Human-Centric Approach Critical for Businesses in the Long Run
Leaders agree that businesses can grow without sacrificing empathy. In fact, making empathy a core value can help turn rapid growth into lasting success.
News
- Perplexity Unveils AI System Built to Run Entire Workflows
- Salesforce CEO Dismisses SaaSpocalypse Fears
- e& Delivers Record Profit Ahead of CEO Transition
- When 27 Seconds Is Enough: Inside the AI-Driven Threat Surge
- UAE’s G42 and Publicis Sapient Sign MoU for AI-First Joint Venture
- Nearly 100% UAE CIOs Believe Their Reputation Will be at the Mercy of AI
[Image source: Chetan Jha/MITSMR Middle East]
With so much focus on data and technology, are we losing sight of what makes us human: empathy?
Across industries, especially in tech, employees face long hours, understaffing, and little support. This stressful environment leads to more anxiety, depression, and even substance abuse.
A study by SHRM in February 2025 revealed that nearly 1 in 3 US workers (31%) said their job made them stressed “always or often,” while most noted workload contributing the most to their stress (37%), followed by pay/compensation (33%), understaffing (31%), and poor leadership (29%). Other stressors included a lack of recognition and a toxic workplace culture.
Today, being human is considered a weakness in a world where profits and business growth take precedence.
“People will try to convince you that you should keep your empathy out of your career. Don’t accept this false premise,” said Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, under whom the company maintained strong employee retention compared to its tech peers, in 2017.
But is this still true today?
Many leaders agree that empathy need not be lost as businesses grow. Instead, it can help turn fast growth into long-term success.
“Tech-focused can also be human-focused…. I strongly disagree with the notion that focusing on technology means you cannot focus on people. At the end of the day, technology companies exist to solve human problems,” says H.E. Dr. Tariq Bin Hendi, board member at Astra Tech and CEO of Botim.
Why Empathy Matters?
Cloud-based, SaaS provider of employee benefits administration technology, Businessolver, defines empathy as “the ability to understand and/or experience the feelings or perspectives of another.”
Globally, over 3.5 billion people will spend approximately 90,000 hours, or about 45 years, of their lives at work, as per FreshBooks. This makes the workplace a critical environment for employees and employers.
Employee burnout is a genuine occupational issue, with studies showing a 66% rate of job burnout. “Over the course of my career, I have seen highly talented individuals burn out, disengage, or leave; not because of strategy or compensation, but because leadership failed to protect their mental well-being,” says Hendi on the pattern that shaped how he perceives leadership.
Suresh Sambandam, Founder & CEO of Kissflow, echoes a similar view. “[Burnout] taught me the simple fact that people are not machines. When you protect the human, performance follows. When you ignore humans, nothing sustainable survives.”
Humanizing the Workplace
The truth is simple: actions follow attitude. Simon Sinek, a well-known author, inspirational speaker, and leadership expert, shared a story about a friend who was upset at work and called her boss a terrible person.
“I asked if she abused her children and kicked her dog, and she said no,” and explained that the real issue was not her boss’s character, but leadership.
It is important to separate a person’s job role from who they are as an individual.
“Maybe they weren’t given an education on how to lead,” Sinek said, adding, “we won’t know what they are operating in and that they are doing the best they can with the circumstances and tools they’ve got.”
While this theory may not apply to every scenario people encounter, the essence remains the same: leading with empathy.
Sumanta Roy, President & Regional Head – Middle East & Africa at TCS, calls COVID-19 a watershed moment for workplace culture and operations. “I think leaders realised how important it is to connect and have avenues for employee welfare beyond what is needed by the law,” he says. “Beyond the minimum requirements of the law, you have things that are important, and sometimes it does not cost much.”
With too many moving parts, be it customer retention, cash flow, or business continuity, he made a decision. “When there’s a toss-up between things, we will prioritize employee health at that point in time.”
During the pandemic, companies implemented a wide range of welfare initiatives to ensure employee health, safety, and financial stability, shifting towards a more holistic, “people-first” approach. These approaches included reduced working hours, sabbaticals, mental wellness programs, employee assistance programs, virtual connection activities, and special leave policies.
The practices made a significant impact, with Aon’s Global Wellbeing Survey 2023 revealing that companies that improved employee wellbeing, workplace culture, work/life balance, and belonging enhanced their performance by up to 55%, and that the integration of wellbeing with overall business and talent strategy increased by 17 points since 2020.
The management consulting firm further noted that people were 1.5 times more likely to stay with their employers if they felt their well-being was a priority.
Simply put, empathy is no longer a ‘nice to have’ feature, but rather a tool to expedite growth.
Taking the Leap of Faith
In a time where degrees matter the most, Sambandam took a different route. At 17, he opted to skip higher education. Rather, after programming piqued his interest, he co-founded a computer training center. While others’ sources of education and exposure were largely limited to the brick-and-mortar of an educational institution, his training center gave him unlimited exposure to create programs and solve real-world problems.
Later, HP showed confidence in him, where he spent three years developing Mobile Fraud detection software for Vodafone. “When someone believes in you before your résumé does, you never forget it,” the Kissflow chief shares, adding that the experience taught him that capability doesn’t always come wrapped in certificates.
“So today, I look for hunger, curiosity, and ownership. Degrees can open doors, but character and learning mindset keep you inside the room,” the Kissflow chief shares.
IBM’s “New Collar” initiative, launched in 2027, focuses on hiring for skills rather than traditional four-year degrees, targeting roles in cloud computing, cybersecurity, and AI for candidates with non-traditional backgrounds, like bootcamps, certifications, or self-taught experience. Leading companies such as Apple, Google, and IBM have also dropped college degree requirements.
Globally, the talent pool increase from skills-based hiring is 6% higher for non-degree workers than workers with bachelor’s degrees, according to a 2025 LinkedIn report.
“I’d rather hire someone who took some big swings and missed than someone who played it safe and nailed it. The goal isn’t a perfect track record. The goal is to learn faster than anyone else,” shared Mustafa Suleyman, CEO, Microsoft AI, in a post.
He explains that taking risks should not be reckless. Instead, it means being bold enough to form an idea, test it, and see if you were right. It also means being open to being proven wrong.
Case in point being Dyson. The appliance manufacturer invests in future talent by engaging high school students through work-study programs.
Developing the Real “Operating System”
A culture that values fairness, kindness, and dignity, fosters inclusion, boosts engagement, reduces stress, and improves overall productivity and innovation is a challenging one to develop. However, the need is imperative. “I’ve shifted my focus from driving outcomes to designing the environments that create them. The real “operating system” of a business isn’t its software—it’s the culture. I no longer see empathy as a soft skill; it is a strategic leadership lens,” shares Sourabh Deorah, CEO and Co-Founder, AdvantageClub.ai, an AI-powered global engagement platform.
Randstad’s Workmonitor 2025 report, based on insights from 26,000 people in 35 markets, states that 83% of respondents want their workplace to provide a sense of community. Meanwhile, 49% trusted their employer to create a workplace culture where all colleagues could thrive.
“Most organizations drive performance in one of two ways: one relies on pressure and fear, the other is built on trust, respect, and clear expectations. The first can produce short-term outcomes. The second is what sustains performance over time,” notes Hendi.
When People are Encouraged, Not Punished
Leaders agree that an empathetic culture leads to better results in tech-driven workplaces. Empathy helps teams collaborate, innovate, and be more productive, leading to real business improvements.
For Deorah, empathetic leadership has some costs, but the benefits far outweigh them.
“The most practical impact has been on our learning velocity. When failure is treated as data rather than a setback, teams iterate with greater honesty. Instead of defensive posturing, people focus on refining solutions continuously,” he says, “in turn, reducing rework and significantly shortening feedback loops.”
When leaders and engineers raise safety concerns earlier and propose unconventional solutions in a more rigid culture, decision quality improves. Product, tech, and business functions collaborate more openly when things are unclear.
When companies put empathy and mental well-being first, they create room for innovation.
“Innovation needs courage,” Sambandam shares, “and courage needs safety.”
When people are not reprimanded for trying, they are more likely to keep trying.
“I notice that many ideas succeed because people dared to speak up, challenge leaders, and experiment. Psychological safety didn’t slow us down; it made us faster, smarter, and more original,” he adds.
Allowing employees to experiment, learn from mistakes, and grow helps them feel accomplished.
The IBM Systems Sciences Institute found that the cost of fixing bugs can be up to 100 times more expensive in maintenance than during design.
“Revenue is not the sole measure of leadership effectiveness. It is a byproduct of a healthy, resilient system,” says Deorah.
Retention over Recruitment
Research states that employee happiness is the predictor of long-term stock growth, not pay or perks.
According to Great Place To Work India’s 2024 report on mid-sized organizations, retention and employee advocacy are high in companies with strong cultures.
“To retain talent, be human-centric—but not at the cost of profit. The two almost go hand-in-hand. Without profits, you can’t care for your employees. Without caring for them, you won’t make money. They’re two sides of the same coin,” notes Roy.
A new Express Employment Professionals-Harris Poll survey reveals that the average cost of employee turnover has risen to $45,236, up from $36,723 last year.
“These choices have direct business consequences,” says Hendi. “Burnout, disengagement, and turnover are costly and often preventable. It is far more effective to build a healthy organization than to replace people in an unhealthy one repeatedly.”
Businessolver noted that unempathetic US organizations risked $180 billion in attrition. Moreover, the report stated that more CEOs were linking the company’s financial performance to empathy (89%, +7 points YOY), with the highest number of employees ever (74%) linking empathy to financial performance.
In a time when everything is evaluated through a critical lens —fueled by strong skepticism to begin with—a question arises: how do companies deal with public and investor perceptions of employee-centric initiatives? However, leaders are far above the playing field when it comes to public perception. For them, business matters. And for that, employees need to be looked after.
For Hendi, empathy is not a trend or a branding exercise. Rather, a practical requirement for building organizations that perform.
“In the pursuit of success, we must not forget that human element of what we do, why we do it, and how we do it,” he says on what leaves a long-lasting impact.
“Empathy shows up when it costs you something, whether that’s time, convenience, or comfort. It’s easy to talk about care when things are smooth. It’s harder when deadlines are tight, and numbers are under pressure,” adds Sambandam.
