We live in a time where it’s never been more important to act with empathy and compassion.
We live in a time where people are able to see everything that you do through social media and the likes. Even if you aren’t massively present on social media, people will use social media to talk about you. Especially when it’s in a negative light.
When you are building a brand you want people to talk about you. You want people to know who you are, and what you do, you want people to feel good about all of those things.
You want people to be happy to talk about you and to be positive about you when they do. It is pretty obvious that you want people to share stories of compassion, joy, of empathy. Most of all, you want people to be talking about you positively, you people to be feeling about you positively.
Oh, how times have changed. Out goes cutthroat behaviour and in comes empathy and compassion
Once upon a time, when the world was a little more shielded, privacy was a little easier to maintain.
A business could create a corporate brand that was ethical, compassionate, and charitable. All the while, the leaders could, behind closed doors, be somewhat cutthroat as an individual.
Those days are done. There is no longer a ‘behind closed doors.’
Privacy no longer exists
If you, for example, operate with a team and you treat that team badly the at some point, someone’s going to say something. Which they are well within their rights to do so if you have treated them badly.
They will say something, and they will mention to a friend how you have done X, Y, and Z to them or treated them in a particular way. And you, as an individual and your company as a brand, have absolutely no power to stop that.
That person may only tell their friend, it could literally be a conversation over coffee in their kitchen. But then that creates negative feelings towards a brand. The beginnings of a ripple effect that will soon become unstoppable.
This then means that when that person, that friend who has been confided in, is online and someone asks about your brand or someone mentions your business, while they might not say anything directly about what has transpired, they won’t talk about your brand with positivity. They won’t talk about the brand in a good way.
Negative speculation travels faster than light
That’s not what you want because that then creates speculation, which leads to a rumour. Nothing in this world spreads quicker than rumour and speculation.
So you want people to be positive, you want the rumours going around about your brand, the speculation of your brand to be positive. Because if it’s not, then that negativity will grow, and it will grow exponentially, and there’s nothing you can do to stop that.
Once that whisper gets out the door. That’s the, it’s game over.
A good example of this is the entertainment industry. Certain people, who are not mentioned by name in the interest of not being sued, have spent their career helping people (or creating the perception of helping people) to achieve their dreams within showbusiness.
But, then it comes out later, that, actually, that person was not very nice and that person took advantage of those people. That created an enormous amount of speculation and rumour.
To the point where people are facing criminal charges over things that may not even be true.
Speculation and rumour is stronger than any truth
In the corporate world, similar things have happened and transpired similar outcomes have come as a result. People who were once well thought of are now considered to be terrible people, which damages their brand. Absolutely decimating their company.
If you’re building a brand, you’re building a company, you need to do so with empathy and compassion. That goes beyond the message that you put out in the world, beyond your public image, and stretches right into your personal life.
If you’re out in the world, be nice to people.
If you have people around you (which, of course, you do), be nice to them. Take the time to be nice.
You might think that you don’t have time. But, in a few years time, when your brand has some element of recognition, and people know who you are, you don’t want incidents to creep out of the woodwork.
You don’t want people coming out and saying, “Well, I met that person on [whatever day] and they were horrible to me and they were rude to me, or disrespectful. An item flippant comment, or whatever.” You don’t want that, that will destroy your business.
Be empathetic and building a brand using empathy and compassion
It starts with being an empathetic and compassionate individual, it starts with being a good person. It is just basic human decency.
So be decent and do so all of the time. It’s not just a matter of integrity or morality, it is something that will affect the future of your brand.
How you speak to people matters and how you treat people matters.
These things will follow you around forever.
Do you want, in 20 years time, people to be telling stories about how wonderful you were? Or, do you want them telling stories about how awful you were when they met and all that time ago?
Obviously, you and I both know the answer to that question. Of course, you want people to be talking about you in a positive way.
Empathy and compassion is something that is growing in importance economically
It has always been important, ethically and morally. But now, the corporate world, the world of industry, is starting to catch up. The time of being a cutthroat bastard in the boardroom is over.
Now is the time for leading your people, not controlling them, leading them. Leading and enabling them. So when you have a team around you, need to treat those people well. You need to treat those people with respect, you need to treat those people with compassion. And that will pay dividends in the long run.
When you collaborate with people, you need to be respectful and compassionate and that too will pay dividends in the long run.
When you meet people in the street, you need to treat them with respect and compassion. And that will also pay dividends in the long run.
It has never been more important to consider how you treat people
Nothing can be covered up anymore. It just can’t. There is no room for secrets. Everything finds its way out into the light of day eventually.
Now, because of social media and the innate connectivity that the world has, that process is quicker than ever. So now, if you treat people badly, it will kill your business before it even starts.
That will follow you around, that dark cloud will follow you around forever, and it will ruin you.
Be compassionate, be respectful, and be empathetic. It is the only way to truly win in this world.
Deploying empathy and compassion is a skill
Empathy is a skill we learn as children, or at least we do in some small way. The pressures of the modern world can often skew our perspective and make us jaded in some way. This is something that happens to most of us, after all the world is a tough place to exist.
Reflection, and the self-awareness that it creates, is the very thing that will help lift the veil. It will help you to see things more clearly and engage with more empathy. This is something I wrote about here https://mybizacademy.co.uk/be-more-self-aware-its-not-hard
Sometimes though, reflection isn’t enough. Sometimes we need to talk to someone we trust and get on top of it. I am happy to be that person for you, just drop me a message via my company website’s contact page. The webpage you will need for that can be found here https://mikethebizguy.co.uk/Contact