Michael Ventura is a leading empathy, leadership, culture, and entrepreneurship expert. He has been a leader, facilitator, and educator for over two decades. His work enables leaders and their teams to inspire growth and catalyze change. His book, Applied Empathy (Simon & Schuster, 2018) offers concepts and tools have been adopted by influential and respected organizations ranging from the ACLU, LVMH, Google, Goldman Sachs, IBM, Microsoft, and Nike to The United Nations the Obama Administration.
His work is well-known for inspiring others to feel, think, and act with more significant curiosity and an eagerness to broaden their understanding of the various perspectives that impact our inner and outer worlds. His research and practice of modern leadership draw on ancient wisdom to develop new skills and behaviors that are considerate, intriguing, and individual.
Additionally, he stresses the importance of developing social skills to enhance one’s leadership ability. One way we can do this is by working on our social skills in little ways, in our daily interactions. For instance, if a checkout clerk asks you how your day is going, take the time to respond thoughtfully and to ask them how they are doing rather than the typical single word answer. The same is true for finding ways to extend talks with acquaintances or honing your conversational skills with distant relatives you don’t speak to frequently.
Another tactic that Ventura speaks about is the practice of using open-ended inquiries as a powerful tool for getting people to open up about themselves. It can be beneficial by giving you awareness and insight into your friends, family, coworkers, and even bosses. An open-ended question can make others feel validated in their thoughts and emotions, which signals that you are truly interested in them. This sort of behavior ultimately helps to improve relationships and deepen connection.
As demand for empathy has increased around the world, Michael has communicated his work as an advisor to various public and private organizations and renowned organizations such as Princeton University and the United States Military Academy at West Point as a dynamic speaker and facilitator. His work has appeared in publications such as Business Insider, Fast Company, Forbes, The New York Times, PBS News Hour, and with attendees at Adobe’s 99U, SxSW, The TED Conference, and corporate events worldwide.
Michael’s techniques have been hailed as a watershed moment in the evolution of leadership skills. He is a dedicated steward of the positive, transformative power of empathy, whether working alone, in groups, or society. It’s refreshing to hear an expert in the field of leadership talk about these sorts of social skills and their ability to help us interact and communicate with people in any setting. Communication, empathy, interpersonal skills, and deep listening are functional social skills everyone can benefit from in both our personal and professional lives. These abilities can be a crucial component of staff collaboration, planning, and interaction at work as well as the difference maker in our personal relationships.
By emphasizing one’s particular facets of their social skills, such as your communication, teamwork, and collaboration talents, Ventura tells us that it will show others (potential employers, colleagues, even friends and family) the investment you’ve made in cultivating these important skills. When we recognize the value of communication in our daily life as a critical component of successful relationships, we set ourselves and those around us up for better, deeper, more meaningful outcomes.
