Understanding when your direct report is having a rough day. Being able to calm yourself down after a stressful meeting. Knowing when it’s appropriate to approach your boss with a difficult client issue.
These are all important life—and work—skills that fall under the ever-popular category of “emotional intelligence.” And while we can all claim we have a solid EQ, the reality is that we don’t spend enough time developing it.
Which is why it’s super helpful to get some insight into how good you are at it right now—and what you need to work on, stat.
To get you started toward a better attitude, a greater sense of confidence, and a stronger ability to communicate with and read others, here are five of some of the best EQ quizzes out there (plus, they’re super cheap—if not free—to try today!):
1. Quiz Yourself: Do You Lead With Emotional Intelligence? by Harvard Business Review
What’s great about HBR’s leadership quiz is that it won’t just give you a score and assume you can figure out how to improve. It’ll give you exercises and resources to help you hone in on your strengths and work on your weaknesses based on your results.
Cost: Free
2. Test Your Emotional Intelligence by Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley
A lot of having good emotional intelligence has to do with nonverbal cues—meaning you need to know how to read people’s facial expressions and body language.
Which is why this quiz is so great: It’ll ask you about the various emotions of people’s pictures, testing how well you can recognize embarrassment, sadness, excitement, and more.
Cost: Free
3. Global Emotional Intelligence Test by GlobaLeadership Foundation
Similar to HBR’s test, this one encourages you to think thoughtfully about who you are as a leader and discover how you score in terms of personal and social EQ. Their results will then show you how you rank on self-awareness, self-management, social-awareness, and relationship management so you know what areas to focus on.
Cost: Free
4. Emotional Intelligence Test by Psychology Today
This extensive (read: 45-minute) quiz will give you a snapshot of your emotional intelligence after ranking yourself and others on a variety of topics, situations, and personal statements. If you want the real deal, you can even purchase the full report for less than $10.
Cost: Free with trial/$9.95 for full report
5. Emotional Intelligence Appraisal®—Me Edition by TalentSmart
As a reputable provider of EQ development, and the creator of the book Emotional Intelligence 2.0, TalentSmart’s a great resource if you want to invest more time (and money) into improving your emotional intelligence. After only 10 minutes, you’ll be able to highlight your strengths and weaknesses and start setting goals for yourself.
Cost: $39.95
And if you want to know how to use your results to become a master of EQ, check out some of our best articles on emotional intelligence.