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Awakening Compassion at Work: The Quiet Power That Elevates People and Organizations

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Caring Is a Competitive Advantage

Suffering in the workplace can rob our colleagues and coworkers of humanity, dignity, and motivation and is an unrecognized and costly drain on organizational potential. Marshaling evidence from two decades of field research, scholars and consultants Monica Worline and Jane Dutton show that alleviating such suffering confers measurable competitive advantages in areas like innovation, collaboration, service quality, and talent attraction and retention. They outline four steps for meeting suffering with compassion and show how to build a capacity for compassion into the structures and practices of an organization—because ultimately, as they write, “Compassion is an irreplaceable dimension of excellence for any organization that wants to make the most of its human capabilities.”

272 pages, Paperback

First published February 20, 2017

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About the author

Monica C. Worline

4 books15 followers
Monica C. Worline, Ph.D., is founder and CEO of EnlivenWork, an organization that teaches businesses how to tap into courageous thinking, compassionate leadership, and curiosity to bring their best work to life. She is a research scientist at Stanford University’s Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education; Executive Director of CompassionLab, the world’s leading research collaboratory focused on compassion in the workplace; and co-author of Awakening Compassion at Work: The Quiet Power that Elevates People and Organizations.

Monica holds a lectureship at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, and is affiliate faculty at the Center for Positive Organizations. She is an award-winning teacher who has also served on the faculties of the Goizueta Business School at Emory University; the Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine; and the School of Social Ecology at the University of California, Irvine.

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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
Profile Image for Erika RS.
743 reviews227 followers
December 18, 2020
Organizations should make compassion one of their key competencies. Although compassion is often considered irrelevant in the workplace, it provides the foundation well-being that helps employees perform at their best. It also is at the heart of psychological safety which is critical to helping groups learn, adapt, and create.

One worry you might have going into a book like this is whether or not it will be just fluffy feel good statements. Fortunately, the authors have a solid framework for thinking about compassion in the workplace.

To have a high compassion competence, the organization's individuals should invest in improving their compassion competence. This means looking at how we can improve in each of the four steps of compassionate response: noticing the suffering, interpreting the suffering, feeling empathetic concern, and taking action to alleviate the suffering. Near the end the book, the authors include a self assessment to help you understand your strengths and weaknesses along with questions to help guide improvement in each of the four areas.

Individual competence is not enough. The organization as a whole must build compassion competence to help recognize and alleviate suffering within the organization. This is even more necessary when the organization itself is the source of suffering. The key measures of an organization's compassion competence are the speed with which a compassion response to suffering gets started, how sustained the response is, the scope of resources mobilized to alleviate suffering (utilizing many different types of resources), the magnitude of the resources mobilized (too little, too much, or just right?), and the degree to which the resources are customized to fit the needs of the current situation.

These measure can be improved by improving the compassion competence of different elements of the organization's social architecture. Build formal and informal social networks which connect people to others to allow compassion responses to activate more quickly. Integrate the validity of suffering and the fundamental dignity of all individuals into the work culture. Make compassion a part of all work roles, especially those that traditionally focus on taking a defensive stance toward suffering (such as legal and HR). Find ways to make compassion and acknowledging suffering a part of everyday work routines, such as team meetings. Make sure that leaders are leading with compassion by building individual compassion competence. Make sure they are also leading for compassion by creating a social architecture that integrates compassion. Finally, encourage the sharing of stories of effective compassion responses in the organization to normalize and encourage compassion.

Like with the personal factors, the authors include a list of concrete questions and assessments for these measures and social architecture factors. They also describe social architecture design patterns. These provide clear next steps for creating a plan to improve the compassion competence of an organization.

So... why a 3 star review then? Even by the standards of business books, this book was a slog to read. I frequently got distracted while reading it. This was largely due to the use of too many small case studies to illustrate the principles discussed, leading to a fragmented narrative. The chapters where the authors chose to primarily follow one case study were much more compelling.

I also found that the model did not shine through as well as it could have. When I got to the last chapters, with the assessments and questions, I was able to look back at the rest of the book and see that it had been structured around a tightly structured core model. However, while I was reading the book, the model was muddled.

Overall, this is a book on an important subject which hasn't gotten much attention, so if this is an area of interest for you, I recommend it. Just don't be surprised when it feels longer than it actually is.
Profile Image for Yulia.
56 reviews4 followers
February 11, 2019
This is a great book to start thinking about emotional intelligence and empathy for your co-wokers.
129 reviews7 followers
March 16, 2017
I am fascinated by the variety of cultures in organizations, and an active culture has always been my priority in looking for a new opportunity. I've learned the hard way what doesn't work and have been blessed as well by working with professionals that support one another and form a community. I've searched for the degree of relationships, community, empowerment, leadership, innovation, resilience. The list goes on and on. Guess what quality I haven’t searched for yet? Compassion. It never occurred to me to look deep inside an organization for compassion nor have I expected it. After reading the new book Awakening Compassion at Work: The Quiet Power that Elevates People and Organizations by Monica C. Worline and Jane E. Dutton, I have placed compassion at the top of my list when I look for exemplary cultures within our organizations.

The authors spent decades conducting extensive field research examining compassion way before any of us were exposed to terms like servant leadership or empowerment at work. They discovered that too many people are suffering in the workplace which presents itself in a lack of humanity, less dignity, lower motivation, and the lack of results with innovation, collaboration, employee retention, morale, and client relationships. It never occurred to me that a lack of compassion where we work every day may be the missing key that organizations have been searching for to change their cultures for people and results.

Awakening Compassion at Work is the tool that change agents who desire to change people and processes within an organization need to have on hand. Towards the end of the book, the authors present detailed blueprints for bringing about compassion for individuals, groups, and even how to deal with obstacles to compassion. Each chapter also offers us a question to ponder and fundamental principles to examine or put into use. There are compelling real-life, hands-on stories of compassion in play in some organizations as well as failures. These stories aid us in understanding the theories and tools that Monica and Jane offer peppered throughout the book.

We learn what compassion is and how some organizations resist it. Awakening Compassion at Work describes what compassion can do and what it won’t fix. Compassion must permeate throughout an organization and be present at all levels. Communities of sorts are formed and become the underlying strength of a company. There are four aspects of compassion, and each depends on the others. They include noticing, interpreting, feeling, and acting. Compassion is clearly an interpersonal action, and the compassion competence of a system depends on an emergent pattern of the four factors above. Worline and Dutton also offer suggestions as to how managers can awaken greater compassion through factors such as speed, scope, the magnitude of resources, and customization of resources for compassionate competence.

Awakening Compassion at Work illustrates how organizations can design for welcoming compassion. There is an extensive list of principles for companies of all sizes or structures in chapter 7 and is one of my favorite sections because it's hands on and so practical. Ideas include creating sub-networks within an organization where people can identify, examine hiring incorporating compassion and empathy, and coaching leaders to model desired behaviors or creating "melting" routines that bring people together. Moreover, we learn what actions or behaviors "awaken" compassion competence. They are elements that impact most of us face daily, and with the right mentoring and attention they can have profound implications. They include networks, organizational culture, roles, routines, and internal stories and leader behavior.

By now you should have a grasp of how important compassion Monica C. Worline and Jane E. Dutton feel is needed, and lacking, in organizations today. The information that I shared above is the tip of the iceberg and Awakening Compassion at Work offers an incredible trove of concrete research, information, ideas, and implementable actions companies can make to bring compassion alive. The shared stories bring ideas alive and will spark new thoughts and ideas from within leaders at any level. Compassion needs welcoming into every organization, but it needs to start with you. This book opened up my eyes to what we need to work every day along with empathy, empowerment, leadership or any other elements that you hold dear in a company culture. Bringing in compassion can completely change people and organizations which will impact our results. Are you ready?


Profile Image for Martti.
724 reviews
October 21, 2022
It's a classic "american" self-help book, where you have an anonymous Patty or Zeke that had a problem, but then she overcame the issue. The authors try to convey a research based "framework" to alleviate suffering and encourage compassion in the workplace, but it is difficult to distill it from the overly verbose fluffy text. They should have rewritten it couple of times to be more concrete and more to the point.

* Default to the generous interpretation when dealing with performance or ambiguous situations.
* Creating sub-groups within a larger organization where people with shared duties can develop camaraderie.
* Having regular meetings where people are encouraged to share not only work achievements, but mistakes as well, to make workplaces safe for learning.
* Telling stories about the organization’s mission and its accomplishments, emphasizing its humanitarian achievements and commitment to doing good to inspire employees.
* Formally recognizing acts of compassion at work to encourage more generosity of spirit.
* Having leaders role-model their own vulnerability to create an atmosphere of safety and trust.
* Compassion creates trustworthy workplace, lower turnover rates, less hassle with recruiting.
Profile Image for Saba.
355 reviews2 followers
September 22, 2018
My top three thoughts on ‘Awakening Compassion at Work’:
1. I have been at the receiving end of leaders who lack compassion. I was often miserable and demotivated in those organizations, hating every second I had to drag my feet to work. I am fortunate that my situation has changed after all those harrowing years. I’m currently working for a wonderful organization that knows how to be compassionate and treat me like a human being and not a machine. I have found myself becoming loyal to the company and being motivated to do more because of the trust and understanding of these leaders.
2. I really appreciate how this book doesn’t fill its pages with research, statistics and theory. It gives examples on how to tackle situations that require emotional intelligence and compassion. It works as a very handy guide for managers or even as a self help book.
3. The emotional intelligence covered in this book is basic and almost introductory. It mostly covers empathy and cognitive empathy. ‘Awakening compassion at work’ may seem like a 101 on being compassionate at work, but it is still a must have in any organization that truly cares about its employees.
Profile Image for Dan Lovaglia.
Author 3 books4 followers
March 28, 2017
Compassion Requires More Than Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence is valuable, but only scratches the surface when it comes to exhibiting true compassion. Monica Worline and Jane Dutton tackle the complexities of interpersonal care in the workplace with grace and truth. They don't just present research and theory, they steer readers toward personal change and practical application. If leaders in more MBA programs and organizations take Awakening Compassion at Work: The Quiet Power That Elevates People and Organizations seriously, it won't just impact the business sector--it will affect individuals, families, and communities as well. This isn't a quick-read leadership book. It's a guide for transforming people managers from the inside out so that everyone they lead experiences the heartfelt change compassion can make.
Profile Image for Synthia Salomon.
948 reviews18 followers
March 3, 2020
“Compassion as a principle of company management increases company performances and fosters innovation. It also creates more rewarding and enjoyable workplaces, the benefits of which can be noticed by employees and company leaders alike. After all, compassionate workplaces have lower employee turnover rates. Compassion does, however, require a certain amount of attention and investment, as well as an awareness of typical patterns that people fall into while at work.

Actionable advice:

Reflect on compassion in the workplace.

Sometimes, in the heat of the moment, it is hard to be compassionate. If you regularly take time – even just an hour each week – to think about what could be done to make your workplace more compassionate, you’ll achieve better results.

If you’re a manager, think of the last leader you encountered whose compassion inspired you. Did you do anything to emulate him or her?

Or, if you are an employee, ask yourself if you can remember any interactions where you failed to act with compassion. Was this lack of compassion connected to a pattern or culture within your company? What could you do to change this?”
Profile Image for Sunnie.
337 reviews28 followers
March 15, 2018
In today's society, it is a shame that business leaders and other high ranking officials need a book to get them to open their eyes and see that there is a better way to do business; a better way to earn customer and employee loyalty; a better way to view the world at large. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to feel empowered to make a change in their surroundings. Awakening Compassion at Work has examples of positive ways of handing employee illness, accident, death in the family, etc. that causes other employees to easily take over that person's responsibilities, help care for the family, work as effective and caring liaisons between insurance companies, attorneys, and others, or help make funeral arrangements if it comes to that. It also contains examples of companies that lets their employees fend for themselves. Think about 9-1-1 and how your company would handle such catastrophic events. Now go buy the book!
Profile Image for Douglas Silva.
44 reviews
March 26, 2024
Engana-se quem pensa que compaixão no trabalho está associada complacência. Liderar com compaixão e liderar para a compaixão não só melhora a vida de líderes e liberados como garante muito mais engajamento dos colaboradores, o que necessariamente conduz a melhores resultados para as organizações. Clientes que recebem compaixão se tornam mais fiéis. Colaboradores que recebem compaixão permanecem mais tempo na empresa e vêm propósito no seu trabalho. Compaixão é uma competência que pode ser aprendida por qualquer indivíduo e também pode fazer parte da cultura da empresa se houver um bom planejamento neste sentido. Por outro lado, empresas com uma cultura avessa à compaixão tendem a ter uma cultura tóxica, estão muito mais sujeitas à fraudes e a desaparecer. Esta obra apresenta de forma bem didática os conceitos relacionados à compaixão e como adotá-la nas empresas assim como traz exemplos muito ricos de diversas partes do mundo.
Profile Image for Jenn.
662 reviews
August 29, 2017
I won a copy of this book.

This book is about learning to care and be compassionate towards your co-workers. If you notice someone acting uncharacteristically, consider for a moment that they may be having a hard time outside of the office. Going and asking if they're "okay" could be the start of understanding them better. Plus, you're interacting with them on a personal level, outside of the "Well, it's just business" attitude. Either way, it has been show that caring what happens to a fellow employee creates a space of compassion in the workplace and makes people feel better invested in the company. Go get yourself this book. I would think this book should be part of managerial college classes.
Profile Image for Elizabeth.
945 reviews
April 26, 2019
I appreciated, very much, the sentiment behind this book. It's not often enough that people conduct research into good things that happen in workplaces with the aim of getting people to learn from positive examples rather than negative ones. That said, while the depth and length of the examples provided allowed me to really understand them, the specificity of the workplaces profiled made it difficult to think about how the examples would work in another type of workplace. In short, the fact that the work environment they described was so very different from academia made it hard for me to think about how the principles would translate. I wish they'd spent more time thinking and writing through these types of distinctions.
Profile Image for Michael MacDonald.
110 reviews2 followers
January 23, 2021
Compassion at work? It pays!

A critical foundational piece of literature in the realm of positive organizational scholarship.

The authors build an undeniable case for incorporating compassion and empathy into the workplace. It transcends simple encouragement to embrace emotional intelligence; the book demonstrates how and why action matters.

Using a blend of case studies and academic findings, the authors help us realize how an orientation to alleviating suffering will foster a better workplace and support team consolidation which in turn increases productivity and general success.

Well done.
Profile Image for Bob.
65 reviews1 follower
March 19, 2017
This book is an incredibly powerful response to suffering in the world. While it extensively discusses the suffering in the workplace witnessed and researched by the authors over nearly two decades, it also feels extremely timely because the pain endemic to the workplace is now manifesting itself in our wider culture. This book can bear witness to this pain in multiple ways. Have you intuitively felt that organizations that care about their employees are not only better places to work, but are also more profitable and successful? Monica and Jane show you that your instinct is spot on. Want to see examples of what compassionate workers, teams, and organizations look like? The stories in this book are incredibly compelling. Do you want to know how to assess your own organization demonstrates compassion, and enables its workers to exhibit it? My favorite section, near the end, guides you through simple but powerful tools for making yourself a compassion architect, and your organization a compassionate one. If you want to be a candle against the darkness of our times, read this book.
Profile Image for Mark Manderson.
551 reviews25 followers
September 13, 2018
Use compassion and anticipate employee needs. 

Empathy is innate to us all, but if we fail to imagine other people’s perspectives, it can be forgotten.

Cognitive Empathy: Deliberately imagining yourself in someone else’s shoes and try to work out the best way you could help them through the situation in question.

Compassion as a principle of company management increases company performances and fosters innovation.
Profile Image for Neena Verma.
Author 3 books23 followers
December 3, 2019
Given the times we are living in, this book makes an amazing contribution to help human beings and systems learn to collectively notice and make sense of suffering in the organisational context, and extend the emergent pattern of compassionate action from individual to systemic level.

I highly recommend this book to organisational leaders and consultants.

You may like to read my book appreciation of this book in August 2019 issue of AIPractitioner --https://aipractitioner.com
3 reviews
March 24, 2017
What a great book for leaders. We live in a world today where compassion is seen as a weakness and left for those which practice religion or a non-for profit organization. This book shows us why we all need compassion in the work place. With the changing generations and everything else we have to deal with today compassion is something that has never changed. We all need it and it just makes us feel better when we know someone cares. When you know your co-workers or boss cares about you it makes life at work that much better. I highly recommend this book.
Profile Image for Tanya.
147 reviews
March 3, 2020
It's a refreshing book to read in a world where employees often feel like just a number on the payroll. However, I don't think reading this book will give you better communication skills to become an exceptional leader.
Profile Image for Felipe CZ.
514 reviews32 followers
March 10, 2020
Compassion creates better workplaces, thus lower turnover rates. But it is definitely not easy to achieve it, and we must be aware of patterns and attitudes in our workplace, to avoid falling into bad atmospheres.
Profile Image for Stephanie.
13 reviews1 follower
September 23, 2022
The way the stories were laid out definitely helped bring the message home. I listened to the audio book and found the content to be digestible except for chapter 10/11/12?
Profile Image for Kathleen.
22 reviews1 follower
February 14, 2023
I never finished this book. I'm not sure why. If I pick it up again I will edit my review.
Profile Image for Teo 2050.
840 reviews87 followers
April 4, 2020
2019.11.07–2019.11.14

Contents

Worline MC & Dutton JE (2017) (06:44) Awakening Compassion at Work - The Quiet Power That Elevates People and Organizations

Foreword

Part I: An Introduction to Suffering, Compassion, and Work

01. What Is Compassion at Work?
02. Does Compassion at Work Really Matter?

Part II: Awakening Compassion in Our Work Lives

03. Noticing: The Portal to Awakening Compassion
04. Interpreting: The Key to Responding with Compassion
05. Feeling: The Bridge to Compassionate Action
06. Acting: The Moves That Alleviate Suffering at Work

Part III: Awakening Compassion Competence in Organizations

07. Envisioning Compassion Competence
08. Understanding Compassion Competence
09. Designing for Compassion Competence
10. Leading for Compassion Competence

Part IV: Blueprints for Awakening Compassion at Work

11. Your Personal Blueprint for Compassion at Work
12. Your Organization's Blueprint for Competence
13. Overcoming Obstacles to Compassion at Work

Epilogue: A Call to Awaken

Notes
Acknowledgments
Index
About the Authors
Profile Image for John Smith.
47 reviews16 followers
May 4, 2018
I like authors that write with passion, intelligence, and even a dash of spunk ...

Monica Worline and Jane Dutton have given us a rare gift. Their new book Awakening Compasssion at Work: The Quiet Power That Elevates People and Organizations takes a fairly old discussion and updates it nicely.

While most managers have moved (hopefully) beyond Taylor's concept that we are all just cogs in complex machines, we have not yet fully embraced the idea that we can work like we are playing some competitive team sport like soccer or football. These authors dare to suggest that what we need is less macho and more femininity in the workplace. That's not near all they do, but that's the direction they take us. I like the journey.
Profile Image for Jim.
902 reviews
March 30, 2017
Dr. Worline and Dutton provide an interesting spin on application of a much needed concept in our organizations today. Providing examples and information how compassion in organizations can provide a competitive advantage is an interesting concept and one that has lacked research until now. The text while empirically based was well written and easy to read. This is definitely a recommended read for organizationally minded researchers or individuals wanting to gain a competitive advantage in their own organization.
Profile Image for Roy.
98 reviews1 follower
April 23, 2017
The subtitle of this book is The Quiet Power that Elevates People and Organizations. From reading this book, the subtitle is compelling. In a business world – at least in the United States – where the only objective is this quarter’s earnings, this book gives more justification to the approach of doing well by doing good. In this case, the approach to employees is one of compassion. If we start with a compassionate approach, retention will increase, engagement will be stronger, and individuals will thrive. This is the latest in a series of books, many from Berrett-Koehler Publishers, whose authors are proponents of a collaborative approach to management. Data show that results improve if we as managers start by believing employees are best motivated when engaged – what Dan Negroni, in his book Chasing Relevance, calls API or assuming positive intent.

It can be argues that business leaders are compensated for leveraging results. This can best be done through an organization’s greatest asset, the employees. After a compelling introduction, Worling and Dutton point us to two sections of the book that, respectively, address a compassionate approach to work and within organizations. They steer us to four elements that will awaken compassion: noticing, interpreting, feeling, and acting. This is followed by empowering, understanding, designing, and leading for a management approach that is capable of operating with compassion. Finally, the book concludes with tools to implement a compassionate approach.

Lest the reader think this is all to simply provide a feel-good approach, the authors present compelling data based on over 20 years of field research. We are told – believably – that businesses that express compassion for employees exhibit better financial performance, operate more effectively, and retain both employees and customers at higher rates than those who ignore compassion factors. In examining malpractice claims, the authors point to research that shows that a legalistic approach to managing malpractice claims works against healthcare providers. Citing an article from Clinical Orthopedics and related Research, the authors note that the number of lawsuits decreased when physicians or administrators addressed suffering and apologized for errors.

In short, if we are to be better leaders, we should read and apply the lessons from these two scholars who present a very readable book.
Profile Image for Jung.
1,294 reviews24 followers
Read
September 11, 2018
Compassion as a principle of company management increases company performances and fosters innovation. It also creates more rewarding and enjoyable workplaces, the benefits of which can be noticed by employees and company leaders alike. After all, compassionate workplaces have lower employee turnover rates. Compassion does, however, require a certain amount of attention and investment, as well as an awareness of typical patterns that people fall into while at work.
Actionable advice:
Reflect on compassion in the workplace.
Sometimes, in the heat of the moment, it is hard to be compassionate. If you regularly take time – even just an hour each week – to think about what could be done to make your workplace more compassionate, you’ll achieve better results.
If you’re a manager, think of the last leader you encountered whose compassion inspired you. Did you do anything to emulate him or her?
Or, if you are an employee, ask yourself if you can remember any interactions where you failed to act with compassion. Was this lack of compassion connected to a pattern or culture within your company? What could you do to change this?
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