Under-communication and the Empathy Gap: The Price Leaders Pay for Not Sharing Enough

Abstract

Managers can miscalibrate their communication—either communicating too much or too little with their subordinates. We propose that such miscalibration reflects a strong bias toward under-communication. In Study 1a, we examine 2,717 qualitative comments from 360-degree leadership assessments and find that managers are nearly ten times as likely to be criticized for under-communicating than over-communicating. In Study 1b, we find further evidence for this bias using ratings of managerial communication drawn from a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults. In Study 2, we focus on leader selection, finding that managers who tend to under-communicate are viewed as less capable and are less likely to be selected for a leadership role than managers who over-communicate. In Study 3, we test our model in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, demonstrating that organizational leaders tended to be seen as under-communicating with their employees about pandemic-related planning, which led to them being seen as less empathic, and in turn, less effective, leaders.