Empathy in the Workplace — What Covid19 and Weave’s #peoplenotemployees Have Taught Me During These Strange Times
What in the World is Happening?
About a month or so ago I was brainstorming ideas on what my next workplace related article would be. After much contemplation, I decided to write a series of posts about empathy in the workplace. My idea was: I would shadow different co-workers at Weave for a day. I would listen to their phone calls, watch them respond to emails, listen in on their meetings (where I was allowed), etc. I wanted to understand what a day in the life was like for this particular person. What were their struggles, what they loved about their job, what they hated, etc. I had already shadowed my first co-worker. She is on, what I considered, to be one of the harder jobs here at Weave. She is on the SWAT team trying to save customers who want to cancel with us. I was only able to sit with her for a few hours, but I was able to gain some good insight to at least start writing my article.
Thursday March 12th came around. I still had not started writing my article yet, but that was okay as I tend to work well under pressure (it needed to be finished by March 31st). I had been working from home that day as my husband had an appointment I needed to be home for our 10 month old son. The coronavirus has been making headlines, but I wasn’t too worried about it. We received notice this day from HR, mandatory work from home until at least April 3rd. What?? I was honestly shocked. I ran into work to grab some things that I needed (notebook, dock, magic mouse, etc). Chatted with some of my co-workers about how crazy and hard this was going to be for the next two weeks. I am very must an extroverted person. I thrive off the energy of others so not being around my awesome coworkers was going to be really hard.
Saturday March 13th, and the governor of Utah announced that all Utah schools would have a soft close for the next two weeks. Now I was sweating a bit more about what was going on. I would need to work from home, and also work with my husband to take care of and entertain our 8 year old and 10 month old for two weeks?
Wednesday March 18th, and I am stressed. I was used to my work/school/home routine I had with my family. Everything has been upended. Then a 5.7 earthquake hits our area. For those of you not familiar, earthquakes of this magnitude are not common in Utah.
I could write paragraph after paragraph, but needless to say, these are unprecedented times for all of us. One thing that has helped me as an employee, has been the strong leadership team at Weave. They have been working tirelessly the last few weeks to figure out how to position Weave so that we can come up of this pandemic, yet still remaining true to our company values. I have especially appreciated the leadership from our CEO Brandon Rodman. Weave’s motto of #peoplenotemployees has been reiterated again and again. I was inspired by him on how we can live these values as a company and our own individual teams during this pandemic as we are all navigating a new norm for the time being. Below are some things I am trying to emulate. I hope they can help you and your coworkers as well.
Don’t confuse empathy with sympathy
The queen of empathy research herself, Brene Brown, says this better than anyone. She has created one of the best explanations of empathy vs sympathy. You can view it on YouTube here. In short, sympathy is feeling sorry for someone. Feeling sorry for them, but not actually feeling their sorrow. Empathy is when you are able to understand what they are feeling, even if you have never felt exactly the emotions they are going through. You may not be able to know the exact feelings a coworker may have, but I would bet you would be able to understand those particular emotions they are having (fear, helplessness, despair, depression, etc). Acknowledging someone’s pain, and at the same time not trying to fix it, can create an environment at work that allows yourself and others to be your true self.
Ask your co-workers how they are doing
I have been very surprised the honesty from some of my coworkers from such a simple question. What we are going through right now is hard. This is something that none of us have ever experienced before, and so many things are uncertain. Knowing someone else is concerned for you, and cares about you can really make a difference. One way my team has done this, is we have a daily stand up everyday for 15 minutes. It is not only to discuss work related things, but it is also to check in face to face with everyone to see how we all are doing. Another tool we also use at Weave is called 15five. One of my favorite features is you can give each other virtual high-fives. It may sound kind of cheesy, but it honestly has turned into something really fun. Myself and two other coworkers are in kind of, but not really, competition to see who can give the most high fives in a week.
Be an active listener
Too often in meetings and conversations at work, all we are doing is trying to get our point across. We want everyone to listen to us, agree with us, and go along with whatever our agenda is. Unfortunately this is not the way to work and collaborate with our coworkers. So, what does it mean to be an active listener?
- Look at them while they are talking
- Let them know you are listening by doing things like nodding
- Don’t interrupt them. If you have clarifying questions, note them and ask them once they are finished
- Reiterate a topic and what you perceive it to mean if you are looking for more details or clarifications
- Seek to understand before you judge
Tell your team know how you are feeling
In Brene Brown’s book “The Gift of Vulnerability” she has a great quote
“Courage is like — it’s a habitus, a habit, a virtue: You get it by courageous acts. It’s like you learn to swim by swimming. You learn to courage by couraging.”
When you yourself share how you are truly feeling, it can give others the courage to share as well. On our teams here at Weave, we truly
Don’t assume anything
I think everyone knows the phrase that goes with this? Assuming makes an ass out of u and me. This couldn’t be more true. In my life, I have made so many assumptions about people, their behavior and their motives. But what I have found 99% of the time is, I am dead wrong. You will never have the whole picture, unless the person discloses to you, or you are able to ask the needed questions and the person is able to answer. Haven’t we all said the phrase to someone else, “Well if only I knew that, I wouldn’t have said/done that.” Why don’t we start by just completely eliminating this phrase from our vocabulary.
Validate others
How do you make your coworkers feel like they matter? How do you make them feel like their feelings and opinions are important and are of worth? Below are a few simple ways you can do this:
- Listen with intent
- Recognize and seek to understand what that person is saying
- Don’t dismiss or minimize what someone is saying
- Ask open ended questions
- Show that you understand
Put yourselves in their shoes
Do you really understand what another coworker may be going through? Do you understand the kinds of pressures and nuances that exist on their team? If you don’t know, ask them! You might be amazed at what you can learn by just asking a few clarifying or exploratory questions from them. Something as simple as “Hey, so what is going on this xyx? Can you give me more details on what is going on here?”
Just be nice
This is kind of an inside joke here at Weave to say the phrase “Brandon is Nice”. I think it may have stemmed from some posts that Brandon has made on LinkedIn that got a bunch of traction. You can read them here, and here. But honestly, what a great motto to have. Just be nice to each other. Even if someone is not so nice to you, just be nice.
