First, Let Go

“There's a proverb that I teach people in the company. It goes something like ‘Empathy is not just about walking in another's shoes. First you must remove your own shoes.’ You have to get past your own blinders and biases and assumptions before you can see with clear eyes what's really going on.”

(Scott Cook, founder and Chairman of Intuit, in “Cook's Recipe.” by David Lidsky, David Whitford. FSB : Fortune Small Business: February 2004. Vol. 14, Iss. 1; pg. 76)