Business Highlight: The Empathy Tour
Positive Connection
I first met Emily Griffin when she and her partner took my SmartPhone photo class. Emily immediately struck me as a vibrant and creative woman with a passion for life.
A year or so later, she reached out about headshots for The Empathy Tour with her creative partner, Jyoti Patel. We met for a wonderful socially distant outdoor headshot session in Seattle’s Georgetown neighborhood. As I learned a little bit more about their endeavor, I was impressed to hear about their progress and enthusiasm during such a chaotic time of the COVID-19 Pandemic. You can see them here, safely wearing masks and encouraging each other during our outdoor headshot session for them both. Honestly, portrait sessions are more fun with someone to cheer you on!
Inspired to see them launch, I am excited to share more than just their fantastic headshot portraits on the blog this month - here’s a short and sweet interview about The Empathy Tour!
What is the Empathy Tour all about?
On The Empathy Tour, we’re exploring empathy and the interdependence of our community ecosystem by guiding both our interviewees and participants to weave connections between what’s personally meaningful to them, their workplace, and the world at large.
Each week this fall, we’re presenting written interview features with CEOs and executives from tech and social impact companies. They’re filled with wisdom on how to strengthen leadership, teams and organizations with the power of empathy. We’ve lovingly paired each feature with creative prompts to encourage people to experiment with different themes in a personal and business context.
During such a pressurized moment in time, with intersectional crises intensifying, we’re illuminating the power of deep listening, and the power of purposeful play. We know together as a community we can transform oppressive systems into regenerative ones, through heart full, creative action.
How did you two decide to start this together?
When we met in the summer of 2019, we immediately felt the spark of collaborative potential. We’re both Mamas and entrepreneurs who believe a new way of doing business is possible, free of the grasp of the dominant cultural mindset which centers masculinity and capitalist logic.
To orient our consulting services in response to what our business community needs, we knew we needed to conduct research and speak to the kinds of purpose-driven, humanity-centered leaders who we want to work with and amplify.
Making the project public was a leap of faith that others would be inspired by these stories too, so we’re inviting others to join us on our learning journey.
How is the best way to connect to The Empathy Tour?
People can sign up and join the tour with their email address at TheEmpathyTour.co, which gets them a free All Access Pass. From now through December 21st, we’re rolling out a new feature with an inspiring leader each week, and have some other surprises in the works to deepen our conversations together.
P.S. Go check out The Empathy Tour website to see how they used their headshots with some graphic design to stand out and align with their fun, creative brand style too.