Many years ago I had a coworker who had a very off-putting communication style.
This was well known in my work area.
When I saw the caller ID or this person walking toward my office, I could feel my nervous system bracing for conflict. I was constantly walking on eggshells whenever I knew I had to interact with this individual.
Harsh tones, aggressive body language, angry facial expressions, eye-rolling, and biting sarcasm were all part of this person’s standard way of communicating.
The impact on our team was clear—people held back new ideas, they hesitated to talk in meetings, and they avoided telling this person when mistakes had been made. Most people just avoided this team member.
Thankfully, the top leaders made some changes and the issue was eventually recognized and addressed.
When incivility and unkindness are allowed to persist, it harms the workplace in measurable ways. Good employees leave, retention goes down, engagement goes down, productivity goes down, creative ideas aren’t shared freely, and mistakes aren’t identified and corrected swiftly.
All of these things can happen because workplace kindness is directly linked to psychological safety—a key driver of successful workplaces.
A 2021 study of more than 500 of the worlds leading companies found that an unkind workplace was more than ten times as likely than compensation to be the reason why people leave a job.
Another study of Fortune 1000 managers indicated they spend approximately seven weeks per year dealing with the backlash of employee incivility. That’s nearly one sixth of the year devoted to damage control.
What’s more, studies show that when kindness degrades in healthcare settings, patients end up paying the price for fractured teams.
A kind workplace culture is a big deal and should be treated like a key strategic initiative by smart companies.
What exactly is workplace kindness?
Nicki Macklin is a researcher in this area and defines kindness as the proactive effort to support someone else’s growth, well-being, or success and it is a set of observable intentional actions.
Kindness can also be characterized by unselfish behavior or going out of your way to help the team, and relationships of mutual listening and respect.
People often confuse kindness with people-pleasing, ingratiating behavior, and ignoring problems.
But kindness is completely different than simply being nice.
Real kindness is combined with strength. It means having tough conversations combined with the ability to be direct, empathic, and doing a lot of listening or asking questions to understand an issue clearly. It involves upholding high standards. It involves holding one’s ground on important issues while remaining respectful, curious, and open-minded—a very difficult balance, but something our world certainly needs more of.
It serves no one when the leader can’t confront a difficult issue or address toxic behavior.
How to create a workplace culture of kindness
Political scientist Robert Putnam said that people learn how to behave by participating in communities. People learn what to say and do at work by watching their manager and coworkers.
That means a culture of kindness must start with the leaders at the highest levels. Without this top-down behavioral modeling, this culture is unlikely to take root. Hiring top leaders who are kind is essential.
Next, kindness must be identified as vitally important to work success and then supported by middle managers who also conduct performance evaluations that reinforce the behavioral correlates of kindness in action on their teams.
As Navy Seal turned business consultant Jocko Willink frequently says—“You get what you tolerate, not what you preach.”
Author Kim Scott says that ruinous empathy is the curse of the “too nice leader.” This occurs when the leadership style is characterized by people pleasing that permits problem behavior, which harms the organization.
Good leaders at every level must see their highest good as the commitment to the team and the health of the organization—which means directly and rapidly rooting out toxic behaviors.
It’s not enough to simply talk about it, unkindness must be actively discouraged.
I’ve been leading people for the last 16 years and in my experience, few people address these problems, and even fewer do it well. Addressing problem behavior in a healthy way is a core skill that we can all continue to improve in.
It’s worth saying that a culture of kindness is a great thing for families too.
“When people feel noticed, valued, and respected, they are more wiling to help each other, collaborate, and solve problems” (Harvard Business Review, 2025).
Kindness changes everything.
We recently got the results of our 2025 job survey, and one important statement caught my eye.
Amongst other things that called out kind workplace behavior, one comment from a contract worker said that their favorite thing about working with our team was that “people are so kind.”
That was a homerun in my book.
Take action now
Define, model, and reinforce it. Don’t let another week slip by. If you are in a position of leadership, start sharing this idea and behaviorally modeling and defining it for your team. Keep sharing the vision and reinforce kindness in action with verbal praise or tangible rewards. Talk about it in performance reviews.
Hire for it (especially leaders!). If you have a role in hiring, make sure you ask questions that solicit behavioral indicators of kindness. The Notre Dame Behavioral Interviewing questions list is a key resource I’ve been recommending for years. This is even more important when it comes to any manager. Don’t hire anyone for a leadership role that doesn’t have this skill.
Meetings are a key place where kindness is observed. Refuse to tolerate incivility. Pull someone aside after a meeting for a difficult conversation. Don’t sidestep the issue or the problem will take deeper root.
Email is another place where incivility can show up. Make sure you coach all employees on proper email etiquette and communication. Written communication can easily be misinterpreted and often requires even more finesse and tact. If someone was willing to write something rude, chances are good that their verbal communication is worse. Address it right away.
If you are not in a position of leadership, you can still ask for a meeting with your manager to discuss any concerns or suggestions you may have to increase kindness in your work area. Share the research studies to make a compelling argument of why its so important.
Conduct surveys and leadership 360 evaluations. Kindness should be measured through engagement surveys or blind manager feedback evaluations. Managers will act with a different level of accountability when they know this will be measured and discussed annually.
Have a great weekend!
Parker
Resources
- Why Kindness Isn’t a Nice to Have. Harvard Business Review July 2025
- Toxic Work Culture is Driving the Great Resignation. MIT Sloan Management Review, January 2022
