{"id":1091,"date":"2019-08-07T10:00:46","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T10:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/?p=1091"},"modified":"2025-07-01T17:20:22","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:20:22","slug":"empathy-is-about-standing-in-someone-elses-shoes-feeling-with-his-or-her-heart-seeing-with-his-or-her-eyes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/empathy-is-about-standing-in-someone-elses-shoes-feeling-with-his-or-her-heart-seeing-with-his-or-her-eyes\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cEmpathy is about standing in someone else’s shoes, feeling with his or her heart, seeing with his or her eyes.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

According to Wikipedia, \u201cemotional\nintelligence (EI),  is the capability of individuals to recognize\ntheir own emotions<\/em><\/a> and those of others, discern between\ndifferent feelings and label them appropriately, use emotional information to\nguide thinking and behavior, and manage and\/or adjust emotions to adapt to\nenvironments or achieve one’s goal(s).\u201d \nScience journalist David Colemen, who popularized the term \u201cemotional\nintelligence,\u201d indicates that EI accounts for \u201c67% of the abilities deemed\nnecessary for superior performance in leaders, and mattered twice as much as\ntechnical expertise or IQ.\u201d \nSo EI is twice as important to leadership as IQ?  Wow!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A\nsubset of EI is empathy which, again according to Wikipedia, \u201crelates to an individual connecting their personal experiences with\nthose of others.\u201d  Simply\nstated, empathy is the ability to sense, and relate to, what others are\nfeeling. But why is this important?  Why\ndoes EI in general and empathy in particular matter in business today?  Why does entrepreneur Daniel Lubetsky say,\n\u201cEmpathy is one of our greatest tools of business that is most underused.\u201d  For more on this, particularly if you suspect\nyou may be empathy deficient, please continue reading below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEmpathy is about standing in someone else’s\nshoes, feeling with his or her heart, seeing with his or her eyes.\u201d    <\/strong>~ Dan Pink<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Business\ntoday is all about performance.  Either\nperform or you\u2019re out.  It doesn\u2019t matter\nthat you\u2019ve been a top performer for the last 10 years.  All that matters is how well you\u2019re\nperforming today . . . that is, if you\u2019re working for a company that is devoid\nof empathy.  If, on the other hand,\nyou\u2019re working for a company that values and practices empathy, you\u2019ll probably\nget a visit from your boss (or maybe even your boss\u2019s boss) to find out what\u2019s\ngoing on with you.  He or she may say\nsomething like, \u201cYou\u2019ve been a superstar around here since your first day on\nthe job, but suddenly you seem distracted and disinterested.  You don\u2019t seem to care about your work\nanymore, and that\u2019s so out of character for you.  Are you OK? \nWe\u2019re worried about you.  Is there\nsomething going on we should know about?\u201d \nMaybe the employee is trying to deal with marital issues or problems\nstemming from drugs or alcohol.  Maybe\nthe employee is worried about a sick child or about an unexpected financial\nsetback or whatever. But if there is a problem that\u2019s getting in the way of the\nemployee\u2019s performance, you\u2019re not going to find out about it unless you ask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAre\nyou nuts?\u201d you\u2019re saying to yourself.  \u201cI\u2019m\na busy CEO . . . too busy to spend my time going around and holding the hands\nof everybody who feels a little out of sorts.\u201d \nOK, we get that.  But if you\u2019ve\ngot someone who has a stellar track record, doesn\u2019t it make more sense to try\nto salvage that person than to replace him or her.  Finding a replacement is time-consuming and\nexpensive.  It causes a drop in\nproductivity while the replacement learns the job and gets up to speed.  And there\u2019s no guarantee that you\u2019ll end up\nwith someone who will perform at the level of the person they\u2019re\nreplacing.  No, it makes a lot more sense\nto see if the company can do something to return the current employee to the\nglory days when he or she was a top performer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nU.S. Marines are famously, and fiercely, loyal to one another.  In fact, it\u2019s part of their creed that they\nnever leave a comrade on the field of battle. \nEvery Marine has the comfort of knowing that his fellow Marines will\nalways guard her back.  Very few\norganizations can match that level of tribal unity, so maybe those of us in\nbusiness should learn a lesson from the Marines. After all, isn\u2019t writing off\nan otherwise good employee who is suddenly experiencing performance issues akin\nto leaving a comrade on the battlefield?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Obviously,\nevery business needs to hold its employees accountable to certain performance\nor productivity standards.  If we don\u2019t,\nwe\u2019re not going to be in business very long. \nBut still, maybe we\u2019re too quick to send someone packing only because\ntheir numbers have been off recently. \nInstead, guided by EI and empathy, shouldn\u2019t we give an employee the benefit\nof the doubt and look a little deeper to see if there may be something going on\nthat would explain the employee\u2019s performance problems.  When we do that, a number of good things\nhappen:<\/p>\n\n\n\n