Research on the relationship between leadership and organizational success has shown that a leader's capacity for empathy and compassion has the strongest influence on organizational profitability and productivity.
How does empathy relate to your ability to lead? What can you do to improve your leadership skills? In this post, we will define empathy and empathetic leadership and provide advice on how to enhance this skill.
The term empathy was first introduced in 1909 by psychologist Edward B. Titchener as a translation of the German term einfühlung (meaning "feeling into").
Empathy is the ability to emotionally understand what other people are going through, to see things from their perspective, and to imagine yourself in the same situation. Essentially, it is putting oneself in another person's shoes and experiencing what they are experiencing.
So, for example, when you witness someone being sad over the passing of an elderly family member, you may be able to recall how you yourself felt in that same situation.
Let’s imagine a scenario in which Suzanne, a sales manager, wants to honor Joe, one of her salespeople, for being this month’s top seller. So she decides to take the whole sales team out for drinks in Joe’s honor. The sales team has a great time, but Joe sits at the bar the entire time drinking water and looking at his phone. Why? Because Joe doesn’t drink and is a committed family man. This was clearly the wrong way to honor him. Suzanne notices this and feels terrible about it.
A few months later, Joe has another banner sales month and Suzanne wants to celebrate his achievements. Only this time, she invites his wife and kids to the office for an ice cream party. Joe is thrilled.
What can we learn from this narrative? At first, it appears that Suzanne is not an empathetic leader. She didn’t take the time to learn about Joe before she made a decision that affected him. However, in reality, this was an understandable mistake. Leaders often don't know details about their team members' private lives because not everyone wants to share such things with their colleagues. The important thing is that Suzanne paid attention to the fact that Joe didn’t have a good time at the cocktail party, learned why, and then applied those insights to future situations. In that sense, Suzanne can be described as an empathetic leader.
Empathetic leadership is the capacity to lead with awareness of others' thoughts, feelings, circumstances, experiences, and needs. It's the ability to live and feel someone else's narrative as if it were our own. The story playing in our heads is often different from the story playing in others' heads.
Understanding someone else's point of view doesn't mean you agree with it. But it does indicate that you are willing to comprehend and appreciate it.
Leadership is about influencing followers to achieve a common goal. Empathy is at the heart of it. Here are five reasons why empathy is regarded as one of the most important qualities in a leader:
Empathy establishes connections. You form a strong relationship with others when you care about them. You'll be able to interact with them and have a deeper understanding of their hobbies and opinions. It builds trust in these relationships. Let's imagine your team's potential after all personal barriers have been removed.
Empathy brings insight. It's critical to remember that the tale we tell ourselves differs from the story that others tell themselves. You can only begin to grasp these distinctions by paying attention to others. Listening allows you to learn, and learning allows you to develop understanding. Each individual has a backstory, a reason for being the way they are. Empathy helps you to consider your options before passing judgment or making assumptions.
Empathy instills confidence in employees. An active listener is an empathetic leader. Employees will be more confident in their decisions if they see you as an empathetic leader, and they will not be afraid to voice opinions that differ from yours. That's not to mean they ignore the leader's job or make decisions outside of their authority.
Understanding is based on empathy. It's not always simple to comprehend why someone feels or thinks the way they do. People frequently react in unexpected ways, leaving you unsure of how to respond. However, if empathy is part of your leadership arsenal, you won't have to worry about how to reply since the aim is to listen rather than to respond, and to understand rather than to give critique. Empathy enables you to comprehend people without passing judgment or forming assumptions.
Empathy develops social skills. Empathy requires time and effort to exhibit; it takes time and effort to demonstrate awareness and understanding. When it comes to team building and earning trust, you must show that you care about people. You must demonstrate your attention by inquiring about their difficulties, family, and goals. When you do so, you develop empathy and improve your social skills.
Similar to the argument over whether leadership skills are innate or learnable. This question has been studied by researchers all around the world. One famous debate at the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy in 2016 pitted two groups from the Academic Fellows Program against each other to argue which side had the most evidence in their favor. The two groups concluded that the answer likely involved some element of both nature and nurture.
A 2018 study found that genetics does play a role in empathy, however, only to a small degree. Only 10% of the variance in emotional levels can be explained by biology alone. Consequently, the remaining 90% can be learned.
The same study found that empathy is frequently acquired at a young age when parents and other adults model it. Therefore, leaders who grew up around empathetic adults have a head start on leaders who did not have such a home environment. But it’s never too late to become a more empathetic leader.
Here are some ways you can improve your empathy as a leader.
Listen to your team members. You will progressively understand your employees' perspectives if you strive to listen carefully to their thoughts and comments. It is critical to improve your emotional connection to practice listening to your team and viewing things from their perspective.
Get to know your team members. The more personally acquainted with and understood you are by your staff, the more emotionally committed you will be to them. You'll get to know their family, and they'll become genuine individuals who live outside of the office for you. This will take your understanding of them to another level.
Consider other perspectives. When you're willing to look at things from multiple perspectives, you're practicing healthy emotional regulation. Carefully think through the many angles of an argument before giving an opinion. This helps you to have more data and come up with the best solution.
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Empathy is a critical component of leadership. It affects every aspect of a leader. While empathy is genetically determined, it is absolutely possible to practice improving it. CodeStringers hope this article has helped you take a more concrete look at empathy, which can improve your leadership and deliver positive outcomes to your organization.
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Sympathy is feeling for someone: noticing they are struggling and feeling concern. Empathy is understanding from their position: grasping what they are experiencing and why, whether or not you agree. A sympathetic manager offers comfort. An empathetic manager changes a decision because they understand how it lands. Leadership needs the second, because it leads to better choices about people rather than only kinder words.
Yes, and the two go together. Understanding how a layoff, a reassignment or a tough review will land does not change whether it is necessary; it changes how it is delivered, what support comes with it, and whether the person leaves the conversation feeling respected. Leaders who avoid hard decisions in the name of empathy are usually avoiding their own discomfort, which is a different thing.
They ask how people are before asking what is done, and listen to the answer. They notice when someone goes quiet in meetings and follow up privately. They adjust deadlines when they learn about a problem outside work rather than pretending not to know. They remember details from the last conversation. In a remote setting these habits are the only way a manager learns anything about the person behind the screen.
Through what teams say and do. Engagement and pulse surveys with questions about feeling heard and feeling safe to disagree. Retention and internal mobility on that leader's team compared with others. Upward feedback in reviews. And the share of problems that reach the leader early rather than after they have grown. A leader whose team raises bad news quickly is being listened to, whatever the survey says.
Time pressure, which turns every conversation into a status check. The belief that caring about people and getting results are in tension. Fear that asking about someone's situation will obligate the manager to fix it. And distance, because a manager who does not know the team cannot imagine their perspective. The fixes are practical: scheduled one-on-ones with no agenda but the person, and the habit of asking one more question before responding.
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