How leaders turn negative emotions into positive outcomes

Scholars and the general public alike generally assume that negative emotions produce negative outcomes. That can certainly occur, such as when anger, anxiety or fear result in impetuous and harmful reactions that make a problem worse or otherwise backfire.

But such a symmetrical assumption, which dominates theory on this topic, is far too one-dimensional. Research co-authored by Cambridge Judge Business School faculty member Jochen Menges examines scores of academic studies related to the COVID-19 pandemic, a global episode associated with negative emotions linked to restrictions and health concerns, and the findings challenge the negative-equals-negative supposition.

More specifically, the review of this scholarship finds that negative emotions from such a disruptive event can often have a functional or positive outcome, and the research identifies steps that managers and firms can take to help forge a positive outcome from these negative emotions.

Rethinking negative feelings

“Negative emotions aren’t simply harmful,” says Jochen. “The pandemic created a surge of them, giving us a suitable opportunity to study their effects. What we found was a wide spectrum of outcomes – and evidence that leaders can take practical steps to help flip the script so negative emotions can produce positive results.”

The research is co-authored by R. David Lebel and Jordan Sanders of the University of Pittsburgh School of Business and by Professor of Leadership Jochen Menges of the University of Zurich and Cambridge Judge Business School. The research published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, which is an academic journal of the American Psychological Association.

The research by Jochen and his colleagues draws on applied and social psychology to identify 2 pathways through which negative emotions can provide positive outcomes at the workplace on an individual level: a pathway that captures direct effects driven by certain negative emotions such as frustration, discomfort and fear, and a pathway that highlights the effects of both self-regulatory factors and external input from firms, teams or leaders. The second pathway is informed by personality systems interaction (PSI) theory, which outlines how people regulate emotion, behaviour and motivation across different situations.

Heightened negative emotions in uncertain times

Negative emotions are part of human nature, but recent events such as the pandemic and geopolitical upheaval have resulted in heightened negative emotions, with rising reports of worry, anger and sadness over the past decade (according to a 2023 Gallup poll cited in Jochen’s research).

Some previous studies have identified positive workplace aspects of negative emotions, such as signaling the need for changed behaviour, but Jochen’s research says that research has been limited in explaining when negative emotions may produce positive effects and have often focused on a single negative emotion rather than a comprehensive framework that looks at how various negative emotions can produce positive workplace effects.

Research highlights the diverse effects of negative emotions at work

“Although many studies demonstrated the negative effects of negative emotions, we were struck by the variance in observed outcomes with several studies demonstrating positive effects,” Jochen and his co-authors say of their findings. “Indeed, only half of the coded relationships between negative emotions and outcomes in our sample indicated a harmful effect of a negative emotion … 35% of coded relationships indicated no effect of a negative emotion, and even 11% indicated a positive effect of a negative emotion (either a beneficial outcome or a reduction in a harmful outcome).

“In summary, we found evidence of the negative effects of feeling the negative emotions of anxiety, anger, frustration and loneliness during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this does not tell the whole story as we uncovered substantial variance in the effects of negative emotions at work during the pandemic.”

Why short-term negative emotions can produce positive workplace results

The researchers also explored the duration of negative emotions experienced during the pandemic, and found that this played a key role in whether a positive outcome emerged – with a shorter duration of a negative emotion increasing the likelihood of a positive effect of a negative emotion.

“Emotions measured in terms of ‘daily’ or ‘right now’ had the highest ratio of positive effects (23.64%), followed by emotions measured ‘weekly’ (12.98%), ‘monthly’ (8.11%), as a trait (5.71%), or ‘in general’ (1.72%). Thus, more immediate or momentary negative emotions were more likely to be associated with positive outcomes than emotions experienced more frequently or over longer periods.”

Such a finding was in line with 2 key emotional theories that explain the functional effects of negative emotions – one focusing on action readiness which explains how the self-protection reaction to fear can be helpful if activated in a way to minimise harm, and the other focusing on a signaling function that, for example, motivates a worker to raise their game when they feel guilty for disappointing colleagues by missing a deadline.

Workplace resources can help employees cope better with negative emotions

The research also highlighted the importance of moderating factors in whether negative emotions can be harnessed to produce positive outcomes, and identifies 2 key categories of workplaces resources that may enable individuals to cope well with negative emotions:

1. self-regulatory skills that help regulate internal emotion
2. external support that buffers stress

Several papers that form part of the review by Jochen and his co-authors focus on the skills of self-relaxation that allow people to reduce the negative effect of responding to challenging situations, such as taking deep breaths rather than reacting impulsively. For example, a 2021 paper found that employees who were able to reflect on the pandemic’s health risk helped turn “feelings of death anxiety into higher levels of citizen behaviour” regarding health measures, while a 2023 paper found that employees who were self-compassionate and forgiving rather than self-judging “experienced reduced depression from work loneliness during the pandemic”.

Another group of papers examined in the review looked at self-motivation, or the ability to generate positive energy to act despite negative emotion. A 2021 paper suggested that having higher self-motivational ability helped people during the pandemic to “resist distractions, stay focused, and maintain their performance while working remotely”.

The review also drew on a 2022 paper co-authored by Jochen, which found that knowledge workers who had a less-fixed mindset about remote work tended to feel more positive about working from home during the pandemic. “Knowledge workers with a growth mindset who believed that remote work is a skill that can be developed fared better and had higher productivity relative to those with a fixed mindset,” says the review.

What helps employees channel negative emotions productively

So how can managers, teams and organisations help employees to regulate negative emotions in a way that helps produce positive outcomes?

The review found that the expression of positive emotions by leaders impacted worker perceptions and behaviours, with a 2022 study finding employees feeling greater gratitude when leaders demonstrated compassion, care and affection during the pandemic. A 2023 study found that leaders who expressed hope during the pandemic were perceived as providing more support to their employees.

The research also found that leaders who adopted a problem-focused coping strategy during the pandemic helped buffer the negative effects of hopelessness or a team’s doubt on whether work could be accomplished. “In contrast, when leaders attempted to minimise or diminish employee feelings (an emotion-focused strategy), the negative effects of perceived team hopelessness strengthened, reducing the team’s collective efficacy.”

Positive support by leaders can also help improve macro-level results

The research, while mostly focused on the effect on individuals, also cited studies that focused on macro-level results: one study showed how positive support by leaders can help boost a firm’s share price, while another study found that expressions of empathy and confidence by female governors in the US may help explain lower COVID-linked death rates in those states.

“Collectively, these studies suggest that employees appreciated their supervisor’s expressions of positive emotions during the pandemic, resulting in increased job engagement and commitment. Moreover, the expression of positive emotions (empathy, care, and confidence) by leaders seemingly had much larger, broader, positive effects on organisational performance.”

Human resource practices were identified in the research as another area in which support for employees can moderate negative emotions. In a 2024 study, the perception that an organisation took steps to help the local community “weakened the negative effects of frustration at work during COVID-19”, while a 2022 study found that organisations that provided pro-social messages focusing on the positive impact of work reduced negative feelings of anxiety during the pandemic.

Developing leaders to handle negative emotions effectively

The practical implication of these findings is that leaders who recognise and acknowledge employees’ emotions early can take steps to help turn negative emotions into positive outcomes, but this may require training inside firms.

“We recognise that many leaders may not naturally excel at perceiving emotions and therefore encourage organisations to support leaders in developing these foundational emotional skills,” say the authors.