“Is it possible to show cognitive empathy without having any fellow-feeling or sympathy with it?”

It is fair to say that most of us would understand this fellow-feeling to be a part of empathy. Daniel Goleman, an author of Emotional Intelligence, states that cognitive empathy, also known as perspective-taking is basically being able to put yourself into someone else’s place and see their perspective.

Dr Megha Pushkarna conducted a workshop in Zonal Training centre in Gurugram on 14th and 18th January 2020 on the area of Cognitive Empathy at the workplace. Group on day one comprised of middle management and day two senior management heading branches Pan India for LIC. She discussed Cognitive Empathy as a useful skill, particularly in negotiations for example, or for managers.

She explained how it enables the self to put oneself in someone’s shoes, but without necessarily engaging with someone else’s emotions. Managers may find empathy useful in understanding themselves first and later how their team members are feeling and reacting to their leadership. As people, we have individual differences and it makes us unique in or own way. However, these differences can also create conflicts and disturbs equilibrium at work.
Training for Cognitive Empathy was facilitated with an Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire to individual and group interaction about work, self-management, social skills, managing emotions and lastly managing others at work.
It was an insightful session for many, as they opened up about themselves to discuss blind spots of understanding self and others with whom they work closely and how we can this knowledge for a happy place to work in.

We all face day to day struggles and sometimes get overwhelmed with the demands of family, kids, work, bosses, relatives and society. Somewhere in this humdrum we forget who we are and how to just have fun, or smile and really feel happy. It’s important to be ambitious, focused at work and really try to attain perfection in whatever we do and exceed everyone’s expectations. If we don’t nurture ourselves or take care of our inner wellbeing, soon it will start to reflect on our outer self. We will be taken over by ailments, depression, anxiety, lack of good sleep and other lifestyle disorders and maybe in the end head for burnout or a nervous breakdown. The session was really appreciated by teachers and they felt optimistic and focused on the changes that they wanted to make to their lifestyles. Aspects of eating, the right food were informed and certain suggestions of energy-boosting foods were introduced.

We all need to find our happiness mantra and tune in to make ourselves happy; if we are happy we will make everyone around us happy….it’s the ripple effect.

Workshop on Happiness & Wellbeing –find your inner peace was conducted for 150 teachers of Shalom hills Gurugram by Dr Priyanka Anand Associate Professor IILM University Gurugram & Ms Urvashi Nandrajog certified coach. The workshop was initiated owing to a high degree of stress being reported by teachers at their workplace. Growing demands from peers, students, parents, officials and seniors make the workplace for a teacher extremely stressful. They wanted to know and learn about some ways to enhance their efficiency and effectiveness, to be able to balance growing expectations and lead a happy life. Teaching is one of the noblest professions and the future of the young generation is in the hands of their teachers and mentors.

Dr Priyanka Anand being a behavioural scientist and having over 15 years of experience in training and HR, started the session with a self-awareness slow meditation. The Meditation infused with soft rhythm, pleasing incense and a quiet atmosphere helped them to connect with the energies around them. They learnt to activate the heart chakra and tap into connecting their own energies with the Universe. The participants with deeply engrossed in the mudra and really felt peaceful. They were guided into activities to identify the causes of stress in their personal and professional lives and were able to arrive at practical suggestions to overcome them and create value for self and others around them. The importance of planning your day and consciously finding stress busters to maintain your own happiness was shared with them. They were encouraged to sing, dance, listen to music, take short 5 minute naps, meditate for a few minutes, have some calming herbal infusions of tea to just stay tuned in.

We all face day to day struggles and sometimes get overwhelmed with the demands of family, kids, work, bosses, relatives and society. Somewhere in this humdrum we forget who we are and how to just have fun, or smile and really feel happy. It’s important to be ambitious, focused at work and really try to attain perfection in whatever we do and exceed everyone’s expectations. If we don’t nurture ourselves or take care of our inner wellbeing, soon it will start to reflect on our outer self. We will be taken over by ailments, depression, anxiety, lack of good sleep and other lifestyle disorders and maybe in the end head for burnout or a nervous breakdown. The session was really appreciated by teachers and they felt optimistic and focused on the changes that they wanted to make to their lifestyles. Aspects of eating, the right food were informed and certain suggestions of energy-boosting foods were introduced.

We all need to find our happiness mantra and tune in to make ourselves happy; if we are happy we will make everyone around us happy….it’s the ripple effect.

This workshop on Building resilience and empathy was organized for students by the Department of Psychology, IILM University, Gurgaon. The Guest speaker was Dr Achira Chatterjee.
Dr Achira is trained in Applied Behaviour Analysis, Interpersonal Therapy and Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavior Therapy. Achira conducts workshops, customized training and has developed enabling policies across corporate organizations, educational institutions and for NGO’s. Her present commitment also includes being a Consultant and NGO representative for the Internal Complaints Committee on Sexual Harassment for corporate organizations and educational institutions. She is interested in travelling and exploring new learning opportunities.

The workshop started with some Ice-breaking activities. The speaker explained the meaning of resilience and the importance of it in our lives. Role-plays were conducted to let students understand the behaviours that are healthy and adaptive. A resilience-building plan worksheet was also given to a student to actively engage in different activities. The speaker also spoke about the meaning of empathy and explained it more rigorously by asking students to draw empathy maps. Students participated in all the activities with a lot of enthusiasm. They discussed problems such as how to deal with peer pressure and smoking, dealing with emotional abuse and dealing with group conflicts in the class. The students thoroughly enjoyed the sessions.
She closed the session while reiterating on important life skills that would be needed to be successful and overcome life’s challenges i.e., Empathy and Resilience. This workshop will help individuals preserve their individual self-worth by helping them examine and resolve personal barriers that inhibit growth. It will help students navigate through life, love and work with a sense of belonging and optimism. Unfortunately, experiencing adversity and hardship is unavoidable, but coping in an empathetic and resilient manner is doable.

Dr. Megha Pushkarna conducted training workshop for middle and senior class teachers for GD GOENKA School on Emotional Intelligence, where core concepts of EI were discussed in group session.

1. Self-Awareness– What Drives You, What Are You Feeling And Why Are You Feeling That Way
2. Self-Management– Is Not Suppression But Management Of Emotions, Do What Is Right “At The Moment”
3. Motivation– Using Feelings To Help Achieve Your Goals
4. Social Awareness– Appropriate Concern For Others
   1. Relationship Management Skills-Negotiation, Teamwork

It was a fun interactive session where the trainer engaged teachers into self-reflection, role plays to understand how the student-teacher dynamics work in class and how as facilitators they can enhance emotional well-being first for themselves and then for their students. It was also mentioned that how being aware and self-regulated can enhance their teaching skills, multitask work-life balance and transform oneself from feeling burnout to feeling resourceful at work.

While we all are living in a very dynamic and complex environment. In this situation of increased complexity and change, there has been a re-examination of the factors contributing to personal and professional effectiveness. Increasingly, the older notion of intelligence and technical competence being the sole predictors of effectiveness is being contested. Some interesting new ideas in this regard are the concepts of Multiple Intelligence put forth by Howard Gardner and Emotional Intelligence popularized by Daniel Goleman. These broader forms of intelligence have been found to be useful in multitude of situations, including jobs. Emotional Intelligence relates to- sensitivity to and management of self-in relationships. Empirical evidence has suggested that Emotional Intelligence (EI) competencies are at the heart of effective personal and workplace relationships and performance.

Design thinking, as explained by Tim Brown, is a human-centred approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.

Design Thinking Specialist, Marketer, Speaker, Facilitator and Managing Partner of TOSS the COIN (a Mar-Tech Consulting Firm)- Ms. Reshma Budhia who has been recognized as the “Exceptional Women of Excellence, 2018 by Women’s Economic Forum”  has been in the domain of marketing from the past 16 years.. Reshma’s mantra in life is “There is always a Plan Z- if you believe you shall achieve”.

Empirical evidences and data highlight the importance of equipping students emotionally to succeed in life. World Economic forum has named Emotional Intelligence (EI) as one of the top 10 job skills in 2020. Given the increasing importance of Emotional Intelligence, IILM University Gurugram organized a Panel Discussion on the “Critical Role of Emotional Intelligence in School Education.” This session deliberated by Dr. Aruna Broot (Psychologist), Dr. Anjana Sen (Physician, Author and consultant for EI, Founding Members of the Forum for Emotional Intelligence Learning), Mr. Nishchint Chawla (Director, HeritageXperiential Learning School Gurugram), Dr M. Shanawaz (HOD Psychology Department, Jamia Milia Islamia), Ms. Rashmi Malik (Principal, Salwan Public School, Gurugram) and session moderator, Dr. Shuchi Agarwal (Professor, IILM) discussed the importance of enhancing social emotional competencies of students to enable them to prepare for upcoming opportunities in the economy characterized by prevalence of Industry 4.0. The discussion concluded that EI is the strongest driver of leadership and personal excellence, and the single biggest predictor of performance. The experts predicted that with the advent of Artificial intelligence a lot of jobs are going to disappear in the future, but emotional intelligence will gain importance and become a differentiator.