My name is Micah. I'm a social science designer, twin cat owner, and former opera singer. I help organizations rethink and operationalize empathy.

We're in a powerful era where immersive learning, behavioral research, and accessible technology converge. I work at this intersection, exploring how these combined forces can enhance both organizational relationships and our shared sense of humanity and success.

20+ years of work with world class labs, leaders, and organizations have led me to a new definition of empathy, which underlies my approach to scaling empathic growth for organizations.

Empathy Redefined: From Understanding to Equal Meaning

I believe the dictionary definition of 'empathy' is fundamentally flawed and no longer serves our social cohesion. Empathy is not "our ability to understand how someone feels" for two critical reasons.

First, from a scientific perspective, we can never truly know how another person feels. Many of us struggle to understand our own emotions half the time. The neurological and psychological reality of emotions defies such simple transmission between individuals.

Second, the notion of "creating understanding" becomes problematic when applied to people rather than concepts. This approach inadvertently colonizes the idea of 'reality' by placing the burden of explanation on those who are "most different" in order to be understood by the majority.

This conventional definition of empathy is not only unrealistic but potentially harmful, creating more misunderstanding than connection. It's also, I believe, the root cause of empathy fatigue.

Through my work in the field and collaboration with researchers, I've come to define empathy as the ability to acknowledge another's stories as being as meaningful as our own, even when faced with different perspectives. This redefinition is essential for depolarizing viewpoints, preserving our humanity, and cultivating genuine emotional appreciation for others and ourselves.

You can read more about that through this blog. If you’d like to have me come speak about it, just reach out here.

Why I founded Empathable

I created Empathable because empathy needs a practical path forward. If empathy is truly going to enhance human flourishing, we need effective ways to operationalize and scale it. Since launching our app-based immersive + AI technology in 2024, Empathable has transformed how leaders at organizations like Google and Deloitte approach human connection and understanding.

I’m passionate about sharing insights on practical empathy, bridging social divides, and experiential design. Below are select organizations and events that have invited me to speak:

Keynote, Lecture and Workshop Invitations:

      • Harvard Medical School on increasing Affirming Patient Care through Experiential learning.

      • Society for Neuroscience and Creativity on Experiential methods in scientific experiments.

      • The Darden School of Business, on ‘Designing the Empathic Ethnographic Interview’.

      • WillowTree Apps, on Depolarizing the Conversation on Advocacy in DEI

      • Ford Motor Company, ‘How we can make radical change without changing the radicals’.

      • Asian American Bar Association, on ‘How empathy builds resilience’.

      • Triangle Organization Development Network, (same as Ford)

      • University of Virginia, Department of Engineering on ‘Human Centered Design Thinking.’

      • University of Virginia, Design Thinking Class ‘Building Professional Life around Values’.

      • University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, on ‘Experience Ideation and Empathic Design’.

      • Robins Graduate School of Business, University of Richmond, on 'Experience Innovation’ (2020) & Empathic Leadership (2025).

      • University of Amsterdam (De Vrijeacademie), on ‘Intergroup collaborative experiences’.

      • Charlottesville Design Week on de-categorizing personality types.

      • Keynote Speaker at San Francisco’s Social Capital Conference (SOCAP) - Impact Accelerator 2019, on empathic choice making with designing with a sense of connection.

      • Keynote Speaker for Pensions and Investments Annual ESG Conference 2022 on ‘Belonging and the Bottom Line.’

      • Keynote Speaker for Sensata - DEI Conference 2022 on ‘How we can create courageous collaboration without being discouraged.’

      • Speaker at TEDX Oneonta 2022 - How we can make Radical Change without Changing the Radicals.

      • Education First 2023, on ‘How empathy impacts SEL’ at their Social Emotional Learning in Action Conference.

Here below is my talk at SEL in Action:

Biography:

After a young career as a singer at the Metropolitan Opera, Micah Wonjoon Kessel took his fascination of immersive experience into two decades of designing new approaches to the way we learn by applying research on the science of emotions, empathy and connection.

Micah gained his social science informed approach to learning as Design Lead at the Interdisciplinary Affective Science Lab, researching emotions and experience, and a Scientist-Practitioner Partner with the Center for the Science of Moral Understanding. Today, he applies this research as CEO of Empathable, whose technology uses social science, experiential learning theory and AI to advance core skills for managers and teams at world-class organizations.

Under Micah’s direction, Empathable’s concept was a winner of the Harvard Culture Lab Innovation Fund Award, granted by their joint council of Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging. He has presented  at Asian American Foundation, the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, Harvard Medical School, the Society for Neuroscience and Creativity, and was a 2019 Byron fellow. Alongside Empathable, Micah’s has  trained leaders to reinvision and better apply empathy at world-class organizations such as Google, Meta, Deloitte, and United Way, and Massachusetts General Hospital.