Business is about meeting needs, but to meet your customers and your employee’s needs, you need to first understand those needs. This is where empathy is a powerful tool in taking your business to the next level and why empathy is common amongst successful entrepreneurs and businesses alike.
To have empathy as an entrepreneur or business owner is to understand your customers discomfort and have a desire to do something about that discomfort. This understanding of customers needs has lead to many great inventions in business today. Progressive companies tend to be experts at intuiting customers’ discomfort and this is why empathy, as a business skill, is critical to the bottom line.
“Empathy is the highest form of effective communication because it’s based on deep listening, reflection, discernment, and response.”
Empathy is a skill that can be developed, and in its purest form, is the force that moves businesses forward. 99FM’s MYD Smart spoke to Public Speaker, Author, Entrepreneur and Life Coach, Herbert Mtowo, to find out more about empathy as a tool for business. According to Coach Herbert, “Working with people as a Life Coach, I have realised that, empathy is the highest form of effective communication because it’s based on deep listening, reflection, discernment, and response.”
“Think about the long-term wellbeing of the person, and you will greatly increase your chances of building a strong, long-term relationship with that person.”
“If someone shares news that is negatively going to affect him or her and your first thought is about your own well-being, then you’re not being empathetic. If a customer tells you that he is dealing with a crisis and has been downsized from his company and can no longer fulfil his commitment to you and your first concern is your invoice not being fulfilled, you’re not being very empathetic. Think about the long-term wellbeing of the person, and you will greatly increase your chances of building a strong, long-term relationship with that person.” Says Herbert.
To keep our businesses relevant and our consumers happy, embracing empathy is key. Empathy means you suspend preconceived ideas, and truly listen. Actively listening to what is really happening, leads to better communication and builds trust. This is valuable with customers as well as with your staff. “Empathy allows you to figure out how to respond to different employees and meet their different needs at different times.” Says Coach Herbert.
“If you do that on a regular basis, you will steadily sharpen your ability to be truly empathetic with other people. It’s a skill that you will be able to use in many facets of your personal and professional life.”
“Empathy is not a complicated thing to do. You sit. You listen. You consider what you heard and what you saw. You try to discern what the other person is thinking and feeling. If you do that on a regular basis, you will steadily sharpen your ability to be truly empathetic with other people. It’s a skill that you will be able to use in many facets of your personal and professional life.” Notes Herbert.
Those in business, who master the art of Empathy, tend to disrupt the world they live in, for the better. Stepping into your customers shoes and seeing things from their perspective, makes it that much easier to walk a mile ahead of your competition.
Get in touch with Coach Herbert Mtowo through his Facebook page by clicking here
Written by Kirsty Watermeyer