A Story About Developing Emotional Intelligence Through Fiction
Discovering how reading fiction develops empathy and transforms leadership is rarely what managers expect — but for many, it becomes the insight that changes everything about how they understand the people they lead.
Amy had been a senior operations manager for four years.
Projects delivered on time.
Teams organised efficiently.
Performance reviews that used words like decisive and dependable.
And yet — something wasn’t working.
The same problems kept returning.
Jimmy still missed deadlines despite her detailed planning advice.
Flo seemed increasingly disengaged even after Amy redesigned her role.
The tension between marketing and product resurfaced every few weeks.
Amy was solving the problems.
But the solutions weren’t sticking.
The Night She Picked Up a Book
The shift began on an ordinary night.
Amy had been lying awake for hours replaying conversations from work — wondering why the same issues kept appearing despite all the logical fixes she had put in place.
Eventually she reached for a book on her nightstand.
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
She had meant to read it months earlier but never found the time.
That night she started reading — just to quiet her mind.
Instead she found herself completely absorbed in the story.
What captivated her wasn’t just the events of Amir and Hassan’s lives.
It was the way the novel revealed the inner world behind each character’s choices.
Amir’s desperate need for his father’s approval.
Hassan’s loyalty and quiet dignity.
The weight of guilt Amir carried long after his betrayal.
Every decision that seemed confusing from the outside made sense once you understood what the characters were feeling.
By morning Amy realised something surprising.
She had spent the entire night trying to understand the characters — not judging what they should have done, but asking what they might have been feeling.
And it struck her that she rarely approached workplace problems that way.
The Monday Morning Experiment
That Monday Jimmy mentioned again that he was struggling to meet a report deadline.
Amy’s usual response was already forming.
Break the work into smaller tasks.
Block time in your calendar.
Remove distractions.
Instead she paused.
And asked a different question.
“Jimmy — what’s making this deadline difficult right now?”
The answer had nothing to do with time management.
Jimmy’s father had recently been diagnosed with early-stage Alzheimer’s.
He had quietly taken on additional caregiving responsibilities while covering work left by a departing colleague.
The problem Amy had been trying to solve wasn’t organisational.
It was human.
What Amy Realised Afterwards
The more Amy thought about The Kite Runner, the more clearly she saw what the novel had shown her.
Amir’s choices were rarely logical on the surface.
But once you understood what he feared, what he wanted from his father, and the guilt he carried after betraying Hassan — his behaviour suddenly made sense.
Amy began recognising the same pattern at work.
People rarely acted for the reasons she assumed.
And until she understood those reasons, her solutions would always be incomplete.
What Happened Next
A few days later Amy spoke with Flo — the colleague who had become increasingly withdrawn.
Amy’s first instinct had been to improve the workflow around Flo’s projects.
But this time she approached the conversation differently.
“What’s been feeling difficult lately?” she asked.
Flo hesitated.
Then admitted something Amy had never considered.
As the company grew, Flo felt her careful, methodical style was becoming irrelevant.
New hires worked faster and spoke more confidently in meetings.
She had started to assume her contributions no longer mattered.
Amy recognised the pattern immediately.
Just as Amir’s actions in The Kite Runner were shaped by his need for approval from Baba, Flo’s behaviour was shaped by a deeper fear — that she no longer belonged.
The problem wasn’t performance.
It was recognition.
The Shift
One insight changed how Amy approached leadership.
From
Solving visible problems quickly
To
Understanding the human experience behind them
Instead of asking:
“What needs fixing?”
She started asking:
“What might this person be experiencing?”
And the conversations changed almost immediately.
The Ripple Effect
Once Amy began working this way, other situations started to make more sense.
The tension between marketing and product teams wasn’t simply disagreement about priorities.
Each team felt their expertise was being ignored.
Like the characters in The Kite Runner, they were reacting not only to present events — but to deeper concerns about trust, respect, and belonging.
When Amy first tried to apply the same approach with both teams together, it failed. Group dynamics required something different — and figuring out why became its own lesson.
Before bringing the teams together again, she met with key members from each side individually.
Not to mediate.
Just to listen.
The marketing team felt their client relationships were being undermined.
The product team felt their expertise was being discounted.
Both teams were operating from the same underlying need.
Once Amy understood that, the resolution had somewhere to go.
When Amy began addressing those underlying concerns, the conflict finally began to ease.
The Teaching Insight
Amy discovered that leadership wasn’t about solving problems quickly.
It was about understanding the human experience behind them.
When she stopped asking “What’s the issue?”
And started asking “What might this person be experiencing?”
Two things changed.
Her solutions addressed the real problems.
And the people she worked with finally felt understood.
Why This Matters
Professional training often focuses on processes, strategy, and decision-making.
But leadership also requires something harder to teach.
The ability to understand other people’s motivations, fears, and pressures.
When we read fiction, we practise a specific kind of attention: genuine curiosity about what someone is experiencing from the inside, before judging what they should do differently.
Amy’s story shows what happens when that habit of attention moves from the page into the room.
And that practice changes how we understand the people around us.
And like the best novels, the practice keeps revealing new things the longer you stay with it.
This is an extract from How Reading Fiction Develops Empathy and Transforms Leadership — a School of WorkLife Story Lesson.
The complete lesson follows Amy’s full journey — including how insights from The Kite Runner changed how she approached conflict, motivation, and leadership conversations — and what she discovered when she returned to the book six months later. It shows how you can apply the same perspective in your own work — learning to recognise the human motivations behind behaviour and respond with the empathy and understanding that many leadership challenges quietly require.
Experience the complete lesson:
How Reading Fiction Develops Empathy and Transforms Leadership Learn how stories that explore complex human motivations can deepen emotional intelligence and change how you understand the people you lead.
Deepen the practice with the WorkLife Compass Guided Programme:
The Power of Fiction: Developing Character Traits Through Reading –Discover how literature strengthens empathy, perspective, and moral judgement — essential traits for thoughtful leadership.
You may also enjoy How Strategic Opening Lines Transform Professional Influence
If this resonates, you’ll find a daily thought on working life in School of WorkLife Reading Room — a LinkedIn group, Monday to Friday.
This story was inspired by my book, WorkLife Book Club Volume One Shoreditch by Carmel O’ Reilly — following members of a London book club as they navigate WorkLife challenges through the wisdom found in the books they read together.
Work With Me: Commissioned learning resources, speaking engagements, and organisational partnerships.
Support This Work: Your support makes a difference and helps me to continue creating resources that are accessible to everyone. Thank you. Carmel
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