Topic: What Role Can Empathy Circles Play in a Corporate Environment? 

10:10 am Speaker: Maria Ross   (10 min)

Summary

Maria Ross, an empathy advocate and author of "The Empathy Dilemma," discussed the role of empathy circles in corporate environments. She emphasized that empathy is about mutual understanding and support, not acquiescence, and highlighted five pillars for empathetic leadership: self-awareness, self-care, active listening, conflict resolution, and synthesizing multiple perspectives. Ross noted that empathy circles are effective for active listening and conflict resolution but may not be ideal for innovative decision-making or feedback loops. She stressed the importance of letting go of ego and being curious to foster empathy. Ross concluded by encouraging leaders to ask empathetic questions to guide conversations effectively.

Action Items

• [ ] Check out Maria's book "The Empathy Dilemma" and her podcast "The Empathy Edge".

• [ ] Consider using empathy circles in the workplace, but also explore other modalities for feedback, innovation, and decision-making.

• [ ] Invite Maria Ross back to the Empathy Summit to discuss empathy in the corporate environment further.

Outline

Introduction of Maria Ross and Her Work

• Speaker 1 introduces Maria Ross, highlighting her roles as a speaker, author, leadership trainer, podcaster, and empathy advocate.

• Maria Ross is introduced to discuss the role of empathy circles in the corporate environment.

• Maria begins by sharing her screen and asking for confirmation that the slides are visible.

• Maria thanks Edwin and the team for inviting her to the Empathy Summit and mentions her recent book, "The Empathy Dilemma."

Overview of "The Empathy Dilemma"

• Maria explains that her book provides a framework for leaders to balance performance, people, and personal boundaries.

• She emphasizes the importance of not thinking in binary terms (empathy or performance) but rather focusing on both.

• Maria aims to help leaders understand that empathy is about mutual understanding and support, not acquiescence.

• She highlights the need to curate data and research to show that empathy has a place in corporate life.

Defining Empathy and Its Practical Applications

• Maria clarifies that empathy is about connection, not conversion, and introduces the concept of empathy circles.

• She shares her experience of participating in an empathy circle, noting the difficulty of active listening and interrupting bad habits.

• Maria defines empathy as understanding and feeling another person's perspective and taking compassionate action.

• She explains that empathy can take various forms, such as active listening, giving someone time off, or modifying a decision based on new information.

Challenges of Empathy in the Workplace

• Maria discusses the challenges of empathy in the workplace, including generational clashes and diversity conflicts.

• She mentions the concept of "weaponized empathy," where empathy is used against someone.

• Maria emphasizes the importance of understanding that empathy is not about being nice or caving into unreasonable demands.

• She explains that the goal of empathy is to listen and understand someone's context, even if you don't agree with them.

Effectiveness of Empathy Circles

• Maria explains that empathy circles are effective for practicing active listening and conflict resolution.

• She suggests using empathy circles to facilitate communication between team members who don't get along.

• Maria highlights the importance of providing a safe, supportive environment for sharing stories and perspectives.

• She mentions that brainstorming meetings could benefit from the structure of an empathy circle.

Limitations of Empathy Circles

• Maria acknowledges that empathy circles have limitations, such as not allowing follow-up questions to gather more information.

• She explains that effective feedback loops and performance reviews require back-and-forth communication.

• Maria suggests that leaders need to be able to offer encouragement and ask clarifying questions.

• She emphasizes the importance of letting go of ego and being curious to learn and grow.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

• Maria summarizes that empathy circles are powerful but may not always be the most effective modality.

• She encourages leaders to ask empathetic questions to set the tenor of a conversation.

• Maria thanks the audience for their time and invites them to check out her book and podcast.

• Speaker 1 reiterates the importance of empathy and thanks Maria for her insightful presentation.

Transcript

https://otter.ai/u/NQIHwtvm56masPgsRcrS8Ln_BnA?view=transcript

Can everyone see my slides? Can I have a thumbs up? Okay, perfect. Thank you. Thank you so much for that great introduction. Thank you so much Edwin and team for inviting me to another great empathy Summit. I really appreciate it. 

Yes, I recently published my second book on empathy called the empathy dilemma, how successful leaders can balance performance people and personal boundaries. And in that one, I provide a framework that offers leaders five pillars that they can shore up for themselves in order to be both empathetic and high performing. 

And that's really the crux of my work is to help organizational leaders who might think they don't have time for this whole empathy thing, to understand that it's not a question of empathy or performance empathy or accountability, or even empathy and their own personal boundaries, right? It's we've got to get rid of the binary thinking and focus on both and leadership. And my work is about curating the data and the research for these leaders to say, these are examples of people that are doing this. 

These are examples of organizations that are doing that, to get the skeptics to understand that, yes, empathy does have a place, even in corporate life, even in business, even in a place that's so driven by performance and results. And I'm trying to help them understand that balancing accountability and organizational performance and creating a thriving empathetic culture at the same time is entirely possible. 

What I do is I help them understand that empathy is more about mutual understanding and support than it is about acquiescence. So what I like to say is empathy is about connection, not conversion. And usually when I say that is when I bring up Edwin and the empathy circles and introduce the practice to groups I'm talking to in keynotes, groups I'm talking to in leadership trainings. I even do sort of a speed example of an empathy circle with two people in the room of my workshop to get them to understand how hard it is, like Anita was saying, to flex that active listening muscle.

 I was exhausted after my first empathy circle, because it is really hard to focus on someone else, and as Lou said, interrupt those bad habits that we have. So I also like to define empathy for these leaders and help them understand that it's not about crying on the floor with their employees, that empathy can take a lot of different forms, and it also looks different depending on the person. Based on neurodiversity, we express empathy, and we practice empathy in different ways, but being willing and able to see, understand and where appropriate, feel another person's perspective and further use that information to take an action which is compassion, that action could be active listening, that action could be a hug, that action could be giving someone the day off, that action could be possibly modifying a decision because of something you didn't realize before, 

because now you're being empathetic and you're listening and you're hearing a different point of view. So helping them understand that, and also helping them understand what it's not, it's not about being nice. You can be really nice, but it doesn't mean you're seeing my point of view and that I feel seen, heard and listened to. It's not about caving into unreasonable demands, which is usually what makes leaders in all those studies think that it doesn't have a place in the workplace. They think it means that when someone tells me they don't like something, I have to change my mind.

I have to change the business decision. And this is, you know, again, this idea of it's not agreeing with someone, and this is, once again, where I bring up Edwin and the empathy circles and the work that has been done, especially at the most divisive political rallies. The goal is not necessarily to convert someone to your ideology. The goal is to listen and understand someone's context and where they're coming from, and I still may not agree with you, but now I have a better understanding of why you think or believe the way you do, and that's where we can embrace our common humanity. So why is empathy at work so hard? We've got generational clashes. We've got five. Generations working in the workforce at the same time, who don't understand each other, and it's not right or wrong ways of doing things. 

They're just different. We have diversity conflicts when we bring lots of people with different life experiences and points of view, and we put them in a room, if we don't have empathy fueling the interaction, it's just a bunch of people who don't understand each other, and then this idea of weaponized empathy that I talk about, which is only outliers which are really gaming the system to to use someone's empathy against them. It doesn't happen often, but I do like to alert executives to that. So Edwin asked me to actually be a little bit of a devil's advocate today and talk about how empathy circles can be used effectively in the workplace, and where they may not be effective, where they might not be the only modality we want to engage in. So where it's effective is obviously we can practice active listening to anita's point. My first two pillars are self awareness and self care. And when we can actually work on our own stuff and practice active listening, we can learn to reflect back, listen to understand, rather than listen to speak. And that is also great for conflict resolution, right? 

You're a leader. You've got two people on your team who don't get along, get them in a room and facilitate an empathy circle so that they can hear each other. It's really effective for ensuring that everyone feels seen and heard. So provide that space where people can share their stories, their perspectives or their feedback, in a safe, supportive environment without interruption or judgment. I think of a lot of brainstorming meetings, for example, that could really benefit from using a structure like an empathy circle so that everyone can be heard. Everyone can have equal air time. Everyone can have it. 

Have those moments to actively listen to all ideas, but also share their ideas in a free flowing form of information, part of one of the pillars of the pillars of being an effective and empathetic leader is being able to synthesize multiple points of view and then make a decision. An empathy circle is a great way to unearth those multiple points of view and again, gathering fair and free flowing input kind of related. But again, the leaderly aspect of this is that you get all that information and then you've gotta make you know you've gotta forge ahead. So what I try to tell people is that letting go of your ego and being curious enough to learn and grow is a sure sign that you're tapping into your empathy. 

And I really believe that empathy circles make us let go of our ego and train us and painfully flex that muscle to let go of our ego and to actively listen. But when do we need to think beyond empathy circles interaction prompts innovation and innovative decision making. So when we're not able to respond and add to what someone else is is saying or doing, we can't move the ball forward, because clarity doesn't come from having the right answer. 

It comes from asking the right questions. And there is a limitation with empathy circles in that you can't ask follow up questions to the person so that you can you can then get information and move forward. It's also that effective feedback loops do require back and forth, performance reviews, product design, customer advisory boards, we must be able to offer encouragement and ask clarifying questions. So in that in that area, in that area, it might not be the most effective way to to get the information, and also, we're often required. We often require response and support. 

We want validation. We want comfort. We want advice. Sometimes, one thing I tell leaders, and I'll end with this, is that when someone comes to your office and wants to talk about something, maybe they're venting, maybe they're angry, maybe they're upset, ask them in an empathetic way, do you want me to see this problem and just recognize you? Do you want me to solve it and offer you some advice, or do you just need me to support you and then allow the person to set the tenor of the conversation?

 And that's again, if you are trained in empathy circles, you are much better able to to do this, but you also are sometimes required to give a response and give advice. So in summary, they're powerful, but you know, in some places, you do need some other modalities. And I just want to thank you all for your time today. Hope you'll check out the book, and I hope you'll check out the podcast, the empathy edge, where we did feature Edwin a few years ago, and probably need to have him back again.