Why empathy should be your top leadership priority

As a father of three, I’ve seen firsthand that people are naturally empathetic—my kids, for example, can’t help but get upset when they see someone hurt or in trouble. But as we grow up, empathy becomes trickier to navigate, especially at work. In a fast-paced world where staying ahead of the competition is critical, empathy often takes a backseat. And even when we try to show it, truly authentic empathy can feel like it’s in short supply.

A recent survey of 1,000 U.S. workers found that 52% felt their company’s efforts to be empathetic weren’t genuine. That’s a big disconnect between what leaders think they’re doing and how employees actually feel.

With 2025 just around the corner, now’s the perfect time to rethink your leadership approach for the year ahead. Prioritizing empathy isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s essential. It builds mutual respect, improves productivity, and helps keep great employees on board.

Active listening as empathy

Unlike sympathy, which stems from personally relating to someone’s experience, empathy means showing compassion even when you can’t directly relate. For leaders, that means attempting in earnest to understand where employees are coming from, even if the experience doesn’t resonate.

As Harvard Business Review notes, active listening is the first step to being genuinely empathetic. Engage with body language that signals your interest: arms uncrossed, nodding when appropriate, and maintaining eye contact. People can sense when someone’s listening to respond rather than understand; when they’re just waiting to give their two cents. Good listeners stay present without rushing to interject. For a manager, this means giving an employee your full attention. Show that you’re receptive to what they’re saying and don’t necessarily have the answers—you’re there to listen.

Check your biases

On Stanford Graduate School of Business’s “View from the Top” speakers series, Leena Nair, the CEO of Chanel, championed empathetic and compassionate leadership and emphasized the lack of role models who embody these traits. Nair explained how she acts with empathy.

“I believe everyone’s voice matters, not just the ones who speak loudly. . . . Diverse perspectives matter to me.”

Empathy requires recognizing your own biases and doing your best to transcend them. By actively listening to every voice, including quieter ones, the Chanel CEO acknowledges the tendency to favor more assertive personalities. Being cognizant of our biases helps to avoid filtering out voices based on surface-level assumptions.

Giving equal weight to each voice also helps foster collective intelligence, which inherently mitigates bias. By embracing diverse perspectives, leaders can also counter confirmation bias—the tendency to seek information that aligns with our existing views. What’s more, considering diverse perspectives ultimately leads to better, more reasoned decisions.

Express empathy externally

Actively listening to each voice and overcoming biases are only part of genuine empathy. Leaders must also express their empathy externally—as the saying goes, actions speak louder than words. Empathetic leaders seek to understand employees, but also, how they can take concrete steps to support them.

When a colleague opens up to you, Harvard Business Review article suggests responding with phrases like, “That sounds really tough. Would you want to share more information with me so I can understand more about where you’re coming from and how I may be able to support you?” With this approach, you’re not claiming you know what someone is going through. Instead, you’re communicating that you’re prepared to help them.

As CEO of Jotform, I’ve learned that an open-door policy is a good start to demonstrating empathy, but it’s not always enough. Taking the time to personally check in with employees, actively listening, and working together on a strategy to navigate any challenges have proven far more effective. And I think that’s part of the reason why employees tend to stay with our company—because they know that management and leadership are genuinely invested in their wellbeing, engagement, and long-term success.