Having empathy doesn’t mean you don’t have boundaries.   Yes, I know that’s a double negative, but stick with me here. I hear so many leaders bemoaning the fact that they’re ‘too nice’: they ‘re overaccommodating, avoiding difficult conversations, handing out praise to everyone for no reason, and in the process,

Most of the time, people don’t decide to quit all in one day.  Sure, there are times when it’s awful enough that this does happen (I’ve done it), but usually there are signs.  Organizations are losing their people weeks, sometimes months or years earlier, and just aren’t paying attention. It

“But I thought empathetic leadership means making everyone feel ok about the outcome and their performance”? Abso-freaking-lutely NOT. And when you take this kind of warm-fuzzy approach, it causes far more damage than the hard conversations we try to avoid because they aren’t ‘nice’. That’s not showing empathy for anyone.

Let’s just say it: Not every performance issue is a performance issue. Stop and think about that for a moment, because it applies both to you and to your stakeholders. Humans have drivers of their behaviors that are below the surface and, often, are much more powerful.  We’re always running

I can appreciate how, when things go awry, many leaders immediately start looking at behaviors. And I hear the same old problems time and time again. Resistance. Lack of buy in. Poor communication. Weak execution. And yes, these are all issues we deal with.  People will do people things, both

I want to talk about something that might be sensitive for some leaders, but I believe could be the missing component for so many people.  What if what you think you’re working towards isn’t really what you’re working towards? Hear me out.   I’ve been working with leaders and teams for

This one comes up a lot in podcasts too. “But if I have to stop and consider everyone, it slows me down”. But does it? And, more importantly, is not using empathy causing you to make the wrong decisions? Talk about a time waster! This goes along with the idea

I remember this commercial from the 90’s that said “Maybe she’s born with it…”.  I think it was for Maybelline makeup, but I remember thinking “none of these women are born with it – that’s why they’re selling it”. Even at 16 I was questioning what it meant to have

We’ve been over the myth that empathy is only about feeling, so I won’t beat that drum in this post.  If you’re here and reading this, you already have an inkling that empathy goes way deeper than that. Feelings are just the tip of the iceberg. Empathy is about taking

Empathy tends to get lumped in with a whole bunch of other seemingly similar emotives, like the empathy/sympathy/compassion conglomeration. One of those things is being nice, and how having empathy automatically makes you ‘nice’, but it just ain’t so.  In fact, I’d even suggest that empathy isn’t very nice sometimes.