title: Do we develop public health leaders?- association between public health competencies and emotional intelligence: a cross-sectional study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Professional development of public health leaders requires a form of instruction which is competency-based to help them develop the abilities to address complex and evolving demands of health care systems. Concurrently, emotional intelligence (EI) is a key to organisational success. Our aim was twofold: i) to assess the relationship between the level of self-assessed public health and EI competencies among Master of European Public Health (MEPH) students and graduates at Maastricht University, and; ii) to determine the relationship between different groups of public health competencies and specific EI skills.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional study was conducted including all recent MEPH graduates and students from 2009-2012, out of 67 eligible candidates N = 51 were contacted and N = 33 responded (11 males and 22 females; overall response: 64.7%).Two validated tools were employed: i) public health competencies self-assessment questionnaire, and; ii) Assessing Emotions Scale.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Females scored higher than males in all seven domains of the self-assessed key public health competencies (NS) and emotional intelligence competences (P = 0.022). Overall, the mean value of public health competencies was the lowest in students with "staff" preferences and the highest among students with mixed job preferences (P < 0.001). There was evidence of a correlation between the overall public health competencies and the overall emotional intelligence competencies (r = 0.61, P < 0.001).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The study shows a positive correlation between public health specific competencies and EI attributes. It can contribute to the improvement of the educational content of PH curricula by rising awareness through self-assessment and supporting the identification of further educational needs related to leadership.
authors.affiliation: Department of International Health, CAPHRI, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University, P,O, Box 616, Maastricht 6200, MD, Netherlands. kasia.czabanowska@maastrichtuniversity.nl.
authors.forename: Katarzyna
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Czabanowska
authors.forename: André
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Malho
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Schröder-Bäck
authors.forename: Daniela
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Popa
authors.forename: Genc
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Burazeri
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D056348:Emotional Intelligence; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007857:Leadership; D008297:Male; D009426:Netherlands / Q000453:epidemiology; D011361:Professional Competence; D011581:Psychological Tests; D011634:Public Health; D011635:Public Health Administration; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D000078329:Workforce; D055815:Young Adult
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