Business coach Doni Landefeld believes that empathy is underutilized in the coaching industry. How do you know if you have enough? Can you get more? In today’s show, Doni helps coaches assess how to get and use appropriate empathy with their clients.

Doni Landefeld is a certified personal and executive coach. She is the founder of The Metamorphosis Coach, and empathy is her superpower. She works with Positive Intelligence and Emotional Intelligence to help clients stop self-sabotaging. 

In this episode, Melinda and Doni discuss why they believe that empathy is underutilized by coaches and how to incorporate empathy in an uplifting way.

In this episode we discuss:

• What are Positive Intelligence and Emotional Intelligence?
• What is empathy, and how is it different from sympathy?
• How can we learn to cultivate empathy in our lives?
• What is the emotional ladder, and how can we use it in emotional work with ourselves and our clients?
• What are the 3 Rs for cultivating an empathic response?
• Why it is so important for coaches to have empathic concern.
• What empathy is not and boundaries around expressing empathy.

“So it starts with having that empathy for ourselves, to have that deep awareness. And then to have that feeling, that connection to our emotions.”

Doni Landefeld

Doni Landefeld is a speaker, writer, coach, and trainer. Doni helps mid-level and senior business leaders who want to achieve stronger relationships and joyfully flow with life’s challenges. Originally from Pennsylvania, Doni served in several leadership roles in academia before moving to Florida in 2004. In 2010, she created Metamorphosis Coaching and Consulting focusing on leadership development, effective communication, positive intelligence techniques, and enhancing emotional intelligence. 

Doni actively leads in her community – she serves on the Board of Directors for the Gulf Coast Symphony, where she was President for 10 years. She sits on the Education Committee of the Cape Coral Chamber of Commerce, and is co-founder and rotating Chair for “Taste of the Cape,” an event that has raised six figures for scholarships and musical outreach in her community. 

Doni is a regular contributor to Emotional Intelligence online magazine, and her work was featured in the February 2017 issue of Gulf Coast Woman.

Doni attended the Pennsylvania State University (main campus) where she received a B.S. in Music Education, Temple University where she earned a Master’s in Education, and Walden University for her Ph.D. in Organizational Psychology. Doni is a certified Advanced Personal and Executive Coach through the College of Executive Coaching, certified through the International Coach Federation. She is a certified Emotional Intelligence assessment administrator and a certified Positive Intelligence coach.

Resources or websites mentioned in this episode:
Mirasee
Coaches Console
Doni’s website
Doni’s LinkedIn
Doni’s free downloadable empathy checklist

Credits:
Guest: Doni Landefeld
Host: Melinda Cohan
Producer: Cynthia Lamb 
Executive producer: Danny Iny
Scripted and assembled  by: Michi Lantz 
Audio Post Supervisor: Evan Miles, Christopher Martin
Audio Post Production: Post Office Sound
Music soundscape: Chad Michael Snavely
Making our hosts sound great: Home Brew Audio

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Music and SFX credits:
Track Title: Clouds
Artist Name(s): Acreage
Writer Name: Marshall Usinger
Publisher Name: BOSS SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTIONS

Track Title: Coastline Dream
Artist Name(s): Wild Sky
Writer Name: Adam Simons
Publisher Name: BOSS SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTIONS

Track Title: Coo Coos
Artist Name(s): Dresden, The Flamingo
Writer Name: Matthew Wigton
Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION

Track Title: Stars & Trees
Artist Name(s): Outside The Sky
Writer Name: Dustin Ransom
Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION