The Empathy
Project

The six-week program design includes a one-hour Brief, four one-hour intercultural conversations, one hour of guided reflection, and a one-hour Debrief. It asks for seven hours of employee time, with each company agreeing its cohort schedule and support before participants begin.

RW Institute runs the project with Acquaint, and a dedicated Inqli reflection space is coming soon. Each cohort gives employees, conversation partners, and champions a clear role in the experience, while the project continues to learn from what happens in practice.

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Pilot participation · August 19 snapshot

Law-firm cohort

The law-firm snapshot records 26 sign-ups, with 21 employees having joined at least one conversation and 11 reaching four or more. Conversation counts do not establish completion of the full program.

Pilot participation · September update

Dolby

The September 9 snapshot records 15 sign-ups, with 13 employees having joined at least one conversation and three reaching four or more. Acquaint reconfirmed the counts on September 17.

Partner-reported hours · September 18

168 shared volunteer hours

Acquaint reported 168 hours contributed by employees and their conversation partners. The total combines both sides of the exchange and does not establish full-program completion.

Choose your view

Find the page written for you

The Empathy Project has a view for each group taking part. Pick the one that describes you; each card says exactly where its button goes.

Everyone can read the pilot learning report and the complete picture.

Empathy Project · Pilot Learning Report

What we’re learning from the first cohorts

The September 2026 report brings together participation data, what employees and conversation partners valued, and priorities for the next cohorts. It shares early observations and the questions we still need to answer about lasting change.

Read the pilot report

How It Works

Six weeks to listen carefully, reflect, and decide what changes in practice.

Acquaint matches employees with conversation partners for four one-hour intercultural conversations. Prompts give both people a way into the conversation without scripting what they should discover.

The standard design combines a one-hour Brief, four one-hour conversations, one hour of guided reflection, and a one-hour Debrief across six weeks. Champions support participants throughout the experience.

Corporate cohort participation costs US$70 per employee seat. Community volunteers can explore participation through Acquaint. The project is being designed to protect individual responses and share only approved aggregate learning with participating companies.

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1:1 Conversations

Four one-hour conversations with someone from a different culture. Guided prompts move the dialogue past pleasantries into real exchange.

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Guided Reflection

The design reserves an hour for guided reflection, with a dedicated Inqli reflection space coming soon. Participants keep private reflections in their own notes and may choose to share a question with the cohort.

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Champion-Led Check-ins

Champions check in during the experience, helping participants connect the conversations to the wider cohort and notice what they are learning.

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Measurement Design

Each cohort is designed to contribute anonymized aggregate learning about empathy development, behavioral practice, and intergroup contact. The goal is to learn what shifts, for whom, and under what conditions.

The reciprocal equation

The employee is not the only person giving time.

The standard experience counts the hours on both sides of the conversation. Seven hours from the employee, mirrored by approximately four hours from conversation partners, creates about eleven hours of empathy work per completed seat.

That accounting matters because both sides contribute time. The conversation partner is also a volunteer, bringing their own time, stories, questions, and reasons for showing up.

7employee hours1-hour Brief + 4 calls + 1 reflection hour + 1-hour Debrief
4partner hoursFour one-hour conversations
11hours of empathy workper standard completed seat

A clear decision model

One price. A visible operating model.

The standard corporate cohort price is US$70 per employee seat. The breakdown below shows how the seat price is allocated. Use the calculator to plan the investment for your company’s first cohort.

See the full model arrow_forwardCompany overview arrow_forward

Per participating employee

US$70

Acquaint conversation platform$34.40
Inqli reflection environment$8.10
RW Institute delivery and oversight$8.00
Administration$7.70
Fiscal sponsor$4.90
Marketing$2.40
Surplus reserve$4.50

A useful nudge for planning

Start with a meaningful wave, not an impossible promise.

The canonical planning rule assumes that 25% of employees are realistically likely to opt into volunteering, then recommends seats for 10% of that pool. For a 40,000-person company, that means 1,000 seats rather than a vague invitation to “everyone.” A cohort starts at 50 seats; suggested sizes are 100, 500 and 1,000.

40,000

total employees

1,000

recommended seats

11,000

projected shared hours

The calculator and tier notes live in the complete picture.

Partners

Who makes it work.

RW institute

RW Institute

Overall design, theory of change, champion model, and research governance. RWI is responsible for holding those parts together.

About RW Institute
Acquaint logo

Acquaint

The conversation platform. Acquaint matches employees with conversation partners and supports the protocols for intercultural conversations.

Inqli logo

Inqli

The reflection and social-learning partner in the program design, with its dedicated reflection space coming soon. It will support prompts and optional shared questions, while participants keep private reflection in their own notes.

About Inqli

Current program partners

AcquaintInqli

The Empathy Project · Nonprofit partners and mentoring collaborators

Partners in conversation and continued volunteering

Nonprofit partners help people find their way into conversations with employees. Our mentoring collaborations explore opportunities to keep volunteering after the Empathy Project, with each organization contributing in a different way.

Current volunteer connections

Finding conversation volunteers

VGA and Idealist help us reach people who want to volunteer their time in conversation with employees. Acquaint supports the conversation experience, with recruitment timed around participating cohorts.

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Volunteer network

Volunteer Groups Alliance (VGA)

Through David Styers, VGA connects the project with international volunteer networks, helping us reach people interested in becoming conversation partners.

Meet VGA (opens in a new tab)
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Volunteer community

Idealist

Idealist helps connect its community with opportunities to volunteer in conversation with employees, reaching people and groups across its networks.

Meet Idealist (opens in a new tab)
Acquaint logo

Conversation partner

Acquaint

Acquaint brings volunteers together for intercultural conversations and supports onboarding, matching, and scheduling for the Empathy Project.

Meet Acquaint (opens in a new tab)

Interested in volunteering or introducing your community? Read the nonprofit overview, or contact RW Institute so we can coordinate the next step with Acquaint.

Future volunteering

Continue after the Empathy Project

Employees who want to keep volunteering can explore opportunities with partner organizations. We are developing pathways that connect the experience of listening across differences with ongoing community involvement.

Global Mentorship Initiative logo

Follow-on pathway in development

Global Mentorship Initiative (GMI)

GMI offers structured, one-to-one virtual career mentoring for students preparing to enter the workforce. We are exploring it as a next volunteering opportunity for employees after their Empathy Project cohort.

GMI’s existing mentoring program can be explored directly. The Empathy Project referral pathway is still being developed, and mentoring participation is arranged with GMI.

Explore mentoring with GMI (opens in a new tab)Discuss a company pathway
V2V.net logo

Mentoring collaboration in development

V2V.net

V2V.net is a corporate volunteering platform and consultancy whose mentoring programs include soft skills, financial education, and Girls in IT. RW Institute and Acquaint are exploring collaboration with founder Bruno Ayres around mentoring and what both programs can learn from participants.

A future mentoring opportunity for Empathy Project participants would need to be arranged with the project team and V2V. Contact us to discuss a potential pathway for your company.

Explore V2V.net (opens in a new tab)Discuss a mentoring pathway

Advisor pathway in development

Mountaintop International

Mountaintop International runs leadership fellowships for social impact leaders working in low-income communities, including people running education, health care, peacebuilding and environmental organizations.

RW Institute and Mountaintop are exploring a pathway in which Empathy Project participants could serve as advisors to its Fellows. Contact us to discuss it for your company.

Explore Mountaintop International (opens in a new tab)Discuss an advisor pathway

Current Ways In

Three ways to continue the conversation.

Whether you want to volunteer, partner on research, or explore a company cohort, we will point you to the current next step.

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Volunteers

Conversations That Bridge Worlds

The project is welcoming new conversation partners through Acquaint for the next cohorts. Volunteer networks can introduce their volunteers, and anyone can try a conversation first.

arrow_forwardOpen the Nonprofit Overview
biotech
Researchers

Research Briefing for Academic Partners

A virtual briefing on the proposed research architecture: what data may be collected, how multiple timepoints could work, and where governance questions still need partner input. We are looking for collaborators who want to help shape the right questions.

arrow_forwardAsk About Research Collaboration
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Corporate Leaders

Corporate CSR Briefing

A virtual briefing for CSR and social impact leaders. We will walk through how the six-week experience works, what participation could involve, and what the current measurement design is intended to support.

arrow_forwardAsk About Company Participation

Research

The dataset that does not exist yet.

The project is developing research questions about what participants experience, how learning may carry into everyday behavior, and what a cross-company approach could help us understand. The pilot report shares early observations; it does not establish lasting empathy or prosocial identity change. Three research streams are being explored.

Complexity and Systems

How empathy signals may propagate through teams and organizations. Research conversations have included Dr. Kirsten Wright and the Waterloo Institute for Complexity and Innovation.

Behavioral Science

Enrollment nudges, drop-off mitigation, and what drives sustained prosocial behavior. In development with ideas42.

Volunteering Outcomes

Well-being, performance, retention, and volunteering identity. Academic partners in development.

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When Scheduled

Makerspace Salons

Empathy Project conversations may run as Salons when a session is confirmed. The Makerspace calendar is the source for upcoming dates.

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Makerspace Labs

Core Labs and Genome Labs

The structured working side of the Makerspace. Labs run on specific frameworks and produce real deliverables.

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Questions about the Empathy Project?

Whether you want to ask about future volunteer openings, partner on research, or bring the experience to your company, we would like to hear from you.

Get in Touch