In recent months we’ve placed a number of new hires into executive roles, upper level engineering management positions and pure senior software development jobs, with several different clients. As I stepped away from each situation, I recently noticed one beautiful common thread among the successful candidates that received offers;
They were each the most empathetic and thoughtful of the finalists.
Perhaps this renewed focus on hiring for empathy was ushered in by the pandemic, perhaps we as humans are evolving rapidly out of necessity in an exponentially more complex technical world, or perhaps it’s been there all along and high functioning (and GASP – profitable or cashflow positive) startups are leaning back into the areas that matter most. There does seem to be a heightened sense of urgency to build leadership and engineering teams who genuinely care about one another. It seems simple at it’s core, but of course (respectfully) it’s far from an easy task to build teams of technologists who know not just how to play nicely in the sandbox, but who genuinely understand and care about how others feel, and know how to lift others up.
A semi-recent Forbes magazine article on the topic mentions that empathy in a business environment “at its core is about understanding: being able to see the world from another person’s viewpoint. Without that ability, teams break down. Leaders lose respect. Individuals are not recognized, and potentials go unrealized” Forbes continues that the related concept of Cognitive Compassion “is another way of describing emotional intelligence: technically, sensing another person’s emotional state without allowing it to effect your own. The capacity to be aware of emotions – and express your own in a way that’s measured, useful and appropriate – is central to leadership (*and team) success”. This approach absolutely applies to Senior Engineers helping to ‘level-up’ less seasoned engineers, to help them grow personally and professionally, as well as for C-Level execs motivating their teams daily or scaling their startup in an intelligent manner.
It’s been refreshing to see many of our clients prioritize the humanity within their organizations, regardless of the title of the role.
We hope to see a lot more of this.
Drop us a line if you’d like to learn more about HOW we helped these companies hire for empathy AND technological depth.
Thanks for reading!
Dave
