Empathic Leadership - Self-Reflection

Aktualisiert: März 1

Empathic Leadership starts with your honest but benevolent self-reflection, self-regulation and the will to develop. How can you train that awareness?

Be aware of your feelings and triggers and learn to recognise them, when they pop up. Here is one of the many tools to train that. Start a journal; write down the difficult situations life throws at you and you (again!) did not behave the way you wanted.

Write down the situation: Who did say/do what?
Write down your reaction: How did that make you feel and why?
Write down your future behaviour: How do you react the next time in that situation? What do you say/do?

Here's an example from my leadership journal (no real names used ;):

Situation team call: Hillary started a task before documents were finally approved by Simon, assuming they were ready. Hillary speaks very fast and loud and starts shouting at me, that I was cc'd and should have stopped her. I interrupt and say "now calm down, I can't understand you when you shout" and refer to the project rules (we only react on "to-emails" and do not act based on assumptions). I start asking: "Now help me to understand the situation, so I can help you: What is already done?", "What could be a possible solution?"... Hillary finds a solution herself.
My reaction: made me feel hurt and angry because experienced shouting as total disrespect and unreasonable personal attack, took a deep breath and straightened my body before interrupting, explained why and that the task is important to the whole team, focused on the solution.
Next time: Stop emotional overreaction in the very beginning by interrupting earlier by saying "Hillary, calm down and explain the situation to me, otherwise I can't help you".

Which values are particularly evident in your leadership behaviour? You can find out whether these fit the culture of your company in the MOVE Compass© for personality development, for example.