Member of the board of directors of Adpugh
Let’s start by debunking a myth: “Being empathic is putting yourself in the other’s shoes”. Although the expression is graphic and clear in its intention, it hides an impossible, since not even having lived the same experience we can be in the place of the other, simply because we are Other. “We do not see things as they are, but we see them as we are” (Jiddu Krishnamurti). What happens to the other is from the other and our empathy connects from what we are ourselves, that is, from our own interpretation.
Going a little further, we can refer to an even more neuralgic point: vulnerability. Emerging issue in the field of Human Management despite being present in each of the people who inhabit this planet at different times, with different intensities and resolutions but being the basis for achieving empathy. It is from here that, to achieve empathy with the other , we need to open ourselves to include our feelings, connect with our emotions and recognize ourselves in our vulnerabilities, that although they do not resemble the situations that the other experiences, they are linked to our possibility of feeling, accompanying and sustaining that moment from our place , including our experiences and experiences regarding pain.
But how is this support framed from a leadership role in our organizations? First of all, we talk about people and as obvious as it is, as leaders, working on our own biases, our hurts, our desires and our ways of achieving our dreams, become key. By linking ourselves with another from a specific role that includes decision-making, our self-knowledge becomes a fundamental work tool, in constant transformation and development.
We may associate being empathetic with difficult moments, of sadness, but it also applies to happy, joyful and celebratory moments. To advance in tune, let us remember some difficult, sad case that we have had to accompany in our organization, such as the loss of a loved one; and a joyful, celebratory one, such as the birth of a child. In both cases it is generally easy to empathize in principle, but the challenge is in sustaining this disposition when the situation drags on and consistently gets in the way of the organization’s tasks and results. It is here where the understanding of the other’s situation, their times and personal processes can become more complex, and that initial empathy can turn into demand, generating frustrating bonds where expectations and demands are those who govern the relationship. A linking modality that restricts any type of advance or possibility of accommodation based on a co-creation of the reality that they want, and at this moment, can inhabit.
So how do we get out of this knot? First, it requires moving from the ‘should be’ to reaching the ‘wanting to do’, from a place that enables the other to respond to their experience in a conscious way, accompanying the moment to reach agreements that allow moving towards where they want to go. I invite us to reflect on ourselves, where we are, where we want to be, what we need for it and what we are doing to achieve it, building roles that enable and re-signify the limit word so that everyone can make decisions and actions that accompany the construction process. joint. In this sense, Limit moves away from the notion of prohibition and approaches that of framing, framing the scope of possibility of action of each one, added to their desire to build healthy bonds and humanized leadership roles, expanding the concept that “The leader must be able to handle it”, as an inherent aspect of career development, and lead it to imply work and personal transformation to open up the possibility of building, step by step, the place they really want to inhabit, the objectives they hope to achieve and the experience they want to treasure as part of their daily lives.
Including moments of vulnerability as part of vital processes in organizations is opening up to a reality of impact on the lives of each of our collaborators, from a horizontality that transcends and links personal and organizational purposes.
