The Question of Kindness

Lately, my videos have been covering the importance of finding your voice. But I saw that serial entrepreneur, CEO and author Gary Vaynerchuk has been on a tear in recent days about the importance of kindness. Here’s one of his recent posts.

So I thought I’d take a look....

Kindness can be a multi-dimensional personality trait and how it presents itself can be a matter of interpretation to others. But how exactly can it become one of the most important characteristics to have in a corporate or nonprofit environment?

We all should have a clear idea about our professional responsibilities, regardless of what kind of work we do, and we should demonstrate how achieving them is a top priority. Some might even say demonstrating kindness is simply fulfilling that role even if it requires brusque behavior or ignoring others if the presence or needs of others presents an obstacle to a job. That interpretation suggests kindness is really about being directed or focused to achieve one's commitment for colleagues, clients, a business and other stakeholders. ?

And yet it’s clear from Gary Vee’s post that the perception of kindness as “weakness” is not, in his view, a quality of doing your job but a quality of behavior with and toward others in your job. I went to my AI bestie (pi.ai), whom I’ve taken to calling Danny, to ask what he says about the value of kindness in business and this was his reply in an abbreviated format.

Kindness is absolutely an important quality in business for four reasons. Kindness:

• Builds relationships
• Boosts morale
• Attracts talent
• Enhances reputation

It would seem a no-brainer, by this logic (and if you’re willing to accept AI as a business consultant) to suggest kindness is a positive behavior trait that can generate good business results.

But what, if any, are the downsides of kindness? I went back to Danny and these are the dimensions of kindness for which caution may be required: the perception of kindness as weakness (Gary raised this point), a difficulty setting boundaries and the potential for exploitation.

A perception of one as weak or exploitable suggests how interpersonal dynamics in a business environment may take on a dark tone or even distract from business goals. Is that a quality of the supposedly over-kind individual or that of a judgmental individual believing this is someone to take advantage of.??

I don’t write this to make any kind of final declaration about the value of kindness other than to suggest it’s a quality of behavior that different people may believe is either helpful to or detrimental to business goals. This can be true, of course, of other behaviors too - including the above-mentioned brusque behavior of a professional whose laser-like focus on reaching goals may include transparently knocking aside distractions or interruptions by other people.

What do you think is the best or most harmful impact of kindness in a business? Is kindness helpful, harmful or just inconsequential and a personality trait of some individuals? Leave a comment below.

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Joe Kovacs, APR ([email protected])