Empathy in the workplace isn’t a new concept. What is new, though, is the world’s current social and economic state coupled with the unique challenges of a global health crisis unlike most living generations have ever seen. There’s no map for navigating the obstacles of the pandemic against the contemporary backdrop of our social climate, global economy, and modern approaches to business.
What’s clear is that empathy among colleagues has never been more critical than it is at this time. With some beginning to return to the office in person while others continue to work from home, this spectrum of diverse workday experiences can generate a team divide that company leadership must consciously address.
Hybrid teams can be very successful when well-managed, as flexible work styles often yield enhanced employee productivity and engagement. Yet there are also significant challenges that can arise due to the structural gap of hybrid teams—a unique divide that necessitates an innovative kind of bridge.
CultureWizard’s new Inclusive Virtual Teams course offers a deeper exploration of the following concepts and tools to help create that bridge.
Why Empathy?
For many years, forward-thinking companies have explored how interpersonal skills like empathy increase job performance. Some even host professional development workshops for enhancing social-emotional awareness and connection-building, with the goal of fortifying healthier employees and stronger teams.
Over the last decade, Google has conducted two significant data-driven studies on the positive correlation between social-emotional intelligence and workplace productivity—both of which showed that soft skills, a range of aptitudes for navigating interpersonal communication, were what set certain team members apart from the rest.
The data revealed that these abilities were even more critical to success than the hard skills typically enumerated on resumes—things like graphic design, IT, marketing, writing, etc.—and that the best teams were characterized by:
- An inclusive mindset
- Curiosity toward others’ ideas
- Emotional intelligence
- Psychological safety
Empathy—the ability to understand and have compassion for another person’s experience or perspective—is the foundation of every one of these skills. It’s a proven powerful contributor to leadership ability and outstanding job performance.
How to Cultivate Empathy on Virtual or Hybrid Teams: BRACE
In actual bridge-building, the bracing system is a critical element that stabilizes the bridge for ideal function and longevity. Here are 5 ways to BRACE your team for maximum effectiveness and endurance, with a support system rooted in empathy:
- Build Interpersonal Trust
Empathy often naturally arises from relationships that are based on a solid foundation of trust. Interpersonal trust includes taking time and care in building relationships with colleagues, treating others the way you would want to be treated, listening well, and being open in sharing your own perspectives and experiences.
- Respond to the Emotion
When some team members are working remotely, there can be more misunderstandings and negative emotions that build up in between touchpoints. If a colleague expresses these kinds of feelings, it is best to acknowledge and speak directly to the emotions that they’ve expressed, so that they feel heard and understood.
- Abide by Rituals and Touchpoints
The more contact teams have, the easier it is to empathize with one another. To ensure that your hybrid team connects enough to form this kind of bond, it’s best to set up routinely occurring meetings that foster the habit of healthy communication. These can be short daily meetings, weekly tactical meetings, large-scope monthly meetings, and/or regularly scheduled 1:1 meetings.
- Create Multiple Opportunities for Connection
The more opportunities for and styles of connection your hybrid team has, the more likely they are to develop good communication, and as a result, mutual empathy. Connection time can be structured into regularly occurring meetings, such as offering a 5-minute invitational “check-in” at the beginning of the meeting, where everyone is free to share a few words about how they’re feeling that day. You can also establish designated virtual watercooler meetings that are just for casual conversation, and encourage the use of group chat boxes for social or supportive dialogue among team members.
- Establish a Team Identity
A team identity is a set of tenets that help guide the way colleagues interact with each other. Creating a unique, mutually agreed upon identity for your entire team can help everyone to engage in forms of communication that encourage empathy and strong relationship-building. Some examples might be: We respect each other even when we disagree or We celebrate each other’s successes.
Challenges on Both Sides
Developing empathy requires that we actively put ourselves in others’ shoes, and imagine what it would be like to be in their specific positions. Of course, we can’t truly know how others feel unless we experience what they do, but we can still keep at the forefront the understanding that others are often experiencing something different than we are. On hybrid teams, this understanding is particularly important.
The following are some potential challenges unique to different workday experiences, that are helpful to keep in mind when collaborating with colleagues across the virtual bridge.
Remote coworkers:
- Feelings of isolation from the rest of the team
- General loneliness, especially for those who live alone
- Overwhelm or distraction by others in the home
- Time management and focus in a non-workplace environment
- Communication gaps that can inhibit workflow
- Lack of social context that can lead to misunderstandings
In-person coworkers:
- General overwhelm from re-entering the workplace
- Difficulties feeling connected to virtual teammates
- Managing in-person and remote collaborations simultaneously
- Navigating time away from family
- Personal health concerns
- Possible social overload after a long period of isolation
These different sets of diverse challenges can heavily impact the workday in ways that are significant, yet sometimes imperceptible. Other times, we might indeed notice something about a coworker’s behavior or communication, but misinterpret its cause.
Having empathy for others’ challenges and circumstances always helps facilitate collaboration from a more stable place. And when that collaboration occurs across a virtual divide, the need for empathy is even greater. It’s what creates critical connections, and builds bridges braced with a solid support system of trust, understanding, and unity.
Learn more about empathy with our diversity and inclusion courses. Click here for a free demo!
