Leadership & Character – Compassion

The past three blogs have focused on character in leadership based on an assessment of the presence of four universally-accepted moral principles: integrity, responsibility, forgiveness and compassion.  These principles are the foundation of the methodology for assessing character that Fred Kiel introduced in his book entitled “Return on Character”.   This blog will focus on the importance of compassion as it relates to character-based leadership.

In order to understand the role of compassion in a character-based leader, we can turn to Fred Kiel’s book “Return on Character” where he outlines three common behaviors or attributes that constitute compassion in a leader: empathy, attachment and affection.

Let’s start with empathy. Empathy is broadly defined as the ability to understand the feelings of others. It is an important attribute for leaders to have for many reasons. First of all, a person who demonstrates strong empathy skills focuses on the feelings of others and not just their own feelings. Stephen Covey, author of “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” put “Seek first to understand then to be understood” as habit number five.  I think that Covey believed that to honour this habit a person must be able to demonstrate empathy and strong listening skills. Once they establish a deeper understanding of the other person’s point of view, they will be in a much better position to articulate their own thoughts and feelings.  When a person senses that you understand what they are feeling, the relationship strengthens. Leaders who have strong skills in empathy have higher levels of emotional intelligence because empathy is a core capability of EQ.  A leader who understands a person’s “heart” is able to discern the other person’s motivation and drive.  This in turn leads to a greater capacity to influence and the ability to influence is a fundamental requirement of effective leadership.

When I think about the concept of attachment another word immediately comes to mind – engagement. Leaders who have the ability to inspire and engage employees and create stronger attachments have a dramatic impact on organizational results. In 2009, the Gallup organization published a survey indicating that organizations who had employee engagement scores in the top 25^th percentile in their industry achieved earnings-per-share (EPS) results that were more than 27% higher than the average of all companies in their industry. Other studies on employee engagement have shown similar results and have put a spotlight on the higher levels of productivity and the lower levels of employee turnover that accompany strong employee engagement. Attachment and engagement come from developing an emotional bond as outlined in the previous paragraph.

The third component of compassion – affection – is in some ways even more interesting. Throughout my career, I have encountered people who believe that for a leader to be successful, they need to be hard-nosed, dispassionate and unemotional. However, my experience with successful leaders has been quite the opposite. I remember an expression from a CEO I worked for who said “no one cares what you know until they know that you care.” This is how I would choose to define affection in the context of leadership – affection means that you care.

Many years ago when putting together my first employee engagement survey, the consultant I was working with recommended that we include the following statement:  “My manager cares about me as a person”. There was a five-point evaluation scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree. I asked the consultant what information we would gain from a positive answer to this question with respect to employee engagement and productivity. Their answer surprised me although in retrospect it shouldn’t have. Research demonstrates that there is a very strong statistical correlation between an employee’s perception of how much their manager cares and the employee’s level of engagement. In other words, there was a significant probability that employees who scored this question low would also be somewhat disengaged and likely less productive.

Caring about others makes good sense and it impacts results. In his book “Good to Great”, Jim Collins reveals in their research that companies that had achieved sustainably better results over long periods of time, were headed up by leaders described as “level 5” leaders. A level 5 leader is a leader who combines the attributes of ambition and humility and acts as a “servant leader” to enable the success of others. It is not possible to be a level 5 leader if you can’t demonstrate caring. The core of servant leadership involves a leader changing their mindset from “me” to “we”. There is no “I” in team!  It is important to note that a servant leader who demonstrates a caring approach is still able to tackle tough decisions.  However their level of caring helps them discern the difference between tough and rough.

Compassion is a critical attribute for any leader who wants to achieve lasting success.  When you show empathy and caring and build stronger attachments, you increase your ability to influence the thoughts and actions of others.  Research has clearly demonstrated that the integration of good character traits into leadership training helps develop a Personal Leadership Effectiveness Culture that reinforces a strong CQ (Character Quotient) within the organizational culture.

As always, I welcome your feedback. You can connect with me via email or telephone or leave a comment right here on the site.

Until next time,
Dave

David Town, CHRL, is a facilitator and coach of leadership and management principles that enable individuals and organizations to build greater leadership competency, resulting in higher performance and higher employee engagement. David has a particular focus on effectively managing conversations involving confrontation or conflict. As well, he provides insights and assessment strategies for integrating character competencies into leadership skills resulting in increased trust and reduced risk for leaders. David is President of Your Leadership Matters Inc.