ConsiderJennifer

To be kind, you must have empathy AND boundaries. Otherwise, it's enabling.

After my talk at SHRM Charleston yesterday, a woman pulled me aside and asked something I hear in different forms all the time: What do you do when you want to be empathetic but someone still isn't meeting the standard?

My answer: keep the problem the problem.
The reasons might be real. They might even be heartbreaking. But reasons don't make the standard disappear — and pretending they do doesn't help anyone.

This is why we need boundaries. Not about walls or punishment. As clarity.
A boundary says: here's what I need from you. Here's what I can offer. And here's where my responsibility ends, and yours begins.

When you blur that line — when you absorb someone else's problem as your own — you're not being empathetic. You're relieving them of the very ownership that might actually change something.

And let's keep it real, holding that line is uncomfortable. Staying out of someone else's problem when you care about them goes against every instinct.

It takes discipline. And that discipline starts with getting honest with yourself first — about what you can control, what you can't, and what you're actually responsible for.

Where do you find it hardest to hold the line — with your team, your clients, or yourself?