Fitting Empathy Into Your Leadership Style

Are you already practicing empathy as a part of your leadership style? If so, does your team recognize it? If not, what difference can it make? To be a great leader, you have to be a great listener. If there’s an issue, you need to be able to figure out what the problem actually is in order to work through it, even if an employee doesn’t communicate it directly. You have to be able to empathize with them.

Are you seen as an empathetic leader?

Empathy requires three things: listening, openness, and understanding. These lead to others feeling comfortable coming to you when they seek advice or feedback. Approachability becomes a huge factor when you are seen as an empathetic leader. Those around you will trust that you will hear their voice, sense their feelings, and provide counsel to help in their specific situation. Approachability allows you to influence more and influence effectively because you are given the opportunity to discuss situations with people versus never knowing that there was something of concern in the first place. You can simply ask yourself, “does my team come to me routinely to share their ideas, concerns, and obstacles?” If you cannot answer that quickly and emphatically, then you likely still have some work to do. Hanging the ‘open door policy’ sign on outside your office is not enough to ensure you are approachable.You may also invest in a 360 type survey to ask your team, peers, and supervisors about your leadership style. Ensure the survey asks questions about how effective you are at listening, being approachable, building trust, and sharing information. These will all help guide you to areas you can improve the levels of empathy you demonstrate in your leadership. Do not overlook the simplest way to find out how your team sees you - ask them.

The difference between empathetic and non-empathic leaders

Gary Vaynerchuk makes an excellent point in his article Empathy: One of The Keys to My Business Success:

empathy is also what allows me to motivate each of my employees. I don’t manage any single one of them the same way. You need to be able to figure out what actually drives them.”

The ability to motivate your team is one key differentiator of an empathetic leader. Effective motivation is a personalized experience, not something that can be generalized all the time. Understanding your team, and listening to what matters to them will allow you to provide that unique motivating factor that inspires the best from the individuals on your team.Take a look at the sample scenarios below highlighting the differences that may exist between someone who leads with empathy versus someone who is disconnected from their team.

Empathetic Leaders	Non-Empathetic Leaders
What is troubling you today?	Why aren’t you getting more done?
Can you tell me more about what happened?	Sounds like a tough situation. You just need to work through it.
What can I do to help in this situation?	Here’s my advice: buckle down, work a little longer and I am sure you will get it figured out on time.
I know planning is important to you. Can you lead the team in a session that will identify the potential outcomes and the timeline needed to achieve that?	Everyone likes to get things done on time - right? Here are the 5 things that need to happen this week to ensure we deliver the results everyone is counting on.
I recall today is your son’s birthday. You should leave early today to spend time with him when he gets home from school.	I heard you wanted to leave early for something today. Just make sure you’re caught up before you leave.

Who would you rather work for? Which leader do you think will garner more energy, productivity, and loyalty from their team?In the article The Importance of Empathy in the Workplace, author Delores Pressley further illustrates the power of empathy in leadership.

Empathetic people listen attentively to what you’re telling them, putting their complete focus on the person in front of them and not getting easily distracted. They spend more time listening than talking because they want to understand the difficulties others face, all of which helps to give those around them the feeling of being heard and recognized.

Empathetic executives and managers realize that the bottom line of any business is only reached through and with people. Therefore, they have an attitude of openness towards and understanding of the feelings and emotions of their team members.

And that will make them a more effective leader in the long-term. That is the biggest difference between using empathy in your leadership style and not.

How do empathy and emotional intelligence work together

Emotional intelligence is a popular buzzword in today’s workplace. Everyone needs to have it and training departments are scrambling to teach it. So, how does empathy work to build emotional intelligence?To begin, we need to have a better understanding of emotions. Eric Barker in his article, New Neuroscience Reveals 3 Secrets That Will Make You Emotionally Intelligent, provides some very good insights into understanding our emotions in order to connect it to the idea of being emotionally intelligent. In short, emotions are a way of expressing what we feel inside. They are not hardwired or universal, they are learned and unique to individuals. It is the perfect illustration of why being able to connect with each person becomes so important as a leader. It prevents misinterpreting emotions.Emotional intelligence begins with understanding your own emotions and how you express your feelings. Not so that you can project that on to other people, but to have a baseline of what it might feel like for someone else in their own way. Knowing that you cannot actually know exactly how someone else feels is a good starting place for emotional intelligence. (Hint: a good reminder to stay away from the phrase, “I know how you feel” unless you have truly experienced the exact same situation.)Empathy is a component of the larger idea of emotional intelligence. It is a part of the whole that makes up how you express your emotions, interpret other’s feelings, and how you react in the different situations that emotions and feelings present themselves.From the Psychology Today article, 6 Things You Need to Know About Empathy:

The capacity for empathy varies from one person to the next.Not surprisingly, the extent of your own emotional intelligence—your ability to know what you’re feeling, to accurately label and name different emotions with precision, and to use your emotions to inform your thinking—will make it easier or harder for you to be empathic. The more connected you are to your own emotions, the greater your ability to feel for others. Again, once you realize that empathy has a cognitive component, this makes perfect sense. It should come as no surprise that research shows adolescents who consider friendships and social connections important and are “embedded” in their social networks are more likely to display empathy than those who don’t and consider themselves outsiders.

As you continue to strengthen your knowledge and understanding of empathy so to will you increase your emotional intelligence.Blending empathy into your leadership style will have a positive impact on your team. Start by assessing where you are today with something as simple as a survey. Strengthening your ‘empathy muscle’ will further develop your overall emotional intelligence and continue to define who you are as a leader and the success you find because of the relationships you build in time.How will your incorporate empathy into your leadership style? Click here or on the comments button above to share your thoughts. Photo Credit: AnsonLobo