Many people were shocked when the Harvard business review in 2016 has listed the most to least empathetic companies in the world, no surprise that Facebook was the first on the list. As the world will always remember Mark Zuckerberg issuing a statement on his Facebook account about the fatal police shooting of Philando Castileb in USA saying that “While I hope we never have to see another video like Diamond’s, it reminds us why coming together to build a more open and connected world is so important — and how far we still have to go”.
The deed made by the CEO of Facebook is called empathy and Daniel Goleman considered it as one of the components of the emotional intelligence if not the most important one. Empathy is the ability to see the world from another person’s perspective the capacity to tune into what someone else might be thinking and feeling about a situation (Osisioma, Nzewi & Osisioma, 2016, P.3)
The world is changing so fast with technology and social media, entrepreneurs in Kinshasa must learn and develop some new skills to run their businesses successfully. Many studies have shown that opportunity is the key element that make a difference between a successful entrepreneurs and a common one. Chell, Hawort & Bearly (1991) argued that successful entrepreneurs have the quality of seeing business opportunities and starting appropriate actions.
Being able to recognize opportunities will enable entrepreneurs in Kinshasa to face the competition in the market place. Kinshasa being the capitol of the Democratic Republic of Congo is overflow by the foreigner’s investor such as: Lebanese’s, Indian, Kenyan, Chinese and many others. One of them told me that “it is easier to make money in Kinshasa than in India”.
According to Baron (2008), the application of emotional intelligence is considered important in business. This is because positive emotions enhance entrepreneurial creativity and opportunity recognition.
Emotional intelligence is the best tools for the entrepreneur in Kinshasa; however, they must be willing to learn and to master the five components that defined it such as : Self-awareness, Self-Regulation (or Management), Motivation, Empathy (Social Awareness), and Social Skills (Relationship Management).
As the Harvard business review said “Empathy has never been in more explicit demand from corporate leaders” and I believe that this is so true for the entrepreneur in Kinshasa.
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