Empathy is a vital component in effective leadership, particularly when it comes to giving feedback. In this video, we discuss the importance of empathetic communication and how delivering negative feedback can impact leaders differently depending on their empathy levels.

Transcript – Empathy and Feedback: How to Give Constructive Criticism

If you’re somebody who has to give feedback, and sometimes, even as individual contributors, we have to give feedback to our colleagues, it’s really important to start thinking about empathy. Because, interestingly, this study came out, and it was in Harvard Business Review last year, and they talk about how if you’re an empathetic individual, when you give negative feedback, it can be disturbing for you, and as a result of it, you become less effective. So what’s interesting is, if you’re very empathetic, if you have to deliver bad news, it can destabilize you, right, and make your performance go down temporarily afterwards. So you got to think about that. You got to think about, okay, well, I’ve got to deliver this bad news, can I take a minute afterwards to compose myself? Can I take a minute to get myself back into equilibrium? And likewise, some managers actually get a buzz of excitement from delivering bad news. So for those individuals who aren’t very empathetic, they’ve got to think about being gentler, being kinder, being more compassionate, because obviously, it can be damaging if you deliver feedback in a really harsh way. So let’s look at this in a little bit of more detail. So empathetic leaders, they become less effective after giving feedback. So these individuals need to take time to rest and replenish after they give negative feedback. If you’re a leader who’s not empathetic, you actually become invigorated, like, when you’ve given harsh feedback. But the downside is that you are typically not as good at giving negative feedback. So for you, you’ve got to be more compassionate. Focus on specifics. Focus on psychological safety.

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Hi, I’m Shola and I help you create a people-first culture. My work sits at the intersection of Inclusion, Communication & Emotional Intelligence.

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