Empathy is fundamental in the private sphere, but no less relevant in the world of work, in businessand organisations. This book aims to provide a comprehensive account of empathy and its applications to the workplace, to inform readers of its benefits and its domains of use and to sketchout a basic guide to being more empathetic. The book will help determine the level of empathy in a business, explaining its advantages and offering practical advice for how to develop it.
Index
Acknowledgements………………………………………………11
Preface 1, by Ismael Quintanilla………………………….13
Preface 2, by Roberto Luna………………………………..21
Introduction……………………………………………………..27
Part 1. Is there empathy in our work environment?.......33
1. Do I understand how other people think and feel?.........41
2. Why aren’t some people in my work environment
empathetic?............................................................................46
3. The potential of the empathetic brain: women in
business……………………………………………………..58
4. The danger of obedience to authority and the
search for group acceptance……………………………...62
Part 2. Why is empathy in the workplace
convenient?...........................................................................67
5. Leading and managing teams………………………….77
6. Choosing personnel……………………………………...83
7. Speaking in public……………………………………...90
8. Commercial talent and sales…………………………...99
9. Innovation and entrepreneurship………………………..105
10. Conflict resolution and mediation……………………….110
11. Empathy as a path to happiness at work…………….117
Part 3. How to improve empathy in
businesses and organizations........... 123
12. Knowing ourselves………………………………….129
13. Controlling our impulses and
being assertive……………………………………….139
14. Being optimistic……………………………………..144
15. Using active listening……………………………….152
16. Learning from life experience……………………..162
17. Being flexible and tolerant………………………….168
18. Trusting other people and cooperating……………172
19. Cultivating the imagination through culture
and leisure activities………………………………….181
20. Teaching empathy…………………………………...184
Recommended readings………………………………….187
Luis Moya Albiol is an associate professor and head of department of Psychobiology at the University of Valencia. He gained his PhD at the same university, for which he received an Outstanding Award. He teaches Psychology and Criminology and is the director of the first Master's degree in Neurocriminology. Under his leadership a team of scholars is investigating social neuroscience, based as much on the study of social stress and violence as on cooperation, neurological happiness and empathy.
He has published more than one hundred articles in scientific magazines, supervised a range of investigatory projects and doctoral theses, and is the author of the university textbook “Neurocriminología” ( Pirámide, 2015), the book of popular science “Empathy” and coauthor of “Listen to your Brain”, both published by Plataforma Editorial.
He lectures in universities, associations, businesses and business schools such as ESADE. He is also notable for his contribution to popular science on television and on the radio, in specialist magazines and in the press. Empathy is a key concept in business literature, even though no book has previously given it such an indepth treatment.
