Wooden's Wisdom | Leadership Resource Center

Issue 678 - "Upward Empathy" (Liz Wiseman and John Wooden)


Wooden's Wisdom - Volume 13	Issue 678
Craig Impelman Speaking \| Championship Coaches \| Champion's Leadership Library Login
"UPWARD EMPATHY" (LIZ WISEMAN AND JOHN WOODEN) John Wooden Video Clip (99 sec.): Coach Wooden is asked: "What are some of the more gratifying moments you had in your career?" In her bestselling book, Impact Players, Liz Wiseman describes the value of Upward Empathy in today’s workplace, when describing high performers (Impact Players): "Impact Players learn what their leaders need and are great practitioners of what I call upward empathy, the tendency to look up at managers and see not only a demanding boss but that boss’s challenges, constraints, and best intentions. Upward empathy is looking beyond what frustrates you about your boss to appreciate what frustrates your boss. Upward empathy allows you to take someone else’s viewpoint into account. The impact players figure out what I call the W.I.N.—What’s Important Now." The impact player gets outside of their personal job and goals and asks, "What can I do to help you?" My wife, Christy, who managed retail stores, described a great impact player she worked with, Rene, the stockroom manager. Rene would come to work and ask Christy what she had going on in the store and how he could help her. Rene would then jump in and help with the display, sales, or cashiering, whatever was most important now. The Impact Husband gets up everyday and asks his wife what he can do to help her. The Impact Athlete doesn’t whine about playing time. He/she asks the coach what they can do right now to help the team the most. As Coach liked to say: "It’s amazing how much can be accomplished if no one is concerned with who gets the credit." Do you just do your job or are you an impact player? Click here for personal development exercise: Issue 678. Click here for Printable Poetry: Issue 678. Yours in Coaching, Craig Impelman www.woodenswisdom.com Follow @woodenswisdom	COACH'S FAVORITE POETRY AND PROSE There Are No Gods! There are no gods that bring to youth The rich rewards that stalwarts claim; The god of fortune is in truth A vision and an empty name. The toiler who through doubt and care Unto his goal and victory plods, With no one need his glory share: He is himself his favoring gods. There are no gods that will bestow Earth's joys and blessings on a man. Each one must choose the path he'll go, Then win from it what joy he can. And he that battles with the odds Shall know success, but he who waits The favors of the mystic gods, Shall never come to glory's gates. No man is greater than his will; No gods to him will lend a hand! Upon his courage and his skill The record of his life must stand. What honors shall befall to him, What he shall claim of fame or pelf, Depend not on the favoring whim Of fortune's god, but on himself. Edgar Albert Guest (1881-1959)
For more information visit www.woodenswisdom.com