FEATURE | BUYER EMPATHY
STEPPING INTO THEIR WORLD In the first of a three-part series, SARAH HINCHLIFFE considers Roman Krznaric’s thoughts on empathy
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ollowing my feature in the last edition, looking at how Aristotle’s three persuasive appeals – ethos, pathos and logos – can be used to create winning proposals, I decided to dive deeper into pathos. This led me to Roman Krznaric’s fascinating book on the subject, Empathy. The two key features of the book are the “Six habits of highly empathic people”, and the plethora of examples of empathic people. In this article, I skim the surface of Krznaric’s six habits and pick my favourite characters or scenarios to illustrate each of them.
SARAH HINCHLIFFE is a director of i4 Sales Performance,* a business focusing on helping small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) achieve sales and bid excellence. i4 is a Shipley Business Partner. See i4salesperformance.co.uk or email sarah@i4salesperformance.co.uk *i4 Sales Performance is the brand name of the services supplied by i4 Consultancy and Design.
40 WINNING EDGE
EMPATHY DEFINED Empathy is defined as, “The art of stepping imaginatively into the shoes of another person, understanding their feelings and perspectives, and using that to guide your actions.” So, empathy is all about discovering, understanding and accepting different tastes and views. We learn that there are two types of empathy: “affective empathy”, which is a shared emotional response, and “cognitive empathy”, which is about perspective taking. It is important to develop both. And there is a distinction between empathy, which can relate to positive or negative situations, and sympathy (or compassion), which typically “Do not judge your only has a negative connotation neighbour until you relating to pity or mercy in a bad idea that humans are naturally walk two moons in situation. selfish and aggressive – we must his moccasins” A whistlestop tour of empathy compete to survive. through the ages confirms that it In modern times, who hasn’t Cheyenne saying isn’t a new fad. We find empathyheard the phrases “looking after related words and sayings from number one” and “what’s in it for different languages around the world that stem me?” (WIIFM). Instant gratification, happiness from centuries ago. through therapy, and craving to be slim, We are all wired for empathy, but it’s been beautiful and fashionable are hallmarks of swamped for centuries by a growing focus on today’s society. All this is fuelled by marketing “self ”. Over four centuries, eminent scholars such and social media. Yet many people are still as Thomas Hobbes, Adam Smith, Charles dissatisfied and unfulfilled. Tuning back into our Darwin and Sigmund Freud have reinforced the empathic brains could be the answer. ISMPROFESSIONAL.COM
