Managing Emotions in Business

Understanding emotions is a necessary super skill for businesses and their customer satisfaction. On Tuesday the 14th of January Emotion Evangelist Camilla Tuominen visits Arcada. She will share her insights on why emotions in working life are becoming even more important in the digital age.

Camilla Tuominen is a speaker, illustrator, author, CEO and co-founder of an emotion startup. Working with well-known companies like Kone and Nordea, her mission is to teach everyone in business and working life how to understand and lead emotions.

Tuominen, who has sometimes also been referred to as an emotion evangelist, visits Arcada’s networking event My Future Work on the 14th of January to talk about emotions and how to lead them.

- Young people are one of my favorite audiences, because you are the future. I want young people to be smart in many ways, including emotionally, when you enter working life, Tuominen says.

Tuominen, who holds a degree in economics and has studied psychology, worked as a management consultant in business when she chose to change careers and found an emotion startup. Why she did so is a long story – she even wrote a book on the topic.

- To summarize, I got completely frustrated by the way we were working in business. I knew it was not sustainable and not in line with my values. I could not imagine myself working like that for another 30 or 40 years, and I did not want my children or the next generation to have the same experience. That is why I wanted to do something about it.

And it all revolved around emotions. Tuominen noticed that one of the main problems was that people were neglecting emotions in working life, not paying enough attention to them.

-Neglecting your emotions causes problems not only for your health, but also for your productivity and creativity. 

Emotions affect your choices

If you do not listen to your emotions you will most probably end up making the wrong decisions, Tuominen says. This might affect both your personal life and your work.

- Emotions play a big part in every interaction you have with colleagues or customers. If you want to succeed in business, you need to pay attention to and learn how to understand not only your own emotions but also emotions of others.

As understanding emotions are linked to leadership and customer satisfaction, it is important for businesses to learn how to lead them. In the digital age this is becoming even more vital.

- Emotions are becoming even more important in the future because of the development of artificial intelligence and technology. Computers lack non-linear skills like emotions, so these are going to be the areas where we humans are needed.

There are many ways people can start leading their own emotions both personally and in a management role for a better work environment.

- It is significant that we start giving emotions appreciation and acknowledge that they matter. Emotions are still often being neglected.

In her keynote speech at Arcada, Tuominen wants to make the students aware of the problems they might encounter when entering working life.

 - I want you to be wiser than I was at that age so you don’t have to face the problems that previous generations have had. I hope to give you inspiration and courage to look closely on your emotions and to get more curious about them.

You are welcome to attend the keynote speech at 12.00-13.00 on the 14th of January at Arcada's My Future Work event (in the Big Auditorium) for more of Tuominen’s insights and advice on understanding and leading emotions.

Read more about My Future Work here.