Category: Communication Skills

Empathy is the foundation for connecting with others, and connecting with others is an essential part of entrepreneurship. As John Lennon once said, “A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality.”

Entrepreneurs know that reality better than anyone. So much of entrepreneurship depends on people: your team, your customers and audience, your competition. You can’t build the next Apple or Amazon without thousands of people — or even millions — helping along the way. If those people are only strangers to you, simply dollars and cents, you’ll likely never reach your goals or be as successful as you could be.

Empathy can help business leaders in all sorts of situations, whether they’re looking for the next big idea, struggling to find a target market or simply looking for more ways to grow.

1. What is empathy, and how is it different from sympathy?

If you sometimes mix up the meanings of empathy and sympathy, you’re not the only one. In fact, Dictionary.com even took the time to create an entire blog post about the words and how they relate to one another. The piece notes, “Both of the words deal with the relationship a person has to the feelings and experiences of another person …. Both sympathy and empathy have roots in the Greek term páthos meaning ‘suffering, feeling.’”

The greatest difference between the two terms is your relationship with the object of your empathy or sympathy. Sympathy is a more external force — a conveyance of pity or compassion for someone you feel sorry for, but whose circumstances you might not fully understand. By contrast, Dictionary.com states that empathy “is now most often used to refer to the capacity or ability to imagine oneself in the situation of another, experiencing the emotions, ideas, or opinions of that person.” That is to say, empathy refers to the act of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. In this way, empathy can apply to a wider range of people — not just those who have experienced misfortune lately, but anyone whom you want to approach or understand.

If you’re still confused, consider this: You can find sympathy cards at Hallmark for sad occasions. You can see empathy in a movie, where an actor adopts the feelings and emotions of a character or real-life person.

2. Why is empathy an essential trait of great leaders?

In competitive fields like business and entrepreneurship, leaders typically have two primary, basic functions. The first goal for every good leader is to optimize their own teams’ respective performance. The second goal is to understand and beat the competition. Empathy is required for both of these goals.

Optimizing your team

What is entrepreneurship at its most fundamental? It’s solving a problem, isn’t it? And identifying a problem requires understanding the challenges others face in their daily lives.

As Bill Gates pointed out in a Stanford commencement speech, “If we’re going to make our optimism matter to everyone and empower people everywhere, we have to see the lives of those most in need. If we have optimism, but we don’t have empathy — then it doesn’t matter how much we master the secrets of science, we’re not really solving problems; we’re just working on puzzles.”

As Mike Kappel points out in an Entrepreneur piece, it’s not enough to just have a business idea. You need to consider the demand for your product or service — not just some faint desire, but the willingness to spend hard-earned money for it. You can’t do that if you don’t understand your target consumer and how your offering will help make their lives easier.

One of the most common pieces of advice our contributors and business experts give is to find your niche. Some companies even go so far as to create a target market profile — examples of people who match the age, gender, income and other factorsideal for a given product or service. The more you understand your target market or audience, the better you can tailor your offerings toward them.

Beating the competition

Bryan Janeczko makes a great point in his recent Entrepreneur piece, “How Can I Tell Whether My Business Ideas Are Good or Bad?” He writes, “Just because you have a solution doesn’t mean you have a head start against your competitors. You need to be able to pioneer your idea and, importantly, avoid others duplicating your model. It can mean becoming a market leader while everyone else is still figuring out a strategy.”

By using empathy and adopting the mindset of your competition, you should be able to determine their pain points and weaknesses. What do you do that someone in your competitor’s shoes simply can’t replicate? And by the same token, what can you take from other great leaders or businesses to improve your own company? A common quote within my field — the writing and journalism industry — that “good writers borrow, but great writers steal.”

That is to say, the best writers can not only take on new styles but also incorporate them so seamlessly into their own works that an outsider could only assume it was theirs all along. What can you learn from others in your industry and master to that degree?

3. How can I show more empathy as a leader?

In a contributed piece for Entrepreneur, John Rampton offered nine tactics that leaders can use to help their teams in difficult times. Tip No. 1? Prioritize the health and well-being of the members of your team. To do that, you need to invest your time in actually understanding that team.

Here’s a recent example from my life: I offered to have a 15-minute Zoom call with a new colleague at 11 a.m. ET, thinking that would allow him plenty of time in the morning without having to skip lunch.

However, that time didn’t work for him for two reasons:

1. He worked on the west coast, not the east coast, meaning I’d set up an 8 a.m. meeting instead of an 11 a.m. meeting.
2. He had children and needed to see them off to school or daycare before starting his work.

Neither of these factors occurred to me initially and required an adjustment. We rescheduled, and all was well. But, the next time we do a Zoom meeting, I’ll know better than to try on an east-coast schedule.

There are tons of ways you can practice empathy as a leader in your day-to-day life. You can be sure to avoid words that make people uncomfortable or inferior, adopt facial expressions that convey you really care about your team or work on improving your compassion and emotional intelligence. But, at the end of the day, if there really were one true tip or trick to leading with empathy, it would be easy and everyone would do it.

Instead, empathy requires unique solutions for each problem. The whole point is to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, and of course, not everyone’s shoes should fit the same.

4. How can I create a more empathetic culture?

Depending on your business or situation, it isn’t always possible to meet and know every single person whom you lead. Leaders of corporate giants like Apple or Amazon simply don’t have the time to know all of their employees on a personal level. So, what can you do in those cases?

Creating an empathetic office culture

If you’re looking for a place to start, try to avoid flashy gimmicks like installing a ping-pong table and focus on the things that will make a noticeable difference in people’s lives. One of my Entrepreneur favorite stories to work on over the past few years was a piece contributed by Dennis Eusebio titled “Why Office Perks Are Traps, Not Benefits.”

In the story, Eusebio wrote, “These days, you’ll hear more about perks than you will about benefits. Things like ping-pong tables, fridges stacked full of Red Bull and Perrier, video games, and other vanity items. What the employer is signaling to you with these items is clear: We’re cool! We’re hip! Join us, and you too can play ping-pong all the time! It’s an attractive signal, especially to young employees.”

But, you know what mattered more to him than getting free energy drinks or video games? The substantial paternal leave his employer gave, which allowed him to spend time with his child. “If I were like most employees in the United States workforce,” he wrote, “seven days is all I would have.”

Creating an empathetic brand

Mark Cuban makes an important distinction on how best to use empathy when relating to your customers. “Your customers can tell you the things that are broken and how they want to be made happy. Listen to them. Make them happy. But don’t rely on them to create the future road map for your product or service. That’s your job.”

He points out that your customers and clients lead busy lives and don’t need to reinvent the wheel for you. However, if you can identify what’s important to these customers and prove they’re important to you, too, then you might just be onto something. As always, this sort of empathy can take on different forms.

For example, Zappos distinguished itself with its excellent customer service, helping users of the site with any problems they might encounter. Ben & Jerry’s made recent headlines by joining a group of businesses in boycotting Facebook and Instagram ads. Shoe company Toms is famous for its philanthropy, while companies like Tesla or Beyond Meat offer potential for positive environmental change.

Each brand found its own path, and no strategy is necessarily more successful than others. The key is to find one that fits with your brand and mission in a genuine way.

5. How will using empathy on a regular basis improve my business?

At the end of the day, a company with a great culture can still go under if it can’t make payroll or generate income. So, how can empathy actually have an impact on your bottom line? Consider this post by Entrepreneur editor in chief Jason Feifer, who details the process he went through when he was locked out of his office and needed to hire a locksmith:

“Picture it: There’s me, standing around like a doofus, locked out of my own office. At a loss for what to do, I went to Yelp, found a bunch of locksmiths, and emailed them to explain the problem and ask for quotes. Four replied quickly.

“The first one simply wrote: ‘Price estimate: $29.’ Then, 18 minutes later, they followed up with this promise: ‘I will give best price.’

“The second wrote: ‘$125 to open the door. Just need phone number and address.’

“The third didn’t offer a price. ‘Yes, we can help you,’ they wrote instead. ‘Call us to verify your address.’

“The fourth came from a guy named Jay Sofer, owner of Lockbusters, who wrote me this: ‘Hi, Jason, thank you for the detail. Would it be possible to send me a quick image of that handle to make certain I give you an accurate quote? Here is my direct email address.’”

Can you guess which locksmith Feifer chose? It was Jay Sofer, the man who asked for details in order to provide an accurate quote and offered a direct email address. Feifer chose him even though Sofer gave him an estimate of somewhere between $99 and $198 — and possibly even up to $300!

Feifer was willing to pay $271 more to someone he trusted — someone who had shown him empathy — than someone who simply offered him the same generic response they would offer anyone else.

And if empathy can help you get customers to try your product or service, it can also help you earn their trust and keep them coming back for more — and brand loyalty is an essential part of sustainable income. As Amy Gallo notes for the Harvard Business Review, “Depending on which study you believe, and what industry you’re in, acquiring a new customer is anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one.”

Practicing empathy in the office can lead to happier employees, which can lead to more productive employees, which can lead to greater profits. Investing in these connections can help you build your business and grow it into something stronger.

“When you think that way,” Feifer concluded after finally regaining entry to his office, “your customer isn’t a transaction. It’s another person — someone to build a relationship with, even if it’s a brief one, and even if it’s about something as simple as a lock.”

What Is Empathy, and Why Is It So Important for Great Leaders? [Entreprenuer]

To say that we are in the start-up culture era would be a gross understatement. Start-ups are popping up left, right and centre – and the entrepreneurs behind such companies are reaping in the rewards.

While there are all sorts of characteristics that define leaders, we would hedge a bet that something all of the founders of said companies have in common is that they can pitch. To obtain that elusive initial funding, or funding to take your business to the next level for that matter, pitching is a crucial part of being a modern-day business leader.

In fact, if you were to mull over some of the material for online business certificate programs, you would quickly see that pitching for investment is one of the most important things that you can master.

Unfortunately, pitching is by no means simple. It’s one of the toughest things that you can overcome and a lot of people are absolutely terrified of the whole process. As today’s title has hopefully given away, we will now mull over some of the best steps to overcome your fear of pitching once and for all.

Just have the answers

It sounds simple, but just knowing your product or service inside-out can help you quash a lot of the problems that investors face.

For a lot of people, it isn’t the actual presentation of your product which is the big problem, it’s the questions that follow it afterwards. Investors have the unfortunate habit of asking the questions that can really catch you out like a rabbit in the headlights. However, if you know your product and the numbers inside-out, there is absolutely no reason to be fearful about this. Furthermore, if you do possess confidence during this Q&A part of your pitch, you’ll do your chances of investment the world of good.

The power of practice

At the risk of stating the obvious, we really can’t highlight the importance of practice. If you study your pitch the night before it is due, you are asking for trouble.

Those entrepreneurs who continuously go over their pitch don’t just know it like the back of their hand, but they also iron out any issues. They can start to identify the weaknesses of their pitch, and slowly fine-tune it into something that is going to knock the socks off a potential investor.

Focus on your investor

Whatever you do, make sure this pitch is targeted towards your investor, and not you. A lot of pitching beginners will tell a story of how a product solves a particular problem. In doing that, they fail to realize that this problem might not actually be something that the investor appreciates, nor does the pitch explain to them what sort of return they are going to get on their money. The latter is particularly important during your pitch; you need to explain, in no uncertain terms, exactly how financially your investor is going to benefit.

Be yourself

Finally, we can’t reiterate the importance of being yourself. At a lot of these pitches, investors appreciate that they are investing mainly in the individual in question. You might have invented the perfect product, but if they don’t think you have the prowess to take it forward it’s going to be a no.

Make sure you express yourself and show them who their money is truly going towards.

Years ago, when I was studying the craft of writing fiction, I ran across a book that talked about how story was the “sugarcoating” to make the “medicine go down.”

The example the author used was fairy tales, which he claimed were old-fashioned morality lessons (the medicine) wrapped in story (the sugarcoating). People would want to read the fairy tales, and when they did, they would learn the lesson.

As humans, we’re genetically wired to respond to stories. It’s in our DNA. It’s one of our most powerful communication tools. Whether we’re telling our spouse a story about what happened to us at work, or our friends a story about what happened on our vacation, we use story to make sense of the events that happen to us.

So, as a business owner, wouldn’t it make sense to use our most powerful communication tool to convey the benefits of our products and services and programs?

And there’s more—have you ever noticed how we can get lost in a book or a movie? The pages disappear, the words disappear, the screen disappears?

That’s because the story hypnotizes you. You are literally in a light trance.

And, when you’re in that light trance, you’re going to continue engaging with the story.

That’s the power of story.

Now, let’s not forget the true power of story, which is to trigger our emotions. Stories provide us with a safe container to feel our emotions. Whether it’s a scary story or suspenseful or sad or romantic, when we’re in a story, we feel the emotions.

And, it’s safe, because it’s not our life that’s causing us to feel those emotions. It’s a fictional reality.

So often (especially because we spend so much of our time running away from feeling our fear-based emotions), we walk around feeling completely numb. That’s because it’s not possible to just numb one emotion, we’re either feeling all of our emotions, or none of them.

But, as humans, feeling emotions is an important part of fully experiencing life. So, if we’ve numbed our emotions, we find ourselves actually craving them.

Stories can help us feel emotions, that way.

Now, as a marketer, people buy because of emotions. So, what better way to sell more with love than by using stories?

And, last but certainly not least, stories are entertaining. As marketing guru Dan Kennedy says, you can’t bore your clients into working with you, so why not use stories in your marketing?

But, not all stories are created equal (nor do all stories even work in a marketing setting).

Below are examples of some of the best stories to use for marketing, and some best ways to use those stories.

Your story.

This is sometimes called your “origin story,” or your “hero’s journey.” And yes, people want to know how you got started in business.

But, they want more than a list of titles or accomplishments that prove your expertise. Yes, those are important, but those types of “bio” bullet points tend to be less than memorable. (Not to mention, people’s eyes tend to glaze over when you get into the weeds.)

But, more importantly, those types of bios don’t make you relatable. Or human.

However, if you tell your story about how you got in business, and you include some vulnerability in it, like maybe how you hit rock bottom in some fashion or failed in some way, now you’re relatable.

Now, you’re human.

And, that’s what people are going to remember.

People won’t remember all the words you say, but they WILL remember how you made them feel. Your story of how you became an entrepreneur or business owner is a great place to help them start to get to know you as a person. (And, remember, people buy from people they know, like, and trust.)

Now, you may have one origin story, but chances are you’ll end up with multiple origin stories (especially if you’ve been in business for many years). That’s perfect. I’m a big believer that businesses are living entities that grow and change over time, so your stories will also grow and change over time.

Your customer or client stories (also known as a testimonial or case study).

A case study is a story that basically outline why a client decided to work with you.

They’re important because, as the expert, your prospects may see you as someone “above” them, so even though what you’re selling worked for you, it may not work for them.

But, with a case study, you have the opportunity to highlight a lot of different life situations, so your prospects can see themselves in your current clients.

If they can see themselves in a case study, it can give them hope that they too can overcome whatever it is that’s keeping them up at night, and start sleeping like a newborn babe.

General stories.

If you have a business where you rely heavily on email and the Internet to market and promote your products and services, you’re likely going to find yourself creating a lot of posts and articles and emails.

And, using general, life story emails are a great tool to toss into the mix.

Maybe you had a conversation with your eight-year-old daughter that leads to an ah-ha to a problem your clients wrestle with. Or maybe you had a breakdown on your recent vacation that is a great illustration of the breakdowns your prospects are going through.

Collect those stories. They’re valuable.

There’s definitely more ways you can use stories in your marketing, but these are a good place to start. Once you start opening your eyes to all the different stories you can be using in your marketing, you’ll be amazed.

In future blog posts, I’ll share more around best practices for writing stories, but for now, be open to all the stories around you that you can use in your marketing. Maybe you can even start an idea log to keep track of those stories (which is also a great idea to start waking your muse up).

We all know the incredible power of the internet. We understand it as an invaluable tool for research, shopping, and building networks and connections. We recognize the viral influence of social media and its impact on cultural and buying habits. We can see it as a wonderful catalyst for ideas and education. And yet, even with this unquestioned knowledge of the internet’s potential, still a huge number of small businesses have little to no presence online. If you’re stunned, you should be.

You’re Not only missing out on potential customers…

It’s unquestioned how much the internet has expanded and diversified over the past decade. With the rise of social media, blogging platforms, and a host of tools for quickly building websites, the internet has been re-packaged for large-scale consumer interaction. Geographical boundaries no longer matter in terms of trends, ideas or even news and the amount of fresh content that is created each day is astonishing. In short, we’ve become a culture that literally “Google’s” everything – we even check out reviews for the local Barber before we think about walking through the doors. So, if you’re not online, you’re not only missing out on a huge market, but you may also be in danger of losing your current customers.

This is why it’s so essential for Businesses to regularly be publishing quality content on the web. More than ever, businesses need to position themselves as experts in a specific area and draw loyal online readers by providing this specialized content. But for many small businesses that don’t have a blog or website, taking the first steps can feel daunting: How do I get a blog started? What should I write about? How often should I post?

The Simple Guide To Business Blogging

With these questions and concerns in mind, Simply Business has put together an incredibly helpful guide for small business blogging. It walks businesses through the steps of defining a blogging niche, brainstorming content ideas, and understanding the blogging culture. It’s one of those resources that you’ll find yourself returning back to again and again. So if you find yourself either frantic for content or simply unsure on how to move forward, grab a cup of coffee, a notepad and start strategizing a new way of engaging customers online.

Article Contributed by Elizabeth Lee

We’ve all been there. Either we bite off a lot more than we can chew, or life gets in the way. This is especially true for freelancers who have to make their own schedules and don’t have anyone to delegate the work to when things get busy. At one point or another, everyone will miss a deadline, or at least come terrifyingly close. What matters is knowing what to do in those situations. There’s a smart way to handle everything – and it’s possible to do it without losing the client.

When The Outlook is Bad

The best time to get in touch with your client is before you’ve actually missed the deadline. If you have ten days of work to do and three days to do it in, chances are slim that a miracle is going to swoop in and save you. You should still try your best to meet the deadline, but you should also have a realistic estimate on when your client can actually expect the completed work.

Let them know how far along you are in the process, and be honest about what happened. If you have a good relationship with the client and you don’t have a history of missing deadlines, they’ll understand. Workloads get heavy sometimes. Give a brief explanation.

When The Deadline Is Now

If you knew you weren’t going to make the deadline, you probably should have said something before this moment. If time slipped away from you, be forward about it. Tell the client that you understand that you missed the deadline, provide them with a timeline they can use to determine when you’ll have the work completed.

Offer to send what you’ve finished so far, if that’s possible. Allow them to look over the completed portion of the project while you’re finishing up the rest. They’ll be able to see at least some representation of what you’re working on, and by letting them in on the process, they’re less likely to feel left in the dark. Keep giving them daily updates with some notes about what you’ve done until the project is completed. Communication is important at this time – it’s your saving grace.

When The Deadline Passed a While Ago

You messed up pretty badly. If the deadline came and went and you haven’t talked to your client, that one is completely your fault. Unless something serious, such as a major emergency happened, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have informed your client.

If it was a major emergency, provide as much detail as you’re comfortable with. If you suffered something like a house fire or a major illness, your client may understand – especially if you already had a great working relationship before that.  Never lie about a disaster – if the client finds out, word will travel fast.

If you’ve already missed the deadline by a lot and you still have a lot of work to do, refund the client. Don’t ask if they want a refund – automatically refund them. Then, ask them whether or not they would still like you to complete the work (yes, for free.) If they don’t, that’s alright. The way you handle a client you’ve drastically messed up with can determine your fate as a professional. If you don’t accept full responsibility and volunteer to go above and beyond to make things right, you risk your entire reputation.

Author’s Bio:

Elizabeth Lee is an avid business blogger from Sydney, Australia, writing on behalf of PACK & SEND. Elizabeth is experienced in customer relations, marketing and logistics, and is often found sharing her tips with other professionals. Follow Elizabeth on @LElizabethLee86