How well do you understand the people with whom you work? In every setting, you can be more effective if you have a clear perception of those around you. Empathy is key for understanding others and is the most fundamental of the social intelligence competencies.
Empathy is the ability to sense others’ feelings and perspectives, take an active interest in their concerns, and pick up cues to what is being felt and thought.
By “understand another person,” I don’t mean merely making believe that you’re interested in their lives, but actually caring about understanding them. Can you discern another person’s motivation? Such understanding is one of the building blocks for any healthy interpersonal interaction, both personal and professional. In fact, when it’s missing, it’s a building block for negative relationships.
Think about a time when you felt that someone was really tuning in to you. What did their behavior look like? Much of empathy comes down to listening. If you want to practice it, practice listening to other people. Very often it means asking them what they’re thinking about or how they’re feeling. You might start in a group meeting where you focus on one or two people during a half-hour meeting and ask yourself, “I wonder what she’s thinking right now? I wonder what he’s thinking right now.” As a way to check whether or not you’re even close to accurate, approach them after the meeting and say, “What were you thinking about during that meeting? What did you think of what happened?” It ends up being a very useful way to see if you can tune in to different people. Ask them an open question and listen closely to the answer. The more you practice that, the easier it’s going to get and the less artificial it will feel.
As a former engineer, a lot of us who were trained technically had trouble even making eye contact. That’s a precursor to listening, and to developing empathy. It’s hard to ask a person a question and to listen to them if you’re not looking in their eyes. There are a number of things that you might have to practice to get to a higher state of empathy, but you don’t have to get to the Spock mind meld, the technique of merging minds that we learned about in Star Trek. Empathy starts with a desire to understand others better.
Here’s an excerpt from a conversation I had with Daniel Goleman for Crucial Competence, in which I elaborate on the foundations of emotional intelligence. You can access the full video series here.
George Kohlrieser has forty years of experience as a hostage negotiator and a psychologist. He’s the Professor of Leadership and Organizational Behavior at one of the world’s leading business schools, the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Switzerland. At IMD he created and directs the school’s flagship High Performance Leadership (HPL) program.
Kohlrieser works internationally with companies and organizations, focusing on the role neuroscience plays in high performance leadership and teamwork, conflict and change management, dialogue, negotiations, stress management, fulfilling potential, and playing to win. He also serves on the advisory board of the Neuroleadership Institute. In the past, he was the president of the International Transactional Analysis Association and the Founder and Director of the Shiloah Center for Human Growth in Ohio and Shiloah International in Switzerland.
Kohlrieser has earned many awards throughout his colorful career. In 2011 he won the global European Case Clearing House (ECCH) Hot Topic Case Award for Renewable and Sustainable Energy, Technology, and Development. A year prior, he earned the BrandLaureate International Brand Personality Award from the Asia Pacific Brands Foundation (APBF) for his contributions to the high-performance communication. His book, Hostage at the Table, is an international bestseller and received the Best Business Book Award in 2007 from the Dirigeants Commerciaux de France (DCF) and the Best Management Book in 2008 from the German business bookseller managementbuch.de. He’s also a popular motivational speaker, and has appeared on BBC, CNN, ABC, and CBS. He’s been interviewed for publications like the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and the Economist. His radio show, Matters of the Mind, is highly acclaimed and ran for over ten years.
Professor Kohlrieser completed his doctorate at Ohio State University and wrote his dissertation on the cardiovascular recovery of law enforcement leaders following high-stress situations. His research significantly contributed to understanding the importance of self-mastery and social dialogue in law enforcement personnel sustaining high-performance through self-regulation and emotional intelligence. When he became a licensed psychologist, he worked with the police department of Dayton, Ohio to reduce homicides in domestic violence. He was held hostage himself four times, and started to teach hostage negotiations at the Dayton Police Academy. He was also working at a psychiatric hospital at the time, teaching mental health professionals how to work with chronic schizophrenics.
Kohlrieser is a conversationalist in The Executive Edge: An Insider’s Guide to Outstanding Leadership, a book containing Daniel Goleman‘s in-depth conversations with respected leaders in executive management, organizational research, workplace psychology, negotiation, and senior hiring. The Executive Edge examines the best practices of top-performing executives. It offers practical guidance for developing the distinguishing competencies that make a leader outstanding.
Kohlrieser is also one of the featured speakers in Daniel Goleman’s Leadership: A Master Class. His segment, High Performance Leadership, reveals the latest research and practice behind high performance leadership, bonding, and managing conflict.
Exciting, compelling, and grounded in new research on meditation, this is a rare audiobook with powerful insights that can change us at the deepest level.
