Intensifying focus on service quality in higher education institutions: the effect of emotional and spiritual intelligence

Educational systems in higher education systems have rapidly experienced changes and reforms, impacting the academicians' quality of life But, intelligence can boost the quality of life and subsequently the work performance among the academicians. Specifically, this study investigated how Emotional Intelligence (EQ) and Spiritual Intelligence (SQ) influenced the lecturers’ Service Quality which eventually led to effective classroom teaching. The investigation is in line with the excellency outlined in the 2015-2025 Malaysian Education Blueprint, which likely affect how each academician has to cope with existing responsibilities and also achievements in their career. The Structural Equation Model with Partial Least Square was done on several groups of lecturers from private-owned institutions in Selangor who were selected via a stratified sampling method. The result of the Fornell-Larcker analysis of 127 respondents was used to access the discriminant validity of the structural model. The results confirmed that both types of intelligence have a positive and significant influence on the lecturers’ teaching progression at the university. The results confirmed that both types of intelligence have a positive and significant influence on the lecturer progression at the university. The study, therefore, concludes that if the average level of EQ and SQ was good, then the level of Service Quality would also excel accordingly. The study highlights the need for academics to have both EQ and SQ as it will encourage and motivate them into giving their best service to the university as well as their highest commitment towards giving students the best quality learning experience. Emotionally and spiritually intelligent lecturers understand their basic roles and responsibilities and are able to use this intelligence effectively at the workplace which will finally help them become an essential part of the university. The knowledge obtained from this study may provide university policymakers additional insights into emphasizing the development of this intelligence for both the academics and students as they pursue a higher service quality output. The focus could be on professional initiatives like increasing knowledge level, skills, abilities, values, and social assets. This study could have been better with bigger sample size. However, due to the university’s policy on privacy, this investigation had limited access to what could have been a much bigger academic opinion