Empathy in Action: How Great Leaders Show They Care

By Sarah Lynch, Staff reporter @sarahdlynch

There was a time when empathy was almost a bad word in the corporate world.  

Empathy--or "the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another," as Merriam-Webster defines it--had a "controversial" reputation in workplaces 20 years ago, says Jamil Zaki, a professor of psychology at Stanford University.  

"The broad consensus was it's way too mushy and soft and friendly for a hard-charging competitive world," Zaki says. "It was more like a weakness than a strength."  

But over the past two decades, empathy's reputation has shifted--the result of a "groundswell of evidence" that demonstrated the benefits of empathy in the workplace. By 2019, 91 percent of CEOs in a survey said they believed "empathy is directly linked to a company's financial performance," per the benefits administration company Businessolver.  

Then came the pandemic and a "massive social uprising" that made the word "empathy" a common refrain, says Alicia Kae Miller, the founder of the Austin-based professional services company Empathy Uprise: "People were taking empathy a lot more seriously."  

But now, Kae Miller fears there's a "backpedaling" on empathy amid political tensions, anti-DEI backlash, global conflicts, and other pressures.

Though 82 percent of CEOs still believe financial performance is tied to empathy, that's down from the 91 percent marked in 2019--and 63 percent of CEOs now say it's "hard to consistently demonstrate empathy in their day-to-day," per a recent Businessolver survey.  

And yet, it's because of the threats to empathy that it is even more important today, argues Tony Kong, an associate professor of organizational leadership and information analytics at the University of Colorado Boulder's Leeds School of Business: "It's really important to find common ground among people in the workplace, outside the workplace. And the first step is ... empathy." 

Here's what experts and business leaders say you can do to start modeling empathetic leadership--and putting empathy at the center of your company's culture:  

Demonstrate vulnerability 

Like so many aspects of company culture, what happens at the top can trickle down. With empathy, that's no different, Kae Miller says: "If we're not projecting empathy, it will not be reflected back at us."  

To clearly demonstrate their capacity for empathy, leaders might start by being vulnerable--breaking down the façade of the untouchable CEO.

In early 2023, Kelly R. Culhane, co-founder and chief growth officer at Culhane, a Dallas-based law firm, noticed that one of the firm's executive assistants was falling behind on her workload. 

Instead of bluntly telling the assistant that the higher-ups were frustrated, Culhane took the assistant out to dinner and shared some of her own struggles (two of her children had recently graduated, and her work-life balance had gotten out of whack).  

That "opened up the door," Culhane says. The assistant shared concerns about her own child and family issues that were distracting her at work. Right there at the table, they worked out a plan to redistribute some tasks and adjust deadlines. Culhane also pointed the employee toward resources for stress management.  

"I really feel like whether it's a dinner or a coffee or just a phone call, if you start by sharing what's going on in your world and be a little vulnerable, that goes a long way in people sharing what's going on with their work issues," Culhane says. 

This tactic could even work beyond one-on-one conversations: In 2021, Jason McCann, CEO and co-founder of the Coppell, Texas-based office furniture company Vari, was dealing with family issues and decided to seek help from the company's 1-800 employee assistance mental health hotline.  

McCann was blown away by the experience and, soon after, shared it during an all-hands meeting with his 250 employees. Afterwards, individual employees reached out to McCann to inquire about the offering. 

Getting vulnerable might feel uncomfortable at first, McCann says, but doing so helped him "stay grounded"--and also helped his team members.  

Don't assume--ask questions  

The further up the corporate ladder you look, it seems the less people know about what empathy really means, Zaki says.  

One of the most common misconceptions is that empathy needs to involve "grand gestures, big moves, big announcements, new policies," he says. But empathy isn't about bringing in a "Ping-Pong table or nap pod": It's about building it into your everyday habits, Zaki says.

The second misconception, he adds, is that empathy means having all the answers--that leaders need to "understand their people almost clairvoyantly in order to be empathic."  

That's not the case, he argues. Rather, empathetic CEOs "take frequent measure of what their people are going through and what they need, not telling people what they need." 

This can be hard to navigate at first, Kong says: "If you ask a lot of questions, will this be perceived as intrusive? What if your people don't want to share a lot of their personal life? Or they don't want to talk about their problems?" 

A key ingredient in successfully managing these conversations is responsiveness, Kong says--really listening to employees, and then following through on what you learned from the conversation.  

Balance "grit and grace"  

Back in 2018, a long-time employee at Finn Partners, a New York City-based marketing agency, was diagnosed with breast cancer. She beat it, and was in remission for about five years, but the cancer resurfaced in 2023, says CEO and founding managing partner Peter Finn.  

"It was affecting her ability to work for clients, but she still had an ability to contribute to the company," he says.  

So, Finn devised a solution: moving her to a non-client facing role in the marketing team, where her writing skills would come in handy. She's now been in the role--a part-time position, to allow her more time with her family--for about a month. She's happy with the change, and so is her team, Finn attests. 

It's an example of the company's mission to lead with "heart and conscience," Finn says, but he acknowledges that it's a balancing act: tending to the needs of employees while also making sure the business is successful.  

"I understand what the financial realities of our business are, and I just have to make that judgment call as to what can we afford to do, and what do we need to do," he says.  

Sometimes, business and employee needs can come into conflict, Zaki says. But he believes the answer isn't turning off emotions or simply being polite--it's about finding a more nuanced approach while still being direct. Or, as McCann puts it, finding the balance between "grit and grace." 

That might not happen in the first meeting, Culhane says. You might need to get a sense of the situation first. But eventually, you need to come to a solution, she says--and "don't dance around it."  

Reward empathy in others 

If you really want to show your team that you value empathy, rewarding empathy in the workplace can be particularly powerful, Zaki says.  

That might look like highlighting "helpers" at town halls--not just those with standout individual performances, he says. Or it might look like changing incentive structures and rewarding employees for collaboration in performance evaluations or through bonuses, not just output, he adds. 

"Oftentimes, CEOs will tell me, 'Hey, Jamil, I've been talking so much about empathy, but people don't seem to be getting the message,'" he says. "If you're only rewarding people for their individual contributions, then you can talk about empathy until you're blue in the face, but they won't feel that it's important."  

Illustration by Ekdojo.