Culture of Kindness

• Define your Values
• Give Earned Credit
• Address Conflicts Constructively
• Focus on Lessons Learned, Not Blame
• Measure Individual Success
• Show Gratitude

What Socially Motivates You?

Being Kind:  Why Kindness Matters

I see this same theme showing up every weekend in my feed on LinkedIn:  Be Kind.  I don’t know if it’s a reminder being sent out to teams after an awesome week, or a cry for help, but it’s always there.  During the week the feed changes to various exciting things happening in the world of business, before shifting back to the same theme:  be kind.  

Why?  Why is it important to even think about kindness?  It’s an interesting question, and as we talk about social motivators it’s the first one I want to bring up.   More than any other individual social condition, a culture built around kindness can increase your teams’ productivity and create a sense of belonging that will translate into more productive, successful teams (Vo, 2022).  I know that’s quite a claim to make, so let’s go over it.  

Social Motivators and Research

In 2022, Vo and team conducted a massive data research project to explore the effects of social conditions meeting individual needs as it relates to work motivation.  There were four motivating conditions that were explored:

• Religious Affiliation
• Political Participation
• Humane Orientation through Kindness and Altruism
• In-Group Collectivism as expressed by pride and loyalty for the organization

The research then focused on six key hypotheses tested as it relates to work motivation: 

1. Competence:  How one’s mastery at the tasks at hand impact their motivation to do the job. 
2. Autonomy:  The ability to do their job, make their own decisions, and take accountability for their own actions. 
3. Social Relatedness:  Feeling secure with their teammates through social connections.  
4. Motivating Conditions Impact Competence:  The impact of each of the four motivating conditions are expected to enhance one’s motivation at each level of competence.  
5. Motivating Conditions Impact Autonomy:  The impact of each of the four motivating conditions are expected to positively effect one’s motivation at each level of autonomy.
6. Motivating Conditions Impact Social Relatedness:  The impact of each of the four motivating conditions are expected to enhance social connection motivation.  

So there’s a lot to unpack here, and if you want the full details of the research project, check the link below.  The primary goal is to explore the impacts of Competence, Autonomy, and Social Relatedness on work motivation.  Each are powerful influencers, and should not be ignored.  I’ll dig into each in future articles.  What’s really impressive, though, is the follow-up:  How social conditions can mitigate or enhance the impact of competence, autonomy, and social relatedness.  

The Competence Exception and Motivation

It seems pretty intuitive that someone more comfortable with a job will feel more motivated to complete the job, and to a certain extent that is true.  What was interesting is that the more competent someone was at a role, the less motivated they were to complete the role (Vo, 2022, p.9).  There wasn’t a conclusion as to this result, though it’s hypothesized that, once a task become routine, there is less desire to do the tasks.  Challenges appear to directly impact motivation.  What’s really interesting is that both Autonomy and Social Relatedness behaved as expected:  The more of each one has, the more motivated the team gets. 

The Impact of Kindness 

As researchers reviewed the differing impacts of motivating conditions on competence, autonomy, and social relatedness.  The results were very interesting: 

• Competence  
  • Positive Impact Observed
    • A strong culture of  Kindness had a positive impact, statistically increasing motivation for those at every level of competence, even as motivation dropped with higher competence.  
    • High Company Loyalty also increased motivation significantly, though it still dropped significantly with higher competence.  
  • Interesting Insight:  Religious affiliation had a very interesting impact on motivation with competence, effectively evening out the difference between high and low competence on motivation.  
• Autonomy
  • Positive Impact Observed
    • Higher political participation had a slightly higher positive impact with increased autonomy, though only when high levels of autonomy was granted.  
    • A strong culture of Kindness very significant increase in motivation for those with autonomy, even when low levels of autonomy were observed. 
• Social Relatedness
  • Positive Impact Observed
    • A strong culture of Kindness was the only statistically significant motivational factor that increased motivation with regards to social relatedness, and it was significant.  I found this particularly enlightening, and once pointed out I could see how this same concept could be rubber-stamped across all social environments.  

As outlined above, kindness was the one social motivator that could impact an individual’s work motivation, regardless of one’s level of competence, how much autonomy they have been given, and how much one relates to their team.  

Building a Culture of Kindness

We know that Kindness makes a huge impact on a team’s motivation, but how do you build a culture of kindness?  Here are some key steps you can use to shift your company culture, regardless of who you are in the company.  

• Define Your Values:  Company values are great, and every company has a list of values they like to highlight.  These should be communicated, reiterated, and focus on the importance of kindness and compassion while working with one another, and then act on them.  Writing your values is a great step, but you, as leadership, employees, and as teams, need to live them.  
• Give Earned Credit:  Recognize those who have great ideas, and give credit to those who deserve it.  This means recognizing a great idea from the janitor if they are overheard and the idea is used, not the guy who implemented it.  Be willing to recognize those who make a difference, and don’t take credit for someone else’s work.  This seems obvious, but it’s amazing to see how often this is not done.  
• Address Conflicts Constructively:  Conflict is going to happen, and believe it or not, it’s healthy if approached constructively.  Everyone should have a chance to have a say, every perspective should be listened to with the desire to understand (not respond), and then move forward with the understanding that all concerns where heard, understood, and considered.  
• Focus On Lessons Learned, Not Blame:  It’s human nature to find someone or something to blame, and feel like a bad situation was completely out of your control.  The honest truth:  you can always do something to mitigate all risk, even if you didn’t know you could at the time.  That’s part of learning, growing, and becoming better.  When you run into issues, focus on the lessons you are learning and how to avoid the problem in future, rather than who is to blame.  When folks feel like they are allowed to make honest mistakes, they will be more willing to put all their effort into making something happen.  And you will earn their trust. 
• Measure Individual Success:  Not everyone is going to be at the same level, and often it can feel like they continue to struggle while others who have more seniority get all the recognition.  As a leader, meet people where they are and recognize their individual growth.  
• Show Gratitude:  As a teammate, show appreciation for the contributions of your peers, however small it might be at the time.  Gratitude can go a long way in building social bonds.  

Research has shown that a culture of kindness, above all else, can have a more of an impact than any other factor in your organization.  By building a culture where everyone is kind and compassionate, you will increase your teams motivation at a social level, engaging them as a team to complete tasks and accomplish more than you could at any other cultural level.  Treat people with respect, listen to understand, and show gratitude at all levels, and you will have a truly great place to work.  

For more information on the research, check out the referenced link below. 

Vo, Thuy Thi Diem, Kristine Velasquez Tuliao, and Chung-Wen Chen. “Work motivation: The roles of individual needs and social conditions.” Behavioral Sciences 12.2 (2022): 49.