Empathy and Inclusion – Considerations for change agents
We live in an increasingly fractured world. It’s a world of tribalism. A world where we identify as part of a group, or groups, and increasingly ignore the views of anyone who thinks differently to ourselves.
Social media hasn’t helped. We are now served content that reinforces existing beliefs. Algorithms serve content based on your connections, and the content you prefer. Meta, TikTok and X will unfollow or hide posts from content you’re less interested in. The result? Availability bias has become one of the biggest barriers to genuine social discourse, empathy and inclusion in human history.
Scanlon’s most recent social cohesion index (Nov 2023), a survey of over 7,000 Australian’s, plummeted to its lowest ebb since it began 16 years ago. It came on the back of the Voice referendum, and as conflict began in the Middle East.
Most of us see the world in binary. We’re right, they’re wrong. Or worse, we’re right, they’re (insert slur). We label. We insult the ‘other.’ Even those of us who try to be mindful, who seek to change the world for the better, do so anchored in our own biases, shaped by our own values, values which typically mirror those that we surround ourselves with, people like ourselves.
Some aspects of empathy are intuitive. Mimicry is a good example. But to be truly empathetic requires systematic thinking. It’s a learned behaviour. We need to be deliberate with it, in our personal lives, and in our professional practice.
And this is where empathy can help. For me, empathy is the engine of pro-social behaviour. Empathy is an innate capacity that we all share, but it needs to be developed. We get better at it the more we practice.
I’ve always been quite empathetic. I sometimes refer to myself as a grumpy old man. My wife calls me insufferable. But I’m not grumpy because of my age. And I’ll park ageism for another day, other than to say it’s one of the most dangerous “isms” out there and we need to do more to combat it. Much more.
Empathy is the engine of pro-social behaviour.
I’ve come to the conclusion, albeit without strong empirical evidence, that I’m grumpy because I’m empathetic. It doesn’t escalate to anger because I choose to channel it in a positive way, through my behaviour change practice. The same may be true for some of you here. Rather than feeling overwhelmed or angered by the depth of feeling you have for others or for the state of the planet, we take action.
And that’s the important bit. Some commentators believe empathy can be counterproductive. And they’re right. Imagine, just being sad for others. You now just have more people feeling sad, but no solution. Acting on that empathy, working with those you have empathy for to affect change is the key. Channeling your empathy into action is the key. It’s not just more effective. It’s cathartic.
Of course, empathy is enhanced by spending time with, and listening to, people who are different to ourselves. For the past 25 years I’ve been mindful of sourcing news and opinion from all sides of politics. I talk to victims and perpetrators; climate activists and deniers, I watch ABC and … Sky. I actively seek to understand why people feel as they do, and then try an empathise.
Many well-intentioned programs and campaigns fail because we assume the values that matter to us, and those like us, are shared by those we’re trying to influence.
I could give many examples but approaches to influencing anti-social attitudes and behaviours on things like racism and gender equity spring to mind.
Too often change agents with the best intent allow their own ideology, their own values, get in the way of effective behaviour change practice. More empathy for those who don’t think like us greatly increases our chances of success. After all, are we trying to convince people our way of thinking is right or stop behaviours that do harm?
As Henry Ford put it: “If there is one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get to the other person’s point of view and see things from his angle, as well as your own.”
That means that when we are designing programs and services, we need to be deliberate in application of empathy. We need to listen, and act on what we hear. We need to create solutions with, not for, those we seek to serve. And this brings me to inclusion, a universal human right that speaks to the need for all to be included and have access to opportunities, inclusive of minorities, the disadvantaged and the under-represented.
As change agents, we seek to influence behaviours and attitudes for the good of individuals, and for the good of society as a whole. But if we’re honest, most of the work undertaken in the pro-social context in the past has been designed for the 80%, the majority. We need to be deliberately inclusive too.
We also need to understand that often the people who have the attitudes and behaviours we want to influence are not likely to respond to those things we believe are important. We need empathy to drive inclusion of the disadvantaged, the vulnerable, the at-risk. But we also need empathy to ensure our programs and services account for the lived experience, values and views of those we seek to influence, no matter how much we many not like them. We can’t be selective with our empathy. It must extend to and include everybody.
For me, inclusion and empathy are two sides of the same coin. While not quite synonyms, where you find one you will more often than not find the other. Empathy is the foundation upon which inclusion is built. Empathy promotes inclusion – it helps us understand and appreciate diverse perspectives.
Practicing empathy with priority populations creates a sense of psychological safety and supports a culture of inclusivity.
And empathy, through active listening, helps prevent micro aggressions and unconscious bias. Affinity bias (the tendency to favour those who are similar to us) and Confirmation bias (the tendency to seek out info that confirms our beliefs), Anchoring bias (the tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information we receive) and Availability bias (the tendency to overestimate the importance of information that’s readily available) have been key features of virtually all social change initiatives over the past 70 years, including, at times, my own.
Over the past decade I’ve become more mindful of trying to mitigate the impact of these biases on inclusive program design and tried to proactively apply an empathy lens to my work. It’s not easy, particularly when procurement and much of contemporary practice still lacks an empathy lens.
And so, when I was asked to convene a panel for Change, empathy and inclusion was an obvious choice.
In a world plagued by dissent, social unrest and tribalism, empathy is the secret sauce, the glue that has the potential to hold society together, and perhaps, even bring us back together.
It will take a concerted effort and a recognition that we all need to learn how to be more empathetic, through reason and systematic thinking. Today’s panel will provide a few insights into how. And I suspect, much much more.
– Introduction to Empathy and Inclusion panel by Luke van der Beeke at Change 2024