Leading with Empathy E-Book

Gautham Pallapa

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 493

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Learn to lead others through adversity with the power of human connection. In Leading with Empathy: Understanding the Needs of Today's Workforce, acclaimed strategist and business leader Dr. Gautham Pallapa presents an insightful roadmap to leading people through adversity and empowering humans in the workplace, the home, and society. Through this book, the distinguished author examines the impact of recent world-shaking events and how they have impacted us as a species and as individuals. He explores how empathy can help alleviate some of the more harmful effects of hardship and offers key actions that empathic leaders can take to inspire their followers. Finally, the book describes how to transform the way we work by rethinking and reimagining existing processes and innovatively introducing strategic disruption. Leading with Empathy also includes: * Stories, anecdotes, and personal musings that grant visibility and validation to the suffering of others * Exercises and strategies to reduce stress, anxiety, and improve happiness and positivity * Actions that enable leaders to empower people through empathy, collaboration, and communication. An essential read for executives, managers, and business leaders of all types, Leading with Empathy will also earn a place on the bookshelves of military, athletic, and educational leaders who seek to inspire their followers and empower humanity in the face of adversity.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

Additional Praise for

Leading with Empathy

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Preface

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1: Introduction

Adverse Impact of a Global Pandemic

Apocalypse Bingo

Impact on Families and Society

Humanity Needs Empathy Now More Than Ever

Finding the Silver Lining in These Dark Clouds

Proposing: Empathy as a Prescription for a World Overwhelmed by Adversity

Lead with Empathy

How This Book Is Structured

Notes

Part I: Adversity

Chapter 2: The Toll on Humanity

Adversity on a Global Scale

The Impact on Society

Racial Inequality and the Pandemic

Gender Inequality and the Pandemic

Virtual Schooling

Financial Impact on Industries

What Can You Do to Help?

Summary

Notes

Chapter 3: Overcoming Stress and Anxiety

Understanding Stress

The Three Major Stress Hormones

Effects of Chronic Stress

Symptoms of Stress Overload

Causes of Stress

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and the Pandemic

Happy Chemicals

How to Combat Stress

Activities for a Healthy DOSE of Happy Chemicals

Building New Happy Habits

Summary

Notes

Part II: Empathy and Leadership

Chapter 4: The Power of Empathy

Emotional Intelligence

Empathy

Types of Empathy

The Difference Between Empathy and Sympathy

The Benefits of Empathy

Empathy Is on the Rise

What Impedes Empathy

Enabling Empathy

Empathy in Children

Summary

Notes

Chapter 5: Leading with Empathy

Start Your Leadership Journey with Emotional Intelligence

The Benefits of Exhibiting Emotional Intelligence

Overcome Your Limiting Beliefs for Better Empathy

Random Acts of Kindness Increase Empathy

Instilling Empathy and Emotional Intelligence in Children

Children Are Our Future

Summary

Notes

Part III: Empowerment

Chapter 6: Enterprise Empathy

Empathy Improves Productivity

Empathic Leadership

How to Be an Empathic Leader

Improving Psychological Safety

Benefits of Psychological Safety

Customer Empathy

Shifting to a Remote Workforce Overnight

How to Develop Empathy at Work

Empathy as a Core Tenet of Organizational Culture

Crowdsource Empathy

Hire for Empathy

The Power of a Generative Culture

Summary

Notes

Chapter 7: Employee Empathy

The Benefits of Empathy in the Workplace

Remote Is the New Normal

How to Increase Psychological Safety

A Good Work-Life Balance

Summary

Notes

Chapter 8: Optimism, Evolution, and Empowerment

Adversity in 2020

Let's Be Optimistic about Our Future

Leapfrogging Innovation and Evolution

Leading with Empathy

Notes

Chapter 9: Actions for Empathy

Empathy for Adults

Encouraging Empathy in Children

Share Your Stories

Notes

About the Author

Index

End User License Agreement

List of Tables

Chapter 3

Table 4.1 Common Causes of Stress

Chapter 5

Table 5.1 Applying 5-Whys Analysis to a Problem: You threw a tantrum.

List of Illustrations

Chapter 1

Figure 1.1 How this book is structured.

Chapter 3

Figure 3.1 Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Chapter 5

Figure 5.1 Star Chart for measuring daily progress.

Figure 5.2 A Mood Tracker app.

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Figure 5.3 Emotional check-in with emojis.

Chapter 6

Figure 6.1 Ron Westrum's Typology of Organizational culture.

Chapter 7

Figure 7.1 Lean, Agile, and DevOps are transformational drivers for employee...

Figure 7.2 POWER start for a meeting.

Guide

Cover Page

Table of Contents

Additional Praise for Leading with Empathy

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Preface

Acknowledgments

Begin Reading

About the Author

Index

End User License Agreement

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Additional Praise for Leading with Empathy

“As technology becomes core, most leadership roles and value streams become more and more cross-functional, and organizations must move away from silos to survive. Breaking through these functional boundaries requires a deep understanding of others’ roles, perspectives, and challenges. Gautham makes a very strong and unique case for empathy being a requirement among leaders in order for them to cultivate thriving workplaces that drive innovation.”

—Dr. Mik Kersten, Founder and CEO of Tasktop and best-selling author of Project to Product

“Gautham's practical guidance in Leading with Empathy could not be more timely, as leaders grapple with supporting our teams through the ongoing challenges of the pandemic. Empathy is also the foundation to acting as an effective ally and using our voices to combat systemic racism.”

—Jacqui Allard, EVP Personal Financing Products, RBC

“In his book, Leading with Empathy, Gautham succinctly captures today's need to build a cohesive team and a positive professional atmosphere. With anecdotes from real-life experiences, the book talks about ‘people management’ and how leaders and managers should develop new traits such as patience, empathy, and the ability to relate to diverse situations. This book serves as a guide on how leaders should become responsible in creating an environment of trust and motivation, while leading form the front exhibiting the same traits, expected from team members. A must-read for all young managers and budding entrepreneurs!”

—Kaushik Madhavan, Vice President–Mobility, Frost & Sullivan

“A strong leader is successful by having a vision and a drive for success, but they also have an empathy for their team that helps them inspire, motivate, and build loyalty. In this book, Gautham explores empathy in its many forms, like how recent world events such as the pandemic and racial inequity have changed us forever, and through this draws out lessons for us all to employ in everyday and in the workplace to drive a better future. His use of anecdotes, stories, and recollections helps bring these approaches to life and leaves the reader with approaches and strategies to help them empower their people and be better leaders.”

—Martin Davis, CIO and Managing Partner, DUNELM Associates Ltd

LEADING WITH EMPATHY

Understanding the Needs of Today's Workforce

GAUTHAM PALLAPA

Copyright © 2022 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Names: Pallapa, Gautham, author.

Title: Leading with empathy : understanding the needs of today’s workforce / Dr. Gautham Pallapa.

Description: Hoboken, New Jersey : John Wiley & Sons, Inc., [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021028974 (print) | LCCN 2021028975 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119837251 (hardback) | ISBN 9781119837275 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781119837268 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Empathy. | Leadership.

Classification: LCC BF575.E55 P35 2022 (print) | LCC BF575.E55 (ebook) | DDC 152.4/1—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021028974LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021028975

Cover image: © runeer/Getty ImagesCover design: Wiley

Dedicated to my mother.

She taught me the value of compassion and empathy in a highly technology-dependent world. Her actions transcended her self-needs, and she was always willing to help others.

Her approach to life and work instilled in me a desire to lead with empathy and improve human quality of life.

Preface

My mother was a strong and empathic human. She was also incredibly driven and motivated to help people, sometimes at her inconvenience. When I confronted her about this growing up, she told me that a person's existence is meaningless until they improve another's life, even if it is in some small way. She confided in me that was a primary driver for her becoming a doctor. Seeing that look of happiness and gratitude in her patients made her feel joy and empathy.

My mother was a busy person, being an ob-gyn at one of Bangalore's top medical facilities in India. She then gave it all up to support her husband's PhD in England, switching from being a busy doctor to a stay-at-home mom, taking care of me, and later my brother. I never once heard her talk about her old days or how she missed her life while at home. She had put her family first and spent her energy with her children's upbringing and emotional support for my father during his doctoral studies. I remember several occasions where she went out of her way to help the friends she had made during our stay there. One particular incident stands out in my memory. A friend of hers was going through a rough patch, and my mother wanted to cheer her up. Despite being in her third trimester with her second child, she cooked her friend's favorite food and took me with her to her friend's house, braving a snowstorm. We had to change buses in between, and I remember not being very happy or cooperative during the journey, but she bore it all with a smile and patience because she wanted to be there for her friend. I did not know it at that time, but she had a wealth of compassionate empathy in her.

When we returned to India, my mother decided to return to work. Our stay in England had exposed her to other aspects of humanity, adversity, and suffering, and she decided to focus her energy there. It was the late 1980s, and the AIDS epidemic had started to become a topic of public health and concern. My mother decided that this was the area she wanted to work in. She joined her Doctor of Medicine program in Microbiology, specializing in HIV/AIDS. She then went on to become a leading expert in her field. We used to have passionate and heartfelt conversations on her research, patients, and their unique stories.

I learned about Devi, a victim of human trafficking, at the age of 13. She was sold to a brothel and forced to have sex at such a young age, an act that could only be described as rape, sometimes 10 to 12 times a day. She had her first miscarriage at 14 and mistook it for heavy periods. Not being exposed to sex education or the concept of safe sex, she became pregnant again and had her first child at 15. The child died within the first six months, probably due to an auto-immune disorder. Devi did not know it yet, but she was infected with HIV at a young age and probably passed it on to her child. She was rescued from the brothel at 26 and was brought to my mother's hospital for a checkup. It was at that time that she found out that she had full-blown AIDS.

Feroz traveled from Bangladesh (the actual township escapes my memory) to Kolkatta, India, searching for a job and a better life. He had promised his family that he would establish himself and bring them over within six months. Not being able to hold a stable job in Kolkatta due to his drug use, he moved to Bangalore in hopes that he could have a fresh start. However, unemployment stress exacerbated his drug usage, and Feroz quickly became an addict. It had been over eight months since he left Bangladesh, and through a relative learned that his wife and three children—unable to repay the debts that they had incurred—had committed suicide by eating rat poison. Consumed by guilt, Feroz took to drug abuse to numb his pain. Not having any stable income and using all his earnings to purchase drugs, he became homeless.

Mary's uncle abused her at the age of 5. She grew up in a dysfunctional joint family and ran away at the age of 10. She worked as a maid until the age of 15 but told that her employers repeatedly abused her. She resigned to her fate and went into prostitution. She told my mother that she received more valuable gifts from her abusers than her work and figured that she could have a better life as a prostitute than a maid. She made that decision at the age of 14. She was diagnosed with HIV at the age of 17.

I still remember the pain and compassion in my mother's voice as she recounted these stories. I wanted to follow in my mother's footsteps and be a doctor to make the world a better place, and my mother, fully supporting me, shared her work and stories to motivate me. Unfortunately, being two years younger than my classmates, I was deemed ineligible to pursue medicine for another year. Rather than waste a year waiting for eligibility, my mother persuaded me to take up engineering, my father's profession. She said that there were many ways to impact humans and that opportunity would always present itself to people who had the desire to help others. I took that to heart, and though I pursued engineering and later computer science, I sought to apply my knowledge toward healthcare applications. As an extension of my master's thesis, I worked on a device that performed vagus nerve stimulation for patients who have epilepsy and seizure disorders. As part of my PhD, I worked on smart technology to improve patient quality of life in assisted healthcare. It gave me a sense of fulfillment, knowing that I was using technology to improve patient quality of life in a small way.

What I cherish most about those late-night discussions with my mother was her retelling of work stories and experiencing empathy for her patients. We bonded at a deep, emotional, and empathic level. I could sense my mother's passion for her research, her constant effort to improve people's lives, and her pain when talking about her interviews with drug addicts, women in prostitution, and sex trafficking survivors. I am grateful to have been exposed to such an influential parental role model who imparted a sense of empathy in me.

My mother passed away from cancer in 2009, and it impacted our family deeply. However, thanks to my mother and her guidance, I have made it my life's purpose to improve human quality of life through technology early in my career. I have had the good fortune to work with hospitals, assisted healthcare facilities, nonprofit organizations, and charitable institutions to help humans (and animals) through technology. I strive to channel my mother's passion into my work and interactions. I take every opportunity to drive awareness of empathy and its value in enterprises that believe predominantly in technology to transform their businesses. I have embraced the role of a digital humanist and storyteller, promoting workforce empowerment, empathy, and an enabling culture in organizations. My mother's empathic approach to humanity has helped me view challenges as opportunities to help others, especially in the workplace.

The first time I was given the opportunity of moving out of an individual contributor role and into management, I was nervous and scared. With a lot of trepidation (and a strong imposter syndrome), I took on the management role, as I viewed it as an opportunity to earn a seat at the table to champion my teams' wants and needs. It was a high-pressure job, and, being inexperienced, I made many mistakes along the way, which increased my stress and anxiety.

I was not a stranger to stress, having dealt with it throughout my life. I was two years younger than everyone in school, and while it did not seem like much, it was considerable pressure, especially in my formative years. My school and college were one of the top schools in my state, and there was an expectation that I, along with a few of my classmates, would excel in the final examinations with flying colors. I started suffering from tension headaches at the age of 12. Within a year, it became so severe that I was placed on medication until I was 15. I can still remember that sensation of dull, aching pain in my forehead, sides, and back of my head as if someone was hammering at my skull from inside. Those episodes lasted for hours at a time, and to compensate for lost exam prep time, I would get up early or sleep late to make it up. Stress and tension headaches were my study partners growing up.

These headaches went away when I entered college, probably because I didn't exert myself so much. But, like an old-time friend that you run into on social media, these headaches came back when I entered management.

Looking back, I believe that my move into management enabled me to spearhead numerous initiatives and institute processes and tools that improved my teams and organizations' quality of life. However, it came at a huge personal cost in terms of stress, anxiety, personal health, political capital, and emotional drain. Despite this toll on me personally, I still believe that deciding to be a strong champion for humans and their quality of life was one of the best decisions that I have made. The adversity that I faced allows me to truly empathize with humans at a genuine level, embodied by my mantra, “Transform with Empathy.” This passion compelled me to write a book on empathy.

The world has undergone an unprecedented amount of adversity in the last few years. We have had hurricanes, tornadoes, racial inequality, riots, a global pandemic, wildfires, and unemployment, to list a few. There has been so much death, pain, stress, anxiety, and suffering in this world. It has been exceedingly challenging for optimists to find silver linings in this mountain of adversity that was 2020, and 2021 doesn't seem to be any better with the delta and lambda variants of Covid. However, it is essential to accept reality and the impact this hardship has had on humanity before we can look to emerge more resilient as a community. And that is what I have attempted to do in this book. Leading with Empathy is my attempt to elevate the importance of empathy in our technologically advanced world and champion human quality of life.

I start this book by exploring some of the events of 2020—the global pandemic and its impact on various industry verticals, racial injustice, and virtual schooling. I then explore empathy and how people can become leaders by acting with empathy. Employee empathy is a passion of mine, and I illustrate how empathy combined with technology can improve human quality of life in organizations, especially with a remote workforce. I have consciously not explored any political themes in this book. It is not because of my lack of belief in their crippling impact on humanity, but because I did not feel confident to have an optimistic or unbiased approach to the topic, especially as an immigrant still being put through the wringer of an unfair and draconian system.

As part of my work, I partner with enterprises on their transformation journey—a critical necessity for a world that has needed to go digital, remote, and contactless overnight. I have been lucky to amplify my call for empathy in the workplace through talks, keynotes, workshops, and executive mentoring. This book is an endeavor to elevate the conversation to all humans and another medium for recognizing what the world is going through and improving the quality of life of people around us, even if it is by a small amount. We currently face tremendous adversity, and there is suffering all around. My goal is to impress upon you the same message that my mother imparted to me. An opportunity will always present itself to people who have the desire to help others. All of us can choose to embrace our humanity and alleviate the less fortunate suffering around us. It does not require a massive amount of effort. Every small action counts.

Writing this book has been a wonderful, therapeutic, and fulfilling experience, but it has also been pretty frustrating at times. With the rate at which world events have been changing and rapidly evolving, I have found myself constantly catching up to them and revising my thoughts based on my learnings. Some of these events have been positive, such as vaccine administration to society, and restaurants and travel opening up again. Other events have been sad, depressing, or horrifying, such as the resurgence of COVID-19 through the delta variant, people making vaccination a political topic in the United States, or an uptick in racial violence. These are interesting and challenging times we live in.

In a way, the experience of writing this book has also been profoundly exhilarating, in the sense that I have been able to employ several Lean, Agile, and DevOps methodologies as this book moved from concept to consumption. Like other companies adapting to a dynamic environment, I went through a transformation of my own, albeit in a very personal way.

Finally, this book is also a eulogy to my mother. I am confident that she would have been a co-author of this book if she were still here, bringing her unique perspective, stories, experiences, and opinions. I have tried my best to channel her spirit and compassion in my writing. I hope you enjoy this book and join me in transforming humanity with empathy!

Dr. Gautham Pallapa               

Acknowledgments

Writing this book was more challenging than I envisioned but more fulfilling than I could have ever imagined. I was very close to my mother, and when I lost her to cancer in 2009, her death deeply impacted me. Since then, I have tried to emulate/extoll her virtues, spread awareness of her achievements, and cherish her memories. However, they always seem to have fallen short of capturing how amazing she was as a human being until I decided to dedicate this book to her. I have included several stories of how my mother shaped my life and made me a better person through her love, kindness, persistence, teachings, and discussion. I was not exactly an easy child, and I am forever indebted to her patience and for not having given up hope.

My wife, Rama, has been my rock throughout this journey. She has always been supportive of my endeavors, supporting me and staying by my side through thick and thin. Her ability to challenge my theses and provide a different perspective has kept me focused. I am eternally grateful that she does this with love and patience and still has not gotten exhausted from putting up with me and my craziness over the last 15 years. She is an immensely strong person, and I am fortunate to be a part of her life.

My son, Buddh, has been a treasure trove of learning, feedback, and a great partner in many of my experiments. Helping him adapt to virtual schooling, supplementing his emotional and physical development through a pandemic—reliving the joy of playing with Lego or soccer, coming up with inventive ways to entertain ourselves, grilling, Friday pizza and movie nights—these memories are priceless. Social distancing and lockdown enabled me to spend more time with my family than I have ever done before, and I feel blessed for that. Working with my son on experiments together, introducing Lean, Agile, and DevOps practices into his daily routine have been extremely rewarding. These experiences taught him to be emotionally aware, secure, and control his emotions, and he has given me valuable feedback if an experiment succeeded or failed. He was a champ and a trooper, though he might also be resigned to the fact that his dad was running social experiments on him and messing with his mind!

I also want to thank my son's friends and their parents, friends, teachers, caregivers, and other children who shared their perspectives, stories of adversity, stress, anxieties, and their approaches to handle and cope with the stress caused by the pandemic.

I am immensely thankful and indebted to my brother, Dr. Manu Pallapa, for reviewing the manuscript with a critical eye and a detail-oriented approach. His suggestions and perspective have helped me think many complex thoughts through, and break them down for better clarity and reflection. Our bond strengthened over passionate conversations around how our mother was empathetic and helped the community, and has made us closer than before. He has also helped keep me faithful to the book's premise and focused on core messaging instead of introducing tangential topics.

A few people have profoundly influenced my thinking and leadership style over the course of my career. Gene Kim with The Phoenix Project and his approach to DevOps methodologies started me down the transformation journey. Like many other leaders, I felt a strong resonance between the characters in the book and what was happening in my organization, and I made the book a mandatory read for my change agents before we embarked on our business transformation journey. With his book Start with Why, Simon Sinek helped me identify the purpose, the why, of our teams, and what business outcomes we wanted to achieve. Eric Ries with Lean Startup, and Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, and Gene Kim with Accelerate have greatly influenced my thought process. My friend Mik Kirsten with his book Project to Product has always been so insightful, and his take on flow and value management is phenomenal.

Various works by Dr. Brené Brown and Adam Grant have heavily influenced my thinking on empathy, compassion, and reciprocity have helped me cope with being an outlier in many respects. Daniel Pink has been an enormous influence in my initiative for helping the workforce, empowering and enabling a generative culture, and increasing psychological safety in the workplace. A few other authors I admire and have learned immensely from are Liz Wiseman, Malcolm Gladwell, John Maxwell, and Patrick Lencioni.

I have also been fortunate to have worked with many empathic leaders at Pivotal and VMware. Pivotal embodied empathy in everything that they did, and it showed in their work. I would like to specifically call out three outstanding individuals who are kind, empathic, and have always been there for me—Raghavender Arni, Chad Sakac, and Matt Nelson. Every idea needs strong champions to keep it alive, and these three leaders have championed my pursuit of enterprise and employee empathy, for which I am indebted. Additionally, the following leaders inspired me, encouraged my work, and channeled empathy in their actions—James Watters, Jeaninne Moya, Derek Beauregard, Jeff Arcuri, Mark Kropf, Steve Becker, and Duncan Winn. Pat Gelsinger, former CEO of VMware and current CEO of Intel, is a highly empathic person, and he embodied compassionate empathy in his actions, town halls, and communications. It was a great experience working with an empathic CEO, and his book, The Juggling Act, helped guide me with work-life balance. I am blessed to work with many of these leaders at VMware.

I am incredibly proud to be a part of an empathic team that transforms organizations with a holistic view and not just from a technological perspective. Jesse, Henri, Rick, Mark, Carl, Bernard, and JT—I enjoy working with you and look forward to many more pairings, interactions, and intellectual conversations.

Special thanks to Siobhan McFeeney and Mahil Maurice for their stimulating conversations, discussions, and insights as we collaborated on improving enterprise and employee empathy during business transformations. A shout-out to Tanzu (Pivotal) Labs and their passionate approach to be kind, do what works, and do the right things. Some of my best times at work were spent at their SF labs, and I missed being able to physically visit that location over the last year. I would be remiss if I did not specifically call out Pivotal Act, especially Ellie Ereira and Aly Blenkin. Our engagement with Mercy Ships was an excellent opportunity for us to exchange our thoughts on compassionate empathy and truly help people in need.

I have been lucky to have had some strong, empathic mentors— Lyssa Adkins, Thomas Squeo, and Maureen Mahoney—who have helped me grow not only through my career but also as a person. I want to give a special callout to Hunter Muller and HMG Strategy, Jayne Groll and Helen Beal from the DevOps Institute and its ambassadors, Mayank Mehta and Lisa Peng from Pulse, and the Project Management Institute. Our discussions and intellectual conversations have been fantastic and stimulating.

Thanks to everyone at Wiley who helped me convert my thoughts and ideas into a discrete, tangible artifact. Special thanks to Sheck Cho, executive editor, for championing my proposal and supporting me throughout this process, the editing teams for crisping up the content, along with Samantha Enders and the marketing team who helped synthesize my ideas into this book.

Personal development and growth are impossible without influence from interactions with friends, associates, colleagues, peers, and community members. Here are some notable people who have helped me grow in more ways than they know:

Swati and Abhishek Patil, Vidya and Sameer Rao, Sara and Kevin DeMers, Arvind Thapar, Jen and Dan Welch, Dinika Joshi and Prasad Sahasrabudhe, Asanka Abeysinghe, Swetha and Mahesh Kashyap, Madhu Venkateshaiah, Ajit Koshy, Shilpa Ramachandra, Kaushik Madhavan, Nidhi and Swarit Agarwal, Jason Foster, Sharath Sahadevan, Brian Peterson, Raj Rangaswamy, Santhosh Nagaraj, John Stong, Jeremy Hofstad, John Staup, Shane Heddy, Sina Sojoodi, Tony Hansmann, Tom Spero, Cornelia Davis, Tyler Jewell, DaShaun Carter, Jeff Hinds, Niki Theophilus, Joseph Barjis, Zach Gould, Dennis Rijkers, Artur Margonari, Jason Schreuder, Kathy and Dan Lanphier, Carrie Kenny and Shane Newman, Stacey and Rodney Parker, Gowri Chaganty, Steven Pratt, Pranav Patel, Pat Clark, Kelley Dean-Crowley, Greg Ahl, Matt Kirilov, Nancy Williams, Kookai Apilado, Rhonda Harvey, Songqing Liu, Kafeel Pasha, Stacy Skradski, Dan Werner, Christine Stanczak, Indradip Ghosh, Anita Kanavalli, Anand Rao, Niall Thomson, Dr. Guna Raj, Dr. Geetha Pugashetti, Aishwarya Suresh, Anup Vijaysarathi, my students and colleagues at PCCE Goa and MS Ramaiah Institute of Technology, my SPHS 93 friends, organizations that I have worked with, and people I have had discussions with and who trusted me with their stories.

Many people have been an influence and inspiration for this book, some of whom I never knew their name. Strangers who performed acts of kindness, people who demonstrated empathy when they did not have to. Some of the inspiration has not been positive, either. However, I want to acknowledge these people who suffer from apathy, insecurity, and hatred in their hearts. My earnest hope is that this book will help reduce such negative emotions and malintent in the world.

I want to acknowledge all of you readers, for purchasing this book and contributing to a good cause. A large portion of royalties received from this book will be donated to nonprofit organizations supporting the underprivileged, underrepresented minorities, and the homeless. By purchasing this book, you have made a difference in someone's life, performed a random act of kindness, and have positively impacted humanity. Thank you for helping.

And finally, humanity is not wholly defined without a spiritual perspective. I want to thank the Lord for protecting me through this complex journey of life and giving me the ability to express my thoughts and share my learning with my fellow humans.

Chapter 1Introduction

The global pandemic of COVID-19 demonstrated how fragile humanity truly is, despite our technological, medical, and evolutionary advancements.

To say we are living in uncertain times is an understatement. In recent times, many of us have been scared, confused, and unsure of what could hurt us first: an unknown virus, a deepening economic downturn, or growing geopolitical tensions. Uncertainty about our future physical and financial health, combined with the pressures of required social distancing, has increased our worry and stress. All around us, we kept hearing stories of peoples' lives falling apart, incidents of injustice and cruelty, alarming mortality rates, and an unprecedented death toll. As a result of all these events, the number of people worldwide1 experiencing high levels of psychological distress has noticeably increased since January 2020.2

Fear, frustration, panic, anger, confusion … we have all been dealing with these emotions (and many others) during these adverse times. News coverage and social media posts have managed to keep us in a constantly triggered state for long durations, making us paranoid, agitated, and insecure. What used to be normal is no more, and our lives have been affected in numerous disparate ways that we would have never anticipated or imagined. Mirthful conversations with friends over dinner and drinks on surviving a dangerous disease outbreak have slowly become a reality. Some people are unable to cope with these difficult conditions and are struggling with stress, anxiety, depression, and even suicidal thoughts.3 It is crucial for us to demonstrate love, compassion, and empathy in each and every encounter.

Many people are scared to interact with humans even when necessary. More patients are missing critical in-person screenings or are coming to the hospital too late for potentially life-saving treatment. For people living with serious chronic conditions, these feelings of fear, anxiety, and worry were amplified, manifesting into various degrees of harm. Those with serious, acute conditions often avoided the hospital due to a fear of catching COVID-19 and consequently ended up sicker, or dying.

Alarmingly, from March to May 2020, visits to hospital emergency departments decreased by nearly 40 percent.4 This was despite measures of how sick emergency department patients rose 20 percent between March and May. In Spring of 2020, non-COVID-19 out-of-hospital deaths increased, while in-hospital mortality has declined.5 Almost half of these decreases (45 percent) were seen in patients with cancer diagnoses, heart attacks (40 percent), and strokes (30 percent). Some leading health systems believed the death toll for these individuals would reach levels comparable to COVID-attributed deaths if patients continued delaying their care.6

Social distancing guidelines, lockdown protocols, rapidly changing information about the virus, portrayal of the virus's danger on media, combined with changes in our external surroundings have all played into individual cognitive biases influencing how people perceived the threat of COVID-19 and influenced their decisions overall. To further complicate matters, rising unemployment also led to real trade-offs in care and affordability. Nearly half of Americans said they or someone they live with had to delay essential care since COVID-19 began.7 Some countries have been suffering a debilitating second wave of the pandemic with a shortage of hospital beds, healthcare workers, medication, vaccines, and even oxygen supplies.

The COVID-19 pandemic put everything to the test—from healthcare systems to supply chains to social safety nets. It also tested our moral character. We didn't fail this last test, but we didn't exactly make the honor roll, either. Throughout lockdown, most of us behaved responsibly by practicing physical distancing and staying away from crowded places to flatten the curve. But as restrictions partially lifted, hundreds gathered unnecessarily in places like boardwalks, beaches, and parks, with no regard to safe distancing, just for a picnic. Many people resisted wearing masks in public, claiming an affront on their civil liberties, putting themselves and others near them at considerable risk.

Yes, isolation has been hard on many, especially in urban areas and small living spaces. But it was challenging to see people on the news and social media saying things like “I don't think this affects me,” or “The pandemic is a hoax,” or even, “I do not trust the vaccine and won't get vaccinated.” It might have been challenging as well to see people with hearing loss, for example, suggesting the use of clear masks. If we have trouble considering the well-being of others in the midst of COVID-19, how can we begin to empathize with anyone outside of our own experience?

How we behave in these situations is important, even beyond COVID-19. Our actions demonstrate our ability to put the greater good ahead of personal desires. Without that capacity, we'll never tackle other global problems, from endemic poverty and climate change to the biggest test of our empathy: systemic racism.

Once vaccine rollout was widespread, people certainly felt pandemic fatigue and many were impatient with the slow progress. They wanted to make up for lost time and regarded the slow vaccine rollouts as bureaucratic incompetence. Administering a vaccine to the entire population is challenging and requires complex planning, logistical management, and tactical execution. There are established protocols to follow, procedures to adhere to, and demographics to cater to. There are horrendous reports of people trying to cheat the system by providing wrong information, buying a prioritized place in line, or impersonating elderly or essential workers.8 A majority of these actions are by a section of society that has become entitled through their wealth and privilege and cannot comprehend a system of democracy where all people are treated equally. It is, therefore, appalling to see people complain about how an unfair system has singled them out and how they face injustice.

People of color and Indigenous groups face racial injustice every day. Those of us who live with racial privilege don't have that experience. Many people in developed worlds have never suffered severe hunger. They don't know what it's like to flee their home country to escape war. They have never had to worry about an unfair immigration system. A lack of lived experience doesn't relieve us of responsibility; it means we need to work harder at empathy. We need to work harder to understand how we might be connected to someone else's pain and to act accordingly.

Many of us understood that a relaxing day in a crowded park during a pandemic could help spread disease. We realized that our actions affected others around us—like healthcare workers, first responders, or grocery store workers who did not have the luxury of isolating themselves—a butterfly effect 9 at a global scale. Our daily habits are connected to climate change and to the Inuit communities most affected by melting polar ice. Our consumption habits are connected to workers in developing countries. From empathy, we can better understand this interconnectedness. And then we can move to action.

Above all, COVID-19 tested our willingness to make small sacrifices, to prioritize the safety of others before our own comfort, to think about others and how our actions affect our community. We can give up coffee or take-out dinners for a month and make a donation to a group most affected by the pandemic. We can stand up for an immigrant being harassed on the bus or speak out when a friend or family member makes racist comments, even if it makes us uncomfortable.

COVID-19 was a moral test of our time, assessing our ability to think about others before ourselves and to take action for the greater good. It was a test, but not the final exam. We still have the opportunity to learn. We can still build on the character strengths and fix the moral weaknesses that COVID-19 laid bare.

Adverse Impact of a Global Pandemic

There have been at least 209.2 million cases of COVID-19 worldwide with 4.4 million dead.10

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a dramatic loss of human life worldwide and presents an unprecedented challenge to public health, global economy, hospitality, food systems, and the world of work. The economic and social disruption caused by the pandemic has been devastating: tens of millions of people are at risk of falling into extreme poverty, while the number of undernourished people, currently estimated at nearly 690 million,11 could increase by up to 132 million by the end of the year. Numerous people are having to make base decisions: feed the family, pay for a roof over their heads, or pay for healthcare. Many cannot even afford to choose two out of those three choices without falling into inextricable debt.

Millions of enterprises also face an existential threat. Nearly half of the world's 3.3 billion global workforce were at risk of losing their livelihoods.12 Informal and gig economy workers were particularly vulnerable because the majority lacked social protection and access to quality healthcare in addition to losing access to productive assets. Without the means to earn an income during lockdowns, many were unable to feed themselves and their families. For most, no income meant no food, or, at best, less food and less nutritious food.

The pandemic also affected the entire food system and has exposed its fragility. Border closures, trade restrictions, and confinement measures prevented farmers from accessing markets, including for buying inputs and selling their produce, and agricultural workers from harvesting crops, thus disrupting domestic and international food supply chains and reducing access to healthy, safe, and diverse diets. The pandemic decimated jobs and placed millions of livelihoods at risk. As breadwinners lost jobs, fell ill, and died, the food security and nutrition of millions of women and men came under threat, with those in low-income countries, particularly the most marginalized populations, which include small-scale farmers and Indigenous peoples, being hardest hit.

Millions of agricultural workers—waged and self-employed—while feeding the world, regularly faced high levels of working poverty, malnutrition, and poor health, and they suffered from a lack of safety and labor protection as well as other types of abuse. With low and irregular incomes and a lack of social support, many of them were compelled to continue working, often in unsafe conditions, thus exposing themselves and their families to additional risks. Further, when experiencing income losses, they were coerced into resorting to negative coping strategies, such as distress sale of assets, predatory loans, or child labor. Migrant agricultural workers were particularly vulnerable, because they faced risks in their transport, working, and living conditions and struggled to access support measures put in place by governments. In the future, guaranteeing the safety and health of all agri-food workers—from primary producers to those involved in food processing, transport, and retail, including street food vendors—as well as better incomes and protection, will be critical to saving lives and protecting public health, people's livelihoods, and food security.

During the COVID-19 crisis, food security, public health, and employment and labor issues—in particular, workers' health and safety—converged. Adhering to workplace safety and health practices and ensuring access to decent work and the protection of labor rights in all industries are crucial in addressing the human dimension of the crisis. Immediate and purposeful action to save lives and livelihoods should include extending social protection toward universal health coverage and income support for those most affected. These include workers in the informal economy and in poorly protected and low-paid jobs, including youth, older workers, and migrants. Particular attention must be paid to the situation of women, who are overrepresented in low-paid jobs and care roles. In fact, several studies found that, financially, women suffered disproportionally during the pandemic.13 Different forms of support are key, including cash transfers, child allowances and healthy school meals, shelter and food relief initiatives, support for employment retention and recovery, and financial relief for businesses, including micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises. In designing and implementing such measures, it is essential that governments work closely with employers and workers.

Countries dealing with existing humanitarian crises or emergencies were particularly exposed to the effects of COVID-19. Responding swiftly to the pandemic, while ensuring that humanitarian and recovery assistance reaches those most in need, continues to be critical.

Now is the time for global solidarity and support, especially with the most vulnerable in our societies, particularly in the emerging and developing world. Only together can we overcome the intertwined health and social and economic impacts of the pandemic and prevent its escalation into a protracted humanitarian and food security catastrophe, with the potential loss of already achieved development gains.

We must recognize this opportunity to build back a better world for all, as noted in a press briefing issued by the United Nations Secretary-General. The UN is committed to pooling their expertise and experience to support countries in their crisis response measures and efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.14 We need to develop long-term sustainable strategies to address the challenges facing the health and agri-food sectors. Priority should be given to addressing underlying food security and malnutrition challenges, tackling rural poverty, in particular through more and better jobs in the rural economy, extending social protection to all, facilitating safe migration pathways, and promoting the formalization of the informal economy.

We must rethink the future of our environment and tackle climate change and environmental degradation with ambition and urgency. Only then can we protect the health, livelihoods, food security, and nutrition of all people, and ensure that our new normal is a better one.

Apocalypse Bingo

First the pandemic, which divided us, economically devastated us; it has killed nearly 4.1 million15 of us worldwide.16 Then the racial unrest, erupting at the deaths of more Black Americans at the hands of police: George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Rayshard Brooks, Daniel Prude—to name a few.

Combine that with extreme weather patterns. For only the second time in history, the National Hurricane Center moved into the Greek alphabet for storm names. The wildfires of 2020 were bigger, deadlier, and more frequent than in years past. For months in several West Coast cities of the United States, people could not breathe properly.17 Many were evacuated, lost their homes, and there was widespread destruction. On a personal front, we almost got evacuated ourselves and experienced a level of anxiety and stress that we had never faced before. We also caught a glimpse of an inevitable bleak dystopian future with red skies, an ash-covered moon, and a blotted sun for days.

In record numbers, humans have been anxious, worried, sleep-deprived, distracted, and depressed. The COVID-19 pandemic's triple whammy of an invisible and omnipresent threat (coronavirus infection), profound disruptions in daily life, and uncertainty for the future thrust many people into a chronic, high-stress state that is, let's just say, less than optimal for rational thinking or any other sort of higher-order cognitive functioning.

Many social forums and social circles started referring to all this adversity as 2020 bingo or Apocalypse bingo. They made it a game of checking off items from a master list of apocalyptic scenarios: Australian wildfires, a plague of locusts and cicadas, war in the Middle East, an asteroid larger than the Empire State Building passing by Earth, solar flares, and increased seismic activity in Yellowstone suggesting reactivation of the supervolcano are but a few examples on the apocalypse bingo card. Several memes emerged as part of this macabre humor.18

While the COVID-19 pandemic raged on worldwide, the immediate mental health impact of this collective trauma is coming into focus even as the outlook for long-term psychological effects remains considerably fuzzier.

Are we experiencing a pandemic of mental illness? Much has been reported about the ill-termed “mental health pandemic” that seems to be surging through the United States and other countries in lockstep with lockdowns and the death, societal disruption, and economic devastation of the viral pandemic. Many experts have sounded the alarm for an approaching tsunami of psychological maladies that could sink an already overburdened mental healthcare system.

A growing cache of data seem to bear out those fears. A recent population survey conducted in April and May found a threefold increase in depression since the pandemic began.19 The researchers examined mental health problems relative to 13 pandemic-specific stressors, including loss of a job, death of someone close to you due to COVID-19, and financial problems. The more stressors people reported, the more likely they were to also report symptoms of anxiety and depression. Other studies show similar rises. From April to October of 2020, the National Center for Health Statistics partnered with the Census Bureau and tracked anxiety and depression symptoms among Americans in household pulse surveys, finding a sharp rise in both.20

Impact on Families and Society

The economic and social disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic affected millions of people worldwide. It rattled pretty much every segment of life, including education, economy, religion, employment, tourism, entertainment, sports, food, security, and posed significant challenges to the global economy. Research has shown the pandemic's significant impact on the psychological well-being of families and overall society and how it has changed the way we work, eat, and interact. Social distancing has led us to a more virtual experience both personally and professionally. Let's take an in-depth look at how the pandemic has affected families and society over the last year.

Impact on Families

COVID-19 was a seismic shock for everyone, even for the financially stable families who did not suffer any income loss from lockdown closures and social distancing. Many people have lost their jobs; some are working on remote jobs from home, and others associated with healthcare cannot meet their families to protect them from virus exposure. Families living in poverty with dependent children and less-educated parents were more adversely affected by the pandemic's emotional, physical, and financial implications than others.

Many single-income families were hit hard when their livelihood was affected by the lockdown and shelter-in-place. Many of these families did not have savings to fall back on, having lived paycheck to paycheck on a minimum wage that hardly covered the inflation rate or price increase of commodities due to the pandemic. Families have also struggled with the additional costs of raising their children at home, most notably from closed schools and childcare. The financial hardships during the pandemic have forced people to make significant changes in everyday routines and with limited resources.

Increased Responsibilities

Traditionally, women were already carrying the primary load as caregivers before the onset of the pandemic. According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in the United States,21 59 percent of women reported that they perform more household chores than their spouse or partner. The same study revealed that only 46 percent share equal domestic responsibilities with their partner. These numbers are worse in developing countries or nations with poor women's rights.22

With the abrupt crises and closure of schools and daycare centers worldwide, the workload dramatically increased for women. As with all times of stress and anxiety, families and the community at large found comfort in the caregiving nature of women. Women are expected to take care of their families and household duties without any additional support. Some men are now more involved with their families, but that percentage is still low overall.

Difficulty in Achieving Work-Life Balance

The pandemic has allowed men to put their share in childcare and housework, and that's the best way to achieve work and family life balance during these challenging times. Parents juggling a full-time job and homeschooling find it challenging to balance their work schedules and their kids' homeschooling schedules. Furthermore, there is a vast discrepancy in the quality and effectiveness of homeschooling, which depends on the parent's education level, language, physical and psychological health, and availability of computer skills along with Internet connectivity.

Homeschooling Children

Reliance on homeschooling had a massive negative impact on children, particularly for underprivileged communities. Virtual schooling was exceedingly challenging for children with special needs and their caregivers. Children experienced considerable stress and anxiety adapting to new communication methods with their teachers, video conferencing solutions, and loss of physical interaction in a familiar setting (school classrooms). They could not spend time with their peers for group learning or go to recess to play with their friends. Child development has been severely impaired due to virtual schooling. We may not know the true long-lasting effects of this forced isolation on the world's children for many years.

Impact on Birthrates

The COVID-19 crises created a baby boom with millions of people stuck at home cut off from reproductive healthcare. Around 140 million babies were born worldwide in 2020.23 The United Nations has already predicted that about 47 million women were unable to access contraceptive measures during the lockdown,24 leading to unwanted pregnancies. Just as expected, after roughly 10 months into the lockdown, there was a huge baby boom worldwide.25 Although social distancing urged partners to meet less and financial instability caused many families to stop having children, the lockdown has led to increased planned and unplanned pregnancies.

Despite the fact that there was a considerable spike in birthrates throughout the world, it was a significant concern for poverty-stricken and underdeveloped nations.26 In India, about 1.85 million women were unable to access contraception and safe abortions during the lockdown. Pandemic-linked deaths in children are projected to be at least 10,000 per month in Latin America, South Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa.27 A study from the Standing Together for Nutrition Consortium predicted that over 12 million children would suffer from undernutrition, wasting, or severe malnutrition due to the pandemic.28

Societal Impact

COVID-19 has severely affected many communities. In particular, vulnerable communities with entrenched poverty, limited employment flexibility, and overcrowded housing faced significant challenges. The health and economic impacts of the virus are being borne disproportionately by poor people. They continue to affect the most vulnerable populations, including older citizens, disabled people, youth, and Indigenous people. Other people at a disadvantage include the homeless, who are more exposed to the danger of the virus in tent camps and other close quarters. Similarly, refugees and migrants also stand to suffer from the pandemic and its aftermath.

Social Relationships

COVID-19 disrupted people's social relationships and the ways they used to connect with their loved ones. Some people felt isolated