Cross-cultural communication and empathic sensitivity in business leadership

Abstract

Over the past decades the global economy has become increasingly international and national barriers have been fading. Companies have evolved into multicultural organizations, with employees from different cultural backgrounds, each of them bringing their own culture and values, resulting in organizational multiculturalism (Davis y Newstrom, 2003). For this reason, to interact and collaborate successfully and create a positive work environment, employees need cultural intelligence (Goleman 2004 and 2019). This report analyses the relationship between culture and how leaders show empathy in the workplace. The key quality to become a successful leader is in the ability of the leader to show empathy (Bell, 2009; Goleman, 2004 and 2019; Moya, 2016 and Zaki, 2019). However, does communication in a second language has an impact in leaders’ ability to transmit empathy? To answer this question a survey was conducted amongst a group of managers of different nationalities, all of them working in multicultural companies. The analysis shows that cultural intelligence and empathy are closely related.