By Mandy Carlson

Why should leaders practice kindness as a leadership strategy? And can they – really? A bit like weight training, leaders can build their compassion muscle in the brain, and have a direct impact on their team’s wellbeing and effectiveness [overall performance]. This means we all show up feeling valued, as people, in addition to placing value on the process and outcome of our project and work goals.

“Acts of kindness activate the part of our brains that makes us feel pleasure and releases a hormone called oxytocin that helps modulate social interactions and emotion. Being kind is good for our own and our employees’ mental health. And that translates to improved morale and performance.”

Harvard Business School article

This quote is emphasising the need to expand managers’ toolkits by showing kindness as a leadership strategy, as well as offering some good simple tips for giving attention to being kind.

There are endless benefits of kindness in our interactions at work relating to wellbeing for effectiveness. More than ever, there is an evidence-based need for kindness as stress levels impact mental and physical health of leaders and teams. Think burnout and psychosocial stressors that are ongoing and unchecked when relationships at work are destructive, even if not overt, in addition to the current stresses during this time of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Kindness is an ACT and not a STATE

My thoughts on kindness in this context immediately connect to the recent references to character in leadership in the acceptance speech by elected Vice President Kamala Harris where she quoted the late John Lewis as saying ‘democracy is an act and not a state’. Kindness is just that too, an act and not merely a state of being. Kindness needs to be demonstrated through our behaviour and relationships with others. 

“The Human brain is set to detect threat signals in an automatic and unconscious way. Due to evolutionary reasons, these ‘automatic’ paths get priority. Therefore, growth and change do not happen by chance: it has to be carefully focused on to be triggered.”

 Delphine Jumelle-Paulet

The BONUS for leaders positioned more on the continuum of task vs compassion is that kindness can be developed and learnt! 

For the sceptics there is evidence-based research and scientific data that shows:

• We can change our thoughts, our behaviours, and our ability to thrive in this world by adapting [learning] in ways that result in physiological changes in the brain known as neuroplasticity where new neural pathways are formed and hardwired. Coaching is a powerful way to integrate learning and change, helping to reinforce good practices through actions that support positive behaviours.

• The good news is kindness can be taught and ingrained through practice by developing the compassion ‘muscle’ in the brain. When kindness is experienced, this reduces stress and raises the right neurochemicals in our body-brain system to inspire us to move forward to achieve goals and growth. 

• Developing hard skills that were previously referred to as ‘soft skills’, relate to the human factor such as empathy, compassion, collaboration, communication, a coaching-based leadership approach, etc. These hard skills touch on EQ [managing my emotions] and SQ [managing others’ emotions] and make a difference to all aspects of performance, organisational wellbeing and effectiveness – for people and teams.

• Sustained change and growth can be achieved.  Empirical research by Richard Boyatzis and associates shows how more powerful results for sustained change is accomplished through coaching for compassion [like positive coaching-style approaches and processes] vs coaching for compliance [ensuring people meet certain behavioural requirements]. What this means for leaders and teams is to focus on people development vs people management as a more effective leadership approach. 

I conclude on developing and demonstrating a strategy of kindness with a connection to the bigger picture and aligning with our global collective sustainable development goals.

“In many ways, acting out of kindness is a way to protest the present trend of pursuing happiness by increasing personal consumption and trying to capture as much as one can for oneself. Kindness – the word that is missing from the 2030 Agenda – might be the only means by which we can achieve our goals!”

United Nations 

I invite you to connect and commit to acts of kindness in leading yourself and your team to experience a healthier and more meaningful and fulfilling work life. 

What can you do differently in this next week?

About the author

Mandy Carlson of ‘Carlson Coaching and Consulting‘ practices as coach, change consultant, and learning facilitator. She is a certified Results Coach through Neuroleadership Institute as well as an accredited coach through Neurozone, and recently studied through Coaches Rising. Mandy is constantly learning through studies and practice of contemporary neuroscience findings, systems thinking, positive psychology, and more. Mandy has an honours degree in organisational psychology and a background in organisational development (OD). She is passionate about empowering teams, leaders and individuals with simple tools to learn and bring about lasting change for wellbeing and effectiveness.