Empathy, Cooperation, and Responsibility Emerge

Leading up to this point, I’ve referenced how consistency in the things we can directly influence through our daily actions can build self-control, courage, and definiteness of decision. Even the minor adversities I was faced with through my late teens and early twenties served as a foundation for the oh-so-important self-control necessary to develop the leadership attributes we’ve been looking at; sympathy (for our purposes here, empathy) and understanding, willingness to assume full responsibility, and cooperation from those around us. Family trials expose our limits and blind spots in ways work rarely does, but owning them through consistent, empathetic action nurtures these leadership attributes.

The inspiration for putting What’s KILLING Your Profitability? (It ALL Boils Down to Leadership!) to paper was based on more than a decade of being expected to show a direct (positive) impact on productivity and profitability through any safety or HR initiative I worked to implement in a manufacturing facility. That overarching expectation, coupled with any of the adversities I had to work through along the way, was indeed demanding. But without experiencing the personal trials leading up to and during that time, I don’t believe I could have handled them; each previous minor adversity had definitely helped establish the foundation I was working from.

I remember hearing John Maxwell share a story years ago about talking with one of his mentors, asking their opinion on someone’s character. The mentor told John that they could offer a fair assessment of that person’s character because they had never seen them deal with adversity, detailing that true character is only revealed in times of adversity. Think about how that relates to folks we’ve seen in positions of authority within the workplace, who can you picture that stands strong through the most significant adversities and which ones folded like cheap lawn chairs when things got tough? During my half-century on this ball of mud, the folks who hadn’t dealt with significant personal adversity were always the quickest to throw anyone they could under the proverbial workplace bus. But those who had faced and overcome things personally often displayed the strongest character professionally as well.

While not necessarily in the order Hill listed them, accepting full responsibility (attribute #10) often provides us with the capacity for empathy and understanding (attribute #8), and that empathy is crucial in earning cooperation (attribute #11). That cooperation is essential for leading through influence rather than simply giving directives based solely on the authority of our position; that authority is only effective when we’re nearby and have the ability to use our carrot or stick.

As much as I’d love to say that this kind of influence was what I’ve always relied on, I can’t. And failing to earn that influence led to even more adversities, but each helped forge the understanding I have for those leadership attributes today; each was essential for me to navigate the family challenges that followed and to learn to turn personal chaos into profitable leadership. The quiet strength that comes from this type of genuine influence often starts at home and we’ll look at that more next. Before that, assess a recent family decision where you’ve lacked understanding. With that in mind, come up with a plan for how you can strengthen empathy moving forward.