A Blessing and a Curse: How CEOs’ Trait Empathy Affects Their Management of Organizational Crises

“I feel your pain”: A critical review of organizational research on empathy

“…For example, a grief counselor who is high in trait affective empathy may experience poor job performance at the beginning of his or her career; however, as the counselor is exposed to additional grieving clients over time and as his or her clients begin to recover from their losses, the negative effects of trait affective empathy on job performance may diminish. Recent theoretical work by Kӧnig et al () also suggests that empathy may have curvilinear associations with outcomes; future research should consider this possibility, particularly when investigating interactive effects (Edwards, ). These suggestions mirror calls for greater attention to context in the emotional intelligence literature (Jordan, Dasborough, Daus, & Ashkanasy, ).…”

“…Given differential effects of different dimensions on outcomes (e.g., Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin, & White, 2008), we think it is critically important that inferences from research on a single dimension are not extrapolated to reflect empathy as a whole. For example, state affective empathy for others' negative affective states may engender a "narrowing effect" during information processing, where potentially useful and relevant information is excluded because of one's negative emotional state (Kӧnig et al, 2018). In contrast, state cognitive empathy appears to foster information elaboration and creativity (Grant & Berry, 2011;Hoever, van Knippenberg, van Ginkel, & Barkema, 2012).…”

“…Empathy has been examined in relation to a range of organizational phenomena, such as organizational citizenship behavior (e.g., Settoon & Mossholder, ), leadership emergence (Wolff, Pescosolido, & Druskat, ), and interpersonal justice (Patient & Skarlicki, ). In addition, recent theoretical papers have identified empathy as a critical construct for predicting organizational behavior, including leader–member exchange (Cropanzano, Dasborough, & Weiss, ), crisis management (Kӧnig, Graf‐Vlachy, Bundy, & Little, ), corporate philanthropy (Muller, Pfarrer, & Little, ), and forgiveness (Fehr & Gelfand, ). The importance of empathy in the workplace has also been highlighted by recent popular press articles centered on developing and managing empathy at work (Loder, ; Waytz, ) and organizational practices aimed at increasing employee empathy (e.g., Ford's “empathy belly”; Beasley, ; Apple's “Genius Manual”; Biddle, ).…”

“…We also thank editors Paul Harvey and Marie Dasborough and the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive feedback during the review process. critical construct for predicting organizational behavior, including leader-member exchange (Cropanzano, Dasborough, & Weiss, 2017), crisis management (Kӧnig, Graf-Vlachy, Bundy, & Little, 2018), corporate philanthropy (Muller, Pfarrer, & Little, 2014), and forgiveness (Fehr & Gelfand, 2012). The importance of empathy in the workplace has also been highlighted by recent popular press articles centered on developing and managing empathy at work (Loder, 2016;Waytz, 2016) and organizational practices aimed at increasing employee empathy (e.g., Ford's "empathy belly"; Beasley, 2016; Apple's "Genius Manual"; Biddle, 2012).…”

There is no such thing as a crisis: A critique of and alterative to the dominant crisis management model

“…Interactions with and relationships between the focal unit and other analytic units can then be probed: Interaction between the event and the strategic response of the threatened unit (e.g., Allen & Caillouet, ). Interaction between the event and the behaviours and personalities of those in charge of responding to that event (e.g., Grant & Mack, ; König, Graf‐Vlachy, Bundy, & Little, ). Interaction between leader effectiveness in response to the event and the variations of leadership development programs (e.g., Baran & Adelman, ). …”