore give hiring teams a broader view of candidate capability.

The important word is relevant. Adding an EI assessment simply because it is available does not automatically make a hiring process better.

6. It can help evaluate self-management

Some workplace situations require employees to manage their reactions before deciding what to do next.

A candidate who receives unexpected criticism, encounters a difficult customer, or has to deal with changing priorities may need to remain productive without allowing an emotional response to dictate their behavior.

Assessing self-management can therefore be useful for roles where employees regularly operate under pressure.

Cons of emotional intelligence in hiring

The potential drawbacks largely come down to measurement, interpretation, and misuse.

1. Emotional intelligence is not always easy to measure

There is no single approach that every organization uses to measure emotional intelligence.

Some assessments ask candidates to evaluate themselves. Others use scenarios or performance-based exercises.

This matters because a candidate's perception of their own emotional abilities is not necessarily the same as their demonstrated ability.

Someone might believe they are excellent at handling conflict without actually demonstrating effective conflict-management behavior.

Hiring teams should therefore understand exactly what an assessment measures before using its results in selection decisions.

2. Candidates can give socially desirable answers

Self-report assessments have an obvious limitation: candidates know they are being evaluated.

If a questionnaire asks:

"I remain calm when dealing with difficult people."

a candidate may be more likely to choose the answer that makes them look desirable rather than the answer that most accurately reflects their behavior.

This can make self-reported emotional intelligence less useful when it is used without other sources of evidence.

3. Interviewers can confuse personality with emotional intelligence

This is one of the biggest risks.

An interviewer might perceive an outgoing candidate as confident, personable, and emotionally intelligent simply because they communicate comfortably during an interview.

Meanwhile, a quieter candidate may be perceived as less socially capable.

But being extroverted is not the same as being emotionally intelligent.

Someone can be quiet and highly empathetic. Someone can also be charismatic while being poor at listening or managing conflict.

That is why hiring teams should evaluate specific behaviors, rather than relying on whether someone feels personable during an interview.

4. It can introduce cultural and communication bias

People do not all express emotions, disagreement, confidence, or respect in the same way.

Communication norms can vary across cultures, personalities, and professional environments.

If an organization defines emotional intelligence according to one narrow communication style, it may unintentionally reward candidates who behave like the existing hiring team.

For example, maintaining strong eye contact or speaking very assertively should not automatically be treated as evidence of higher emotional intelligence.

The assessment should focus on whether the candidate can demonstrate the behavior required for the role.

5. High emotional intelligence does not make up for missing skills

EI should never become a replacement for job-specific competence.

A candidate could be excellent at reading interpersonal situations and still lack the technical skills required to perform the job.

Likewise, a technically outstanding candidate may have areas of interpersonal development that can be improved through coaching.

The right hiring decision depends on the combination of capabilities required by the specific role.

6. It may not add much value when used without a clear purpose

Every additional assessment adds time and effort for both candidates and hiring teams.

If an organization cannot explain why emotional intelligence is relevant to a particular position, there may be little reason to test it.

Before introducing an EI assessment, ask:

What decision will this assessment help us make?

If the answer is unclear, adding another test may simply make the hiring process longer without making it better.

Benefits & disadvantages of emotional intelligence at a glance

When should employers assess emotional intelligence?

Emotional intelligence is most useful when the role depends heavily on interpersonal interaction.

Consider assessing relevant EI competencies for roles involving:

• Customer relationships
• Sales
• People management
• Recruitment
• Customer support
• Account management
• Cross-functional collaboration
• Conflict resolution
• Leadership

However, the specific competency should come from the job requirements.

For example, a customer support role might require patience and emotional regulation, while a people manager may need stronger capabilities around feedback, conflict resolution, and perspective-taking.

This creates a better principle for hiring:

Assess the emotional competencies the job requires—not an abstract idea of an "ideal" personality.

Should emotional intelligence be part of your hiring process?

It can be, but it shouldn't automatically be.

Emotional intelligence can give hiring teams useful information about communication, collaboration, emotional regulation, empathy, and conflict management. Those capabilities can be important predictors of success in roles where interpersonal interaction is a significant part of the job.

At the same time, EI assessments have limitations. Self-reporting can be unreliable, interviews can introduce subjective judgments, and definitions of "good" emotional behavior can reflect cultural or personality biases.

The best approach is to start with the role.

Identify the behaviors that successful employees actually need. Then select a structured assessment method that can measure those behaviors consistently.

In other words, don't hire for emotional intelligence because it sounds good on paper. Hire for the specific behaviors that help someone succeed in the job.

For organizations building a skills-based hiring process, tools such as Testlify can be used alongside other job-relevant assessments to evaluate candidates on the competencies that matter for a particular role.

Related Read: Top 10 advantages of using the Emotional Intelligence test in the hiring process

Related Read: Pros and cons of using mechanical tests

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