Why empathy is important for your career

What you will read here:

• The importance of promoting collaboration and collective intelligence
• Empathy is the secret of high performance professionals and teams
• Tools to help build more empathic environments

You have probably heard of, or even been a part of, the new models of digital operations, based on breaking silos and building squads - the famous multidisciplinary, collaborative and autonomous teams focused on creating end-to-end solutions for consumer pain or business challenges. In fact, these teams are the secret to the agility and quality of digital products as they bring together professionals from different areas to solve problems whenever they happen. 

In the same squad, professionals in areas such as development, design, legal, marketing and data specialists, for example, are constantly discussing better and faster ways to create and improve products, services and experiences. Each one contributing with their specialist point of view, but also from the knowledge they acquire on a daily basis with colleagues of different competencies. This possibility of exchanging learning and expanding views from the perspective of the other is of enormous value for companies today. It is what we call collective intelligence.    

Collective intelligence instigates curiosity, brings concerns about new knowledge, broadens horizons, and that’s why it inspires innovation in companies. It is something precious in digital times, when the ability to create the new to meet the needs of the most diverse audiences with speed is gold. 

In practice, for a squad operation to be successful, it is necessary to establish shockproof communication, broadening our vision for the whole thing, for the real and generous exchange of knowledge.

How to do this? Empathy

The ability of each professional to put themselves in someone else's shoes and see the world through their eyes is a fundamental part of creating, in fact, a real collaboration. 

This is not a practice that can be imposed. Individually, each professional has an important role to play in developing this mentality and, consequently, building an environment that encourages empathy. Opening up to different points of view, combining your own skills with that of professionals from other areas in pursuit of a common goal allows for more transparent communication, conflict resolution and reaching consensus in decision-making more quickly.

The ability to assist in joint decision-making is also fundamental from the point of view of the needs of each aspect of the work. Development professionals can defend a solution that seems perfect from a technology perspective, but that comes up against legal issues or is not necessarily aligned with the company's business objectives, for example.

Empathy comes in here as a facilitator to disarm immutable angle views. By having a common focus, a clear objective, and an empathetic and effective communication, teams are able to deliver high value to customers. 

Tools to generate empathy 

There are some practices and tools we use here at CI&T that are very successful to unlock the skill of empathy between leaders and teams. It is worth mentioning that the leaders are role models to be followed, therefore, they must be the first to exercise this ability to put themselves in the other's place. 

Leaders can help individually in this task with actions that bring people together and promote awareness of the importance of practicing empathy and raising awareness to topics such as diversity and inclusion. It is also important to disarm practices that may inadvertently stimulate competition between colleagues, such as individualized rewarding models, bonuses or career plans that disregard working together. 

One of the practices applicable at all levels, from leaders to teams, is Kaizen and its six golden rules. Coming from the philosophy of Lean management, which is the foundation of our company, Kaizen (or process that aims to always achieve the best result) was developed to improve and optimize communication at any level of the company. 

The 6 golden rules of Kaizen are:

1. Respect people - As one of the most important pillars of Kaizen, respect must be the basis of any interaction. Here, it is proposed to eliminate judgments and blame, to adopt a kind posture and to be open to listening. 

2. Tell the truth - Be transparent, be sincere in communications and solve problems always with the support of facts and data, especially in a digital environment, it is critical. 

3. Think and act safely - Be prudent in your actions and surround yourself with facts to support your decisions. 

4. Ask “why?” - When on Lean, the worst situation is the current situation. The process is one of continuous improvement. Asking why and looking for the root causes of problems and conflicts helps to eliminate them altogether. 

5. Experiment - Always try something new. Once on Lean, you can only learn by doing. It only innovates with experimentation. In a culture based on team work and team autonomy, it is essential to develop this mindset of exchanging ideas and experimentation. 

6. Participate actively - Celebrating successes and sharing experiences and lessons learned from failures is imperative. Sharing merits and responsibilities, being open to receiving and giving feedback brings cohesion and trust.
Other key practices to encourage empathy and generate collaboration are based on constant communication. Also coming from Lean, the dailies and weeklies are rites and exchanges - respectively, daily and weekly - of information within the teams that help in the alignment, cohesion and unity of people. 

The maintenance of these rituals are of special importance for the now, as a way of holding onto proximity and bonds, since the physical distance imposed and the remote work model can distance people in their daily lives.

So, having empathy as an essential premise of your career will contribute to the construction of more collaborative environments and reinforce collective intelligence. If you are a leader or are preparing to take this role, help others to develop these skills, review practices and processes and expand actions that promote communication, acceptance of differences and that encourage the construction of positive relationships. 

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