Practicing 'Practical Empathy' as a Leader

A manager I know had an employee who was facing a challenging situation in their family. They needed time to help another family member, but they felt guilty about falling behind on their work. 

The manager encouraged the employee to take time off and not worry about their tasks, even suggesting gently that they might want to take a temporary leave. However, the employee chose to keep trying to do their job. They said they appreciated the change of pace it offered, even though they were distracted and not able to perform at their usual level. 

The two of them limped through this situation for several months. The employee felt guilty about their work effort, but they were doing their best under the circumstances. Meanwhile, the manager felt like they were not handling everything precisely the way they should. It was difficult and stressful, and the manager felt unprepared to offer the right kind of assistance or to guide the employee to resources that could help.

I’ve often thought about this situation and the challenges it presented. Specifically, I’ve wondered what more the manager could have done to help their employee. Did that boss show enough empathy, and in the right way? It was a question I couldn’t adequately answer.

But after reading the 2024 Global Culture Report from the O.C. Tanner Institute, I better understand what that manager did well—and what they could have done differently—to meet their employee’s needs while meeting their company’s needs, as well. 

If you haven’t yet read the Culture Report, I highly recommend you take the time to do so. It has excellent, actionable ideas to meaningfully improve your organization’s culture. One idea that stood out to me was the call for “practical empathy.”

“Beyond the traditional definition of empathy—the ability to understand and share the feelings of another—practical empathy is a practice of care,” the report says. “It includes all the same elements but focuses on understanding another’s needs and then moves to act on their behalf. Consequently, it also requires guidelines for leaders to provide employees with other resources if issues exceed the leader’s scope of influence.”

As always when trying to express empathy, the report suggests that a leader needs to first focus on the person involved, seek understanding, and listen carefully to concerns. But the real key to practical empathy comes in taking “supportive action.”

“This could be offering greater flexibility in a job, giving employees a stronger voice or more autonomy, connecting them with additional resources, or just some helpful problem-solving. Practical empathy does not always entail an immediate solution, but it must both acknowledge and address the problem,” the report says.

The institute’s research found that only 59 percent of employees think their leaders’ expressions of empathy are matched with meaningful action and support. Unfortunately, that doesn’t surprise me. 

Like the manager in the story above, many leaders feel unprepared to take action. Even well-meaning people who truly care about their employees and listen carefully to their concerns may get stumped when it comes to determining a plan of action that demonstrates empathy. 

But an organization with the right culture can overcome that problem. “Organizations that create policies and programs that enable the practice of empathy remove the burden from leaders who feel conflicted between the business requirements of the organization and the natural desire to help their people,” the report says. “They also remove ambiguity and any stigma associated with empathy in the workplace. Conversely, organizations that don’t make it easier to practice empathy will contribute to leadership stress and burnout.”

Burnout is a real problem, and I’ve felt it myself as a manager. It’s difficult enough to keep your team on track to meet their targets and contribute to the success of the business. When you throw in the need to handle the “squishy stuff,” it can quickly make a leader feel overwhelmed. 

The O.C. Tanner report says that is why boundaries are the key to sustaining practical empathy within an organization.

“Without boundaries in place, empathy can be emotionally draining for leaders and interfere with work because leaders (in most organizations) are not behavioral health professionals,” the report says. “To prevent overtaxing them, organizations must help leaders balance their own mental health and well-being with the needs of their employees. It’s entirely possible for leaders to be supportive and still maintain appropriate boundaries if the organization provides additional outside resources and support systems, such as mental health services, family and career counseling, and childcare.”

Not only does an organization need to provide those resources, but it also needs to make sure managers and employees know how to access them. And it needs to have a culture that encourages everyone to use those resources and trains managers on how to show practical empathy. If companies and organizations build that kind of empathetic culture, it will lead to better understanding among employees, stronger connections, and more feelings of fulfillment at work. 

It may seem like a lot of time and effort to invest in something that doesn’t appear to have a direct impact on the bottom line, but I would argue that creating a more people-centered and empathetic culture is the most important thing an organization can do if it wants to be successful. If you want to be able to recruit and retain the best employees, and then keep them engaged and happy while they’re part of your team, it’s the only way to go.

I’m going to strive to better exhibit practical empathy in my career. I will remember that this requires more than listening and understanding and that the key is to take meaningful action. I will work to build a people-centered culture in which practical empathy is a cornerstone to help people feel appreciated, valued, and engaged at work. It's a big task, but it’s the right thing to do. 

What have you done to show practical empathy in your organization? Does your business have a people-centered culture that promotes it? What would you like to see your company do differently in this respect? Please leave your thoughts in the comments, and let’s talk about it.