A CURIOUS thing happened several nights ago. A friend asked if I could give an opinion on a fee hike proposed by a local gym she frequented. The case looked rather straightforward so I agreed. The increase was reasonable, yes. The reason was pretty obvious, what with the country-wide sharp rise in labor, utility and fuel costs. The move, however, didn't exactly go down well with many of the gym's longtime patrons. Some argued about a lack of empathy by the operators. While the business strategy was financially sound, it made me ask: What is the value of empathy in business?
Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference. In an article on VeryWell Mind, educational consultant Kendra Cherry defines it as "essentially, it is putting yourself in someone else's position and feeling what they must be feeling." In organizations, empathy can mean a business being intrinsically curious about the condition and experience of its stakeholders and seeking to understand those experiences.
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