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Leadership and Empathy

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Leadership Today

Part of the book series: Springer Texts in Business and Economics ((STBE))

Abstract

Theorists across a range of practical and academic disciplines say we are entering “The Age of Empathy.” Having been lately “rediscovered” as an innate capacity to experience the others’ emotions from their perspective and to respond accordingly, empathy is a complex process that combines affective, cognitive, and communicative components.

Empathic leadership is based on the thinking that we are connected with each other and that societies have survived due to our ability to feel for the other and respond. Research shows that empathic leaders create emotional bonds and are therefore competent in understanding and addressing their team’s and customer’s needs, appreciating and drawing on people’s talents, recognizing others’ perspectives in problem solving and including them in decision-making.

This allows for a culture of trust , openness, and cooperation to flourish amongst teams and organizations. Empathic leadership in organizations is not a dualistic leader–follower transaction based on a detached individual’s influence on others. Instead, it is a collaborative process based on deep participation and mutual receptivity. More importantly, empathic leadership opens the way for relational, shared, distributed, and co-creative leadership perspectives.

Empathy can be developed through both cognitive and affective experiences. Organizations are investing in the development of empathy for both their employees and clients and Business Schools are starting to include aspects of empathy development in the curriculum.

The shaping of empathic leadership calls for an adventure in interrelationship!

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Gronn (2002).

  2. 2.

    Avolio (2011).

  3. 3.

    Goleman et al. (2002).

  4. 4.

    Kohut (1984).

  5. 5.

    Rogers (1957b), Davis (1983, 1996).

  6. 6.

    Kabat-Zinn (1996).

  7. 7.

    De Waal (2010).

  8. 8.

    Anders (2013a, 2013b). Run a search for “empathy” among LinkedIn job adverts and list employers’ different ways of using empathy skills

  9. 9.

    Rogers (1957a), p. 4. “To be with another in this way means that for the time being you lay aside the views and values you hold for yourself in order to enter another’s world without prejudice. In some sense it means that you lay aside your self and this can only be done by a person who is secure enough in himself that he knows he will not get lost in what may turn out to be the strange or bizarre world of the other, and can comfortably return to his own world when he wishes. Perhaps this description makes clear that being empathic is a complex demanding, strong yet subtle and gentle way of being”

  10. 10.

    Bass (1985).

  11. 11.

    Goleman (1995).

  12. 12.

    Luthans and Avolio (2003), Kernis (2003).

  13. 13.

    Mahsud et al. (2010).

  14. 14.

    Kohut (1977).

  15. 15.

    Rogers (1959).

  16. 16.

    Gordon (2005).

  17. 17.

    Dovidio et al. (2010).

  18. 18.

    Kouzes and Posner (2011), Kouzes and Posner (2012).

  19. 19.

    Humphrey 2002, Kellett et al. 2002, Kellett et al. 2006, Wolff et al 2002

  20. 20.

    Ibid.

  21. 21.

    Choi (2006).

  22. 22.

    Wolff et al. (2002).

  23. 23.

    Department for Work and Pensions (2013), Family Friendly Working Hours Taskforce (2010)

  24. 24.

    Gensler (2005).

  25. 25.

    Department for Work and Pensions (2013).

  26. 26.

    Bell and Hall (1954), Mayer and Geher (1996), Gough (1987).

  27. 27.

    Goleman, Boyatzis, and McKee (2002).

  28. 28.

    Wade (2002), Madera et al. (2011)

  29. 29.

    Kohut (1984), p. 485.

  30. 30.

    Iacoboni (2008), p. 119.

  31. 31.

    Rifkin (2010).

  32. 32.

    De Waal (2010).

  33. 33.

    Sterzer et al (2007).

  34. 34.

    Rifkin (2010) pp.19–20.

  35. 35.

    De Waal (2010), p.13.

  36. 36.

    Gordon (2005).

  37. 37.

    Ibid p. 169 and p. 239.

  38. 38.

    Ibid 253–256.

  39. 39.

    Ibid p. 248.

  40. 40.

    Martin (1993), Hojat (2009).

  41. 41.

    Hojat (2009).

  42. 42.

    Shapiro and Rucker (2003).

  43. 43.

    Behrends et al. (2012).

  44. 44.

    Martin 1993, Krznaric (2014).

  45. 45.

    Shapiro et al. (1998).

  46. 46.

    Shapiro and Rucker (2004).

  47. 47.

    Covey (1989).

  48. 48.

    Rifkin 2010, p. 545 mentions Columbia University Business School introducing social intelligence pedagogy into its MBA curriculum and other universities have similar programs.

  49. 49.

    Holt and Marques (2012).

  50. 50.

    Through structured company initiatives , their own decision or their participation in TV series such as “boss swap” or “back to the floor.”

  51. 51.

    Craven (2014).

  52. 52.

    Shotter (2005)

  53. 53.

    Battarbee et al. (2014)

  54. 54.

    Ibid.

  55. 55.

    New and Kimbell (2013), pp. 144–145.

  56. 56.

    Batmanghelidjh (2012).

  57. 57.

    Batmanghelidjh (2010).

  58. 58.

    Alexander (2015).

  59. 59.

    Ibid.

  60. 60.

    Ibid.

  61. 61.

    Monks (2009).

  62. 62.

    Alexander (2015).

  63. 63.

    Saner (2013).

  64. 64.

    Orr (2009).

  65. 65.

    Woman’s Hour (2016).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Royal Holloway, University of London, London, UK

    Eleni Tzouramani

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  1. Eleni Tzouramani
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Correspondence to Eleni Tzouramani .

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  1. School of Business, Woodbury University, Burbank, California, USA

    Joan Marques

  2. School of Business, Woodbury University, Burbank, California, USA

    Satinder Dhiman

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Tzouramani, E. (2017). Leadership and Empathy. In: Marques, J., Dhiman, S. (eds) Leadership Today. Springer Texts in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31036-7_11

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