Throughout #HRActsofKindness I have spoken to so many people about how they view kindness – watch this space David Ulrich, I may write my own model on this one day!
Gary Cookson was part of the Blog Squad this year at the CIPD ACE event, when he wrote this for me I couldn’t stop smiling so thank you Gary for your excellent take on kindness:
“Bill and Ted famously said “Be Excellent To Each Other”. Maybe they were onto something but used the wrong adjective. They should have said “Be Kind To Each Other”. After all, who wants to go to a workplace where people are cruel to each other? We spend 35-40 hours a week at work and that’s a big proportion of your entire week to spend NOT being kind. If you treat others the way you’d like to be treated yourself, then you will indeed be kind to everyone. In HR we have a duty to encourage this behaviour amongst all employees and to lead by example. My eldest daughter, when she was 3, asked what I did at work. Its hard to explain HR to an adult let alone a 3 year old child, so I settled on “Daddy’s job is to make people happy at work” and to be honest, as a definition of HR, I’ve not been able to better it since. If I can make people happy by being kind to them, or showing them how to be kind to others, then I’m all for it.”
If you’re not saying “Excellent!” in Ted’s voice already, you need to watch the film again 🙂
The man behind the ACE art is Simon Heath, back in September he wrote a fantastic post about kindness in the workplace and if you’re a #HRActsofKindness fan, this blog post is certainly something you need to read. Simon mentions that kindness can transcend work, age, ethnicity, gender, geography and politics. It can cost nothing and simultaneously hold immeasurable value. It needs no permission, business case, training or instruction to implement. It tends to be highly infectious. We’re all carriers. Give it to someone else. Check out his fantastic post here: https://workmusing.wordpress.com/2016/09/06/love-virally/
Amelia Tickle was also part of this years Blog Squad and her take on kindness is:
“Kindness costs nothing, if that is in the workplace or out in public. Everyone can give kindness weather it is holding an door open for someone or writing a thank you card. The definition of kindness is “the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate” that can transpire at work or in the community. Kindness is all around us, we receive it from birth, then all the way through our life’s. kindness carries a great value and has a ripple affect between person to person, we are all guilty of getting a high from receiving kindness. No matter where you are in the world, kindness can be translated. The power of that is priceless.”
Natalie Ellis HR 