GA 597 | Practicing Empathy and Empathetic Listening with Robin Hills

They want all their people to be happy in their environment and in their presence, but I'm not too sure they've actually thought through the next step. How can people be happy or contented in that environment when they're faced with continual anger?

Today, I'm excited to welcome Robin Hills back to the show. Now, Robin's been on before, and we'll link to his previous episode here in the show notes. But Robin's as a sort of an expert in this field of emotional intelligence, among many other things, but he's especially well versed in emotional intelligence. And so in our previous episode, we sort of introduced that topic. And then we go a little bit deeper today and in today's episode, and so really just, we do begin again with definitions like, what is emotional intelligence? And why is it important? And then we just sort of just dive in. And one of the things you may not know or maybe you do know, I don't know. But I always have sort of a plan of how I'm going to go into each interview and some questions I'm going to ask. This is one of those interviews to where I had some. I had a plan and I followed it for the most part, but, gosh, just things just kept popping into my mind and just. I was just genuinely curious about this topic and was really just trying to pick his brain. And I'm really excited for you to listen to this one. I enjoyed it and I think you will, too. So show notes can be found over@gemba podcast.com Again, this is episode 596. Okay, enough from me. Let's get to the show. Robin, welcome back to the show. How are you?

I am doing great, Robin. Thank you for having me back on. It's a pleasure to be speaking to you and your listeners again.

Yes, yes, yes. So I was, I was looking. It's. It's been a. A few sleeps since we last talked, but just a few.

Just a few.

Yeah. Yeah, you were on. Let's see, episode 554. And just so you know, this is episode 590, so.

Right, right.

So, yeah, we've had a bit of time pass. So how's everything been going?

Everything's been going great at my end. Hope everything's been going great at your end. Well, obviously the podcast show is still going, so it must be.

Yeah, no, everything's going well. We, we, we. We love this podcast. And yeah, we. Interestingly enough, one thing that we're, we're pretty proud of is that we have never missed a week ever since Episode number one, there's been a few where we were down to the wire. We normally try to have a bit of a buffer just in case we have, you know, Murphy strikes or something like that, you know, but. But now it's. It's all good. So. Well, Robin, you know the drill. We, we like to begin all of our episodes with our guests sharing a quote. So what do you got?

Well, this time I have got a quote from Stephen alcovey from his 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. And it' one that I don't often hear, but I think it's a really important quote. Most people do not listen with the intent to understand. They listen with the intent to reply.

That's a good one. And I'm guilty.

Many times I think, oh, yes, so am I. So am I. I wonder what it is.

What is it about the human person that we can't listen, really listen.

I think it's all to do with self, and it's all to do with ego. I think we perceive the world through our own sensing system, and that gives us a very, very clear understanding of reality. And it's such a clear understanding from our own perspective that we just assume everybody else is seeing and perceiving the world in the same way that we do. Therefore, to try and understand somebody else's perspective becomes incredibly hard.

Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. I mean, even thinking about, you know, parenting and whatnot, your kids trying to tell you something, and maybe they have some valid points, but whatever, for whatever reason, you're not even hearing it. You're just waiting for the pause so you can just jump in, you know.

Yeah, and tell them what?

Right, exactly. Exactly. So, all right, well. Hey, where are you calling in from, Robin?

I'm in Greater Manchester in the United Kingdom.

Okay.

We just had a storm over here and we've just got the tail end of it.

All right, well, it's a beautiful part of the world. So I love. I love the uk, so. All right, well, hey, let's go ahead and jump right in. And so when we last talked, we, we. We introduced this whole idea of emotional intelligence in episode 554. That one we called leveraging Emotional Intelligence. And so maybe this is maybe you could say part two of the, of the series. I'm wondering if we could just begin with maybe some definitions. And specifically, how do you personally define emotional intelligence? And I don't know, has anything changed? You've been at this for a while, so has your definition changed at all over the years?

Well, no, I think if Anything, My definition has got a little bit simpler. And since I've simplified it down to its very essence, I've retained that as being my definition of emotional intelligence to work with. Very simply, it's being smart with your feelings, it's utilizing your thinking and combining it with your feelings in order to make good quality decisions and build up authentic relationships with a view to taking appropriate action. And beyond that, we can then start looking at various other aspects of emotional intelligence. But I think most of it is condensed within that very short phrase.

Yeah, your feelings, you know, these feelings are powerful things. I don't know how to describe a feeling. You know, anger or happiness, you know, all of these feelings that influence us. It's easy to say to sort of keep it under control. But what about, like, what about, like, I don't know, sometimes you would talk about, like, righteous anger. Like you should be angry about something is unjust or something like that. Like how. How does emotional intelligence play into situations like that?

Well, firstly, I think we ought to bring to the attention of your listeners that emotions are neither positive nor negative emotions. Emotions are a physiological and psychological reaction to your environment. So if we consider that emotions contain data that need interpreting through emotional intelligence, we can't assign any attributes to emotions in terms of being good or bad. So when we start looking at anger, one of the basic human emotions, we all feel angry from time to time. And often that's because somebody has transgressed one of our core values. And if it is something that goes against our morals and our ethics, then we need to do something about it. And so we can then focus our anger in an appropriate way in order to right or wrong. Now, in that sort of situation, that would be your definition of righteous anger. But a lot of people associate anger with just somebody lashing out and somebody being unemotionally intelligent with their anger and just utilizing it in a blunderbuss manner in order to get the outcomes that they're looking for. And many senior managers have learned over the years that they can get exactly what they're looking for by being angry with people. And then they want all their people to be happy in their environments and in their presence. But I'm not too sure they've actually thought through the next step. How can people be happy or in that environment when they're faced with continual anger? So, you know, the important thing about emotional intelligence is learning to choose the appropriate reaction that you're wanting from people and then tailoring your emotion in order to get that in a very supportive way. Rod, very easy, very easy for me to say here sitting here talking to you, but oh boy, it's so incredible.

So. But I mean, on the flip side, could someone say you're being, even if you don't mean it in a bad way, manipulative, that you're trying to manipulate people through your behavior?

I think we've got to bear that in mind. And emotional intelligence, when it's used for an inappropriate, or used in an inappropriate way as an inappropriate tool, it can be used to manipulate people. And there are instances throughout history and indeed in modern times where leaders and politicians utilize their emotional intelligence not for the greater good, but to get their own way. I think we have to go back to our own morals and our own values and say I am actually utilizing my emotional intelligence in order to create a better world and to be kind. And if we do it that way, then we are not manipulating people for our own end.

Yeah, yeah. What about like, I know we all have sort of like deep unconscious bias. We just. The human person is wired that way for whatever reason. What, how does that sort of, I don't know, play into the situation on how we're responding and dealing with other people?

Well, I think what we've got to do is to recognize that we have prejudices and we have biases and, and we just have to accept that that's part of being human, as you've just said, Ron, and just to try and work to minimize them and to mitigate them so that it then doesn't drive an inappropriate decision and continually check with other people. Am I being biased here or am I being prejudiced? There are ways in which people can measure bias and often what they'll do is they'll look at an in group and they'll look at an out group and they'll do various tests, particularly around different racial groups, to see whether there is bias there. And you know, the frightening thing that comes out of that is that everybody is biased towards their out group. That's the group of people that are not within their immediate group. So here I am, I am a white middle aged man. I've got to be consciously aware that those three factors drive different aspects of bias towards me or against other people. I'm biased towards younger, the younger age group, but biased against them. Probably biased towards people who are not white, bias towards people who are not English, bias towards women, bias towards people that may have a different sexual orientation. To me, these biases are very prevalent within all of us. And what we've got to do is Just to keep very much an open mind and recognize whether we like it or not, we've got these prejudices and try to stick with our morals and our ethics and say, I want to do right by everybody. How do I do that?

I know, but you love Americans, though, especially podcasts.

Oh, of course. Well, look, the majority of people who do the podcast, even the good quality podcasts, are Americans. So you just gotta love them, haven't you?

There you go.

And the majority of people are American listeners. So again, you know, it's important for me to say things not as a biased Englishman towards Americans, but to open up my heart to Americans. Say, look, here are my words of wisdom. Take some comfort from them.

Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. All right, well, let's switch gears a little bit now. And I want to talk about empathy specifically. How do you. How do you show empathy to others when. Well, and we've sort of touched on it a little bit already. Like there's obviously there's differences, many differences in this world, and you just rattled off a number of them. But, but how do we go about, you know, practicing empathy?

Well, most people do not listen with the intent to understand. They listen with the intent to reply. And that really is all about empathetic listening. It's about understanding the other person. You don't have to agree. You just have to listen and to understand. And what do we do? No, you're wrong. You're wrong. This is my view. This is my view. I will get you to come round to my way of thinking by being totally obnoxious, by not listening to you, talking over the top of you and telling you what.

How does that. How do you facilitate that correctly then, to not talk over people? You know, I have had a mentor in my life many years ago, and when I would be talking to them, every time I would finish saying whatever I was saying, they would just literally pause and wouldn't say anything. And just. And it almost. Some. Sometimes it would be like, it almost get uncomfortable because I'd be. I mean, maybe it's like three seconds and I'm like, ah, say something. You know. But I feel like this person was trying to not rush into their response and was trying to articulate, you know, just a proper reasoned response. Is that something that. Is that a tool perhaps that we could use when we are speaking to other people and it's a heated conversation instead of just quickly responding? Give some time, give some space.

Yes, it's important to utilize that time in order to utilize the intent to understand, rather than just jumping in with what you've thought about while the person was talking. Now, I deliberately started that with an awkward silence just to illustrate the point. But the awkward silence is an incredibly powerful tool that very senior leaders within organizations and indeed on the global stage use to a great extent. Some of the people that have used it in the past, Elon Musk and Warren Buffett, they get something that they do not want to answer. And the best way to deal with it is just to put in that order, awkward silence, and really consider what the answer is going to be. But rather than just considering what the answer is going to be, what is the impact that this answer is going to have on the conversation, and what is the impact that the answer is going to have on the people that are going to be listening to the conversation? So it's much more than just giving an answer. It's thinking things through and doing that in an empathetic manner.

Yeah. What about you personally, Robin? I mean, obviously you teach people all this, all these things, and, you know, help a lot of people around the world. But for you personally, how do you practice all these things that we're talking about?

Well, one of my greatest strengths, and a lot of people would say it's a big weakness, but I've twisted it the other way. I'm actually quite deaf. And so it means that I struggle to. I've struggled to listen to people over the years. Now, normally I wear hearing aids. And what that has given me is the capacity to learn how to listen better. Better than I did. I won't say better than other people because that's not particularly empathetic. I've got nothing to compare it with. But I feel that I have this capacity to be able to listen deep by going beyond the words and trying to really understand what it is that the person is saying to me. So this is something that I am really quite pleased and quite proud of. And most people would be mortified and embarrassed not want to talk about it if they are deaf. But as I say, I'm turning it now into a superpower. And if I can't hear anybody or if I haven't heard anybody, it's just really a case of saying to them, I'm sorry, can you repeat that? I didn't hear it. And if I still haven't heard it, I will say, look, I'm sorry, I didn't hear that. Can you repeat it? And if they still, I still haven't heard it, I will say, I'm sorry, I didn't hear that, can you repeat it? And they probably think to themselves, is he deaf? And the answer is, yes, he is. So what they've got to do is to learn how to help me, me to hear what it is that they're trying to say. It's not my responsibility to hear, it's the other person's responsibility to make sure that I've heard. Hey, there's another quote for you.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Now, obviously, the, the, the time that we see ourselves in right now as we're recording this, artificial intelligence has, has officially exploded across the world. We all, most of us are familiar with things like chat, GPT and all that, but that's just the beginning, right? I mean, it's, it's an, it's all in our smartphones. It's, it's everywhere. So do you think, first of all, that emotional intelligence is, is going to remain important or essential when sort of AI is doing a lot of the thinking for us? Like what, what's your, your thought on that?

I think emotional intelligence is going to come into its own over the next 10, 15, 25 years and beyond. Because let's go back to what we've just been talking about. Empathy. It's the ability to understand the person that you're communicating with. Robots just haven't got that ability to do that. So if we practice empathy, practice empathetic listening, we are going to be streets ahead of artificial intelligence. And there are other components that touch within emotional intelligence that we are capable of doing the robots are not capable of doing. One of those is being creative and innovative. Another one goes back to an earlier part of the conversation is being able to contextualize and say, is this right or wrong? Does this with my values? Does this sit with my ethics, my morals? And that then ties into our search for meaning. And a lot of people would badge that spiritual intelligence. But why am I here? Why am I on the earth in the 21st century, at the beginning of the 21st century, what is it that I'm doing with my life? How am I creating the world that I want the world to be? Where am I going to go beyond here? Now, a lot of those questions are big, big, big questions, but they're vitally important. They are things that humans have tussled with over all of our existence. And it can be seen in our art and it can be seen in our creativity. It can be seen within our storytelling. These are beyond the capabilities of the robot. They are at the moment, and I believe they always will be.

Yeah, yeah. There's Certain things that robots will never be able to do that we can. Like love, right? Yeah.

Yes, very much so. And, you know, a lot of people are really, really frightened about the robots. And I just say to them, well, it can't ride a bike. They can't get off its bike and carry it up a flight of stairs and it can't recognize a friend on the stairs and talk about what they did on holiday or have a conversation about a film that they saw a week ago and whether they liked it or not. That's. All of those just very simple human elements are devoid from the robots, you know. Okay, we've got Chatgpt and Gemini and Bard and Copilot and some brilliant AI tools out there, but they just were processing algorithms and they are brilliant, but they're not going to take over the world.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. All right, well, hey, Robin, this has been another great conversation. I appreciate you. You taking some time to visit with us. So maybe, I don't know if you have any sort of final words of wisdom that you want to leave with everybody.

Oh, that's a great question. I think we've got loads and loads of words of wisdom, of infiltrated words, what we've been talking about today. Ron, all I would say to people is just be the person that you are destined to be and be kind.

Yeah, that's a good, good way to end it. All right, well, hey, if people wanted to connect with you personally, Robin, what's the. What's the best way?

Well, I'm easily found on LinkedIn. Just put Robin Hills into the search engine. Should come up. You can contact me at my website, eiforchange.com. that's einumber4change.com and if you want to contact me directly, it's robini4change.com.

Wonderful. Awesome. And we'll have everything in the show notes. Everybody can go find and connect with Robin. So thanks again for coming on. It's been. It's been another fun one. I appreciate you.

It's been brilliant, Ron, and thank you ever so much. And also thank you for your emotional intelligence prior to coming onto the recording because we had some intense issues, didn't we?

Well, we got through it. Patience is a virtue, I suppose, right?

No, it's managing those emotions.

Yeah, lovely. All right, take care, Robin.

Take care. Take care. Bye.

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