I was facilitating a debriefing of emotional intelligence with a client. The large conference room was filled with lawyers who had completed an emotional intelligence assessment and I was sharing the results with them. Part way into the discussion, one of the attorneys said, “Apparently I’m an asshole.”
He was referring specifically to his abhorrently low empathy score. In the assessment that I use with clients, there are five key categories, with 15 subscales. The assessment produces a detailed review of each of these subscales, along with how someone’s score impacts performance, both on and off the job. Empathy is just one of the 15 attributes measured, but one of the most important ones in my humble opinion.
So why is empathy so important? According to the Emotional Quotient Inventory, “Empathy, the ability to recognize, understand and appreciate the way others feel, is a crucial emotional intelligence skill at the heart of all effective work relationships.” I would add that it’s at the heart of all relationships, work and personal. It is, in fact, the secret ingredient that can take your relationships to the next level.
If your empathy is well-developed, you are seen as someone who respect other’s ideas even when they differ from your own. You’re able to easily build trust because you are seen as someone who is genuinely interested in others. Your empathy will draw others to you because they will naturally like and respect you. You will be considered caring, fair and forthright.
Empathy, on the other hand, is not sympathy. You can disagree or not see eye-to-eye with someone and still have the insight and ability to understand where they are coming from.
Without a doubt, it doesn’t matter what your profession, empathy will help you be better at building relationships. If you work with others, or want to get along with others, it’s a critical skill. There’s no doubt, that an empathic manager will garner more loyalty and dedication from her team while a salesperson with healthy empathy will build stronger relationships with his clients.
So how do you become more empathic? And is too much of a good thing still good?
To be more empathic, there are a number of things you can do. Here are three things you can start with:
- Observe a pro. Find someone you believe is an effective communicator or team leader. Observe their communication style and take notes. Notice how their language and body language is open and accepting. Pay attention to how they are tuned-in to how others feel and will recognize it.
- Listen attentively. An empathic person is a good listener. They don’t simply do things their way. They are aware that their decisions impact others and will be open to hearing what others are thinking and feeling before acting.
- Tune in. To grow your empathy, you must train yourself
Whenever I review the results of emotional intelligence assessments with clients, I inevitably get some males in the group who roll their eyes and make a comment like, “I just want to get to the bottom-line. I’m not interested in being touchy-feely.” They’ll continue on with a remark about how they’ve always been that way and they seem to be doing ok.
As a facilitator and trainer, that’s my cue to step in and challenge them. Depending on the person and the situation, this may take several different paths. Often a question like “How does your wife feel about that?” is enough to get the dialogue going where I want it to go. Likewise, if they are in business development or management, I can quickly drill down to show them how they and their clients or staff would be positively impacted by a self-induced empathy shift.
Sometimes, there is still resistance. Let’s face it, we all like to stay in our comfort zones and so a statement may arise assailing too much empathy as a bad thing. So is having too much empathy a good thing or a bad thing? Like many things, balance is critical. While building empathy is great for building trust, it can be challenging if your empathy is not in sync with other emotional intelligence attributes.
For example, if you are known for being empathic, you may find that coworkers (or others) feel comfortable coming to you for advice. Consequently, you could run the risk of taking on their problems or being burdened by people “over” sharing.
Another issue could arise if you find that your sensitivity to others’ feelings keeps you from making tough and difficult decisions that may impact others. In both of these examples, your empathy is less the issue as the balance of your empathy with other skills. In this case, a strong balance with assertiveness (ability to be firm and direct when necessary and communicate feelings/beliefs in a non-offensive manner) and social responsibility (putting the needs of the team or group in front of your own personal interests) will keep your empathy in check and allow you to make the tough decisions and communicate them effectively to others.
In addition, I always coach salespeople that their empathy needs to be aligned with their self-regard or self-esteem. Think about it. If you have really high empathy and low self-regard, you will always put others first and will likely not be seen as strong and confident. Thus, your recommendations or solutions won’t be seen as credible, you will be a poor negotiator and you will not build the peer-to-peer relationships that are critical for long-term partnerships to flourish.
On the flip side, if your empathy is low and your self-regard is high, you’re likely to come across as pushy, cocky or a bit of a know-it-all. In this case, your bravado will be a turn-off and you will never gain the full trust and cooperation of the ones you seek. It was this realization that made the attorney share, “Apparently, I’m an asshole.”
Being empathic does not mean, however, that you have to be extra nice all the time. You’ll find optimal success if you can respect and understand where other people are coming from, but be forthright and transparent in how you deal with tough situations and how you communicate with others.
