Peter Sear

Peter did his first degree BSc (Hons) Psychology, at the University of Hertfordshire, and remained there to complete a MA in Human Resource Management & Industrial Relations. More recently, he attended the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies, at the University of Essex to complete a MA in Jung & Post Jungian Studies. 

Peter is interested in art, literature, sport, depth-psychology, neuroscience, and neuropsychoanalysis. He is a Member of the British Psychological Society, and a Fellow of the RSA.

Sports organisations are renowned for being challenging emotional environments. This can have a detrimental effect on employee wellbeing, commitment, and individual performance. An inability to understand and manage employee emotion hampers the efficacy of a sport leader to lead teams to success. 

 

Empathic leadership could be helpful since it focuses on the understanding of emotions, and responding to emotional needs at individual, team, and organisational level.  Empathic leadership has been researched in a variety of domains, including health, the military, and politics, and evidence suggests that leaders who display empathy through their general behaviour are more effective leaders than those who do not. This effectiveness is achieved by listening to emotional undercurrents and responding to the needs of employees. Empathic leadership has been shown to enhance commitment, improve employee wellbeing, accurately predict behaviour, gain trust, and enhance communication and the quality of relationships. These and other functions of empathic leadership improve emotional climates, and this is positively related to improved individual and organisational performance.