Leadership and Empathy

Session 3

Service Culture
Objectives

• Identify various leadership styles

and theories based on the origins
and culture of the organization
• Discuss how service leadership
emanates from an organizational
culture, and how it contributes to
the development of the self
towards social competency, and
eventually into leadership itself
• Appreciate the value of applying
empathy in various situations,
such as during conflicts, political
and social situations, and areas
needing cooperation and
collaboration, to enhance
leadership
Introduction

This is an introductory module on the emerging

leadership styles, their origins and theories of
development. This is knowledge leading to self-
development and mastery of personal and social
competencies needed for the development and
transformation of one’s self into leadership roles and
competence.
 Rationale
A discussion towards understanding of the various
leadership styles is essential to an assimilation of the
necessary soft skills needed to enhance one’s personal
and social competencies. This is followed by discussions
on culture as the greatest determinant of leadership
style. Corporate or organizational culture is also
introduced as embodying the elements needed to
foster leadership within an organization
 Servant Leadership
“The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural
feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first.” - Robert K.
Greenleaf, founder (1970). 

Servant leadership is a philosophy and set of practices that

enriches the lives of individuals, builds better organizations
and ultimately creates a more just and caring world.
 Service Leadership

Maslow was saying in effect that one of the ultimate

goals of man is helping others realize their true value
or worth, and enabling people attain their level of
actualization as well. A philosophy such as Servant
Leadership satisfies this ultimate goal of development
in man through the rendering of oneself especially
when conducted in the spirit of service to others, or
transcendence, for the greater humankind’s good and
development.
Ten Characteristics of Servant Leadership

•Listening
•Empathy
•Healing
•Awareness
•Persuasion
•Conceptualization
•Foresight
•Stewardship
•Commitment to the growth of people
•Building community
Video

What is Empathy?

 The feeling that you understand and share another

person's experiences and emotions : the ability to
share someone else's feelings

Show Empathy video

Barack Obama Promotes Empathy with Oprah Winfrey- My mother taught me empathy.wmv

Source: Merriam and Webster

Empathy as a Skill

Empathy is the capacity to recognize and to an

extent, share feelings that are being experienced
by another person.

- It is the ability to place one’s self in the shoes of

another, see through someone else’s eyes; it is a
means of identifying with another person or group
with whom we interact.

- It is thus a social skill albeit a critical one.

Defusing Conflict

Empathy has great use in the area of conflict

management.

An empathetic person engaged in conflict

management may actually sense how other
people feel.
Defusing Conflict

He / she would be able to call on supporting or

operative skills in order to understand the true
nature of the conflict, how it affects any of the
parties involved, and attempt to defuse the
conflict:

• Trust * Attentiveness
• Appropriate Responses * Shared
Experiences
• Respect * Support
Empathy as a Social Competency

Social competencies are skills that determine how

we handle relationships.

According to Daniel Goleman, we make use of

empathy as a social competency to understand
others.

As a value, we use it to help us in developing other

people, work on a service orientation, leverage
diversity and to develop political awareness.
Empathic Leadership

Maximizing the use of empathy is especially useful

to leadership.
 
Since staff development is a core task, leaders can
draw from empathy to provide the kind of
guidance his or her direct reports can
appreciate.
Social Radar

Empathy helps us determine how to adapt to given

situations especially when we consider the general
aspects of:

• Understanding others – Empathy is crucial to

excellence

• Developing others – Empathy is best acknowledged

when people are promoted to certain designations
to develop their potentials
Social Radar

• Service orientation – Empathy provides a

framework for how support can be appropriately
provided to customers

• Leveraging diversity – Empathy plays a

significant role in enabling synergy within a
group

• Political awareness – Empathy contributes to

‘savvy’ which allows people to respond
effectively despite currents in the organization
Service Orientation

Refers to giving much importance to efforts that would

improve overall customer experience such as:

• Listening to customers
• Understanding customers
• Anticipating their needs
• Giving high priority to issue resolution
• Gaining customer satisfaction
Social Radar (continued)

Things that help us develop empathy:

• Trust
• Attentiveness
• Appropriate responses
• Shared experiences
• Respect
• Support
Notes