In one of Biden’s first speeches since his cancer diagnosis, he says: ‘Real leadership is all about getting personal’

On July 2, Biden took over the theater in front of a packed room as a main speaker in SHRM, which represents one of his first sermons since the diagnosis of prostate cancer in May.

Biden said: “The team’s strength comes to individuals in this team, whether they feel appreciated, or feel supported,” noting that his father taught him that the work is about more than one salary. His father believed that work helps people to develop dignity, respect and a person’s place in their society.

Biden was historically praised as a sympathetic leader who is proud of his self -reliance on sympathy to build relationships. It has been built unlikely with political opponents such as the late Sens. John McCain and Jesse Helms.

Biden decided early in his political career that employees should be able to appear as themselves completely to work. “Often we are trying to separate people into categories: their work and their family. We say it is a job, it is not a person,” he said. “The real leadership is about obtaining the personality. I have known every major head of state, I have sat and spoke faced to face during the past forty years. It is about [being] connected. This means the existence of sympathy. “

He believes that leaders must communicate personally with their employees, get to know everything from their birthdays to their families, and ask about them. It comes to “identifying what they deal with every day at home, and even the most intense workplaces, we can still save time for this type of human relationship.”

Biden, who lost his first wife and daughter in a car accident shortly before the first Senate, said that the work should not prevent people from enjoying valuable moments with the family. “We tell ourselves, we have to be at this meeting. We must accomplish this report, and take it through it. Then we tell ourselves, my wife will understand. My children will understand … I will spend more time with my children. But in our depths, we know that we are sweeping ourselves. It does not matter moments that will never come back.”

When Biden became vice president in 2009, he sent a new memorandum to the employees, explaining the importance of the family. “I said … I do not want you to miss important family obligations to work. These include birthdays, anniversary, wedding parties, religious celebrations, graduation, times and needs such as illness and loss,” and ignoring his guidance “disappointed him a lot.”

Several times during his stomach statements and an interview with the CEO of SHRM Johnny C Taylor Junior, Biden spoke about his career and led at difficult times, but he reminded the public that employees need to know that human resources are interested in them.

He said, “They need to know that you are interested … not only about what they can do for you, but for them, for their families, for their circumstances,” he said. “This is how you build a difference ready to present everything to you.”

This report was originally published by HR Brew.