“When you start to develop your powers of empathy and imagination, the whole world opens up to you,” said by famous American actress and activist Susan Sarandon.
In any field of Human Resource and Human Resource Management, the first challenge comes with the hiring of an employee based on the requirements of the employee and the employer. Followed by the recruitment procedure, the biggest challenge that comes to the scene is keeping the talent active for a longer period, and that can only be achieved by introducing salary hikes, employee engagement activities and various other benefits being offered to the employees. Employment engagement activities not only keep the employees’ active and mentally charged for work process, but also keep up the vibe for the day-to-day stressful work.
Experts say that empathy is one such thing which plays a vital role in holding employees for a long time, yet it is one such skill which is often overlooked in the workplace. Empathy is defined as the awareness of one’s own and other people’s feelings, needs, and concerns. Research studies have revealed that the individual who is quite empathetic can prevent poor morale, misunderstanding, and conflicts, ultimately allowing a person to build a significant and long-lasting relationship with others. Hence, philosophers have stated that this is the quality which is helping a person to achieve both personal and professional success.
Empathy and Sympathy Are Entirely Different
“Empathy fuels connection; sympathy drives disconnection,” asserts Brene Brown.
People often get confused between empathy and sympathy and think that they mean similar things though they don’t. If one sees the dictionary, one can quickly find out that they say two entirely different things. The dictionary defines empathy to be the ability to understand the thoughts, emotions, and experiences of another individual and on the other hand, sympathy is stated as the feeling comprising of pity and sorrow which one feels for someone else’s misfortune. In short, empathy is defined as the ability to step into someone else’s shoes, being aware of that person’s feelings and considerate of that person’s needs.
“Leadership is about empathy,” asserts Oprah Winfrey.
Best Ways to Develop Empathy in the Workplace
Most of us often overlook or neglect the fact that others can also feel something about a certain thing as we remain mostly preoccupied with our thoughts. This is the reason which often gives rise to misunderstandings and conflicts, consequently resulting in a toxic and pressured environment. Experts are now referring, while in a conversation, people should look at the facial expressions, body language, gesture, the pace of speech which they feel are contradicting to their thought. Sometimes, words do not speak everything, yet the expressions speak a thousand words which the speaker might want to say in reality. It is important to gain patience, pay attention to everyone and everything that is happening around and respond to people in the workplace and elsewhere in a supportive way and not in a way which might give rise to a conflict.
The world has already got too many speakers as most of the people on earth love to speak and there are only a few people on the planet who love to listen. Experts suggest that the first way to win people’s heart is to be willing to listen to others and not just observing. Recent studies revealed that top three business skills, which leaders are looking for while hiring someone, are people’s skills, team-working skills and strong and effective communicative skills. Apparently, it seems that the basis of all these skills is listening. It does not matter who is speaking, but what counts more is that you are listening and that is what will help you and your business to succeed in the days of future.
“Empathy isn’t just listening; it’s asking the questions whose answers need to be listened to. Empathy requires inquiry as much as imagination. Empathy requires knowing you know nothing. Empathy means acknowledging a horizon of context that extends perpetually beyond what you can see,” said Lesli Jamison.
How can empathy help your business grow?
An independent survey has revealed that a major percentage of employees believe that profit is everything that the organization cares about and they are not even bothered about the employees. This apparently gives us the picture of a scenario where it shows how the employees all over the world see their workplace to be and how emotionless that seems. It seems to employees that the employers are focused on filling their pockets and nothing else and this is the idea which has to be changed anyhow, and as soon as possible, otherwise the organization will not be able to pace much towards success. This can lead to a very harmful perception getting built in the mind of the people, reduce the morale of the company and can ultimately lead to the lack of proper human resource in a company.
