Google is perhaps one of the most amazing places in the world to work. They offer remarkable perks to their employees in an effort to help create a meaningful and productive work culture. Google employees get gourmet snacks, a dog-friendly workplace, in-house massage services, free gym membership, free time for creative side-projects, and more. But a long term study that began in 2012 attempted to measure the benefits of these perks. Google wanted to find out which perks produced the most job satisfaction and healthy productivity in their employees.
Their discoveries were unexpected. They discovered that it was not the nap-pods, creative work spaces, or free technology that created the most happiness and buy-in from employees. Rather it was the “psychological safety” and “social sensitivity” fostered in each department. In other words, the greatest factor for workplace satisfaction was the kindness of others.
When employees were allowed to speak up, try new ideas, and even fail without fear of social or professional backlash, they would thrive. They found that when managers were open about their personal challenges and created cultures of trust in their department, whole teams would function smoothly and efficiently. They found that if Google was a place where people could operate without fear and build meaningful and kind connections, the company was always better off.
What Google found may be surprising. In some cultures competition, alluring perks, and secrecy are often used to try and get others to fall in line. In some places it has been the only way to get things done. Yet this not only produces factions and damaged relationships, but productivity slows to a grind and joy evaporates in the face of these constraints.
Kindness, goodness, trust, and care are often dismissed as the soft edges of meaningful productivity. However this new research is revealing once again that employees are people, not machines. We were made to thrive in cultures of trust and kindness.
In our neighbourhoods and in our city we may be tempted to think the way forward is through angry protest, bitter vindictive, or distanced critique. We’re well within our rights, perhaps, to operate from this posture. However we are learning that good things happen slowly, or not at all, in the mire that this culture produces. In places where neighbours spend time together, where problems are addressed over coffee and with mutual high regard, and where trust is fostered at every opportunity – these are the places where goodness emerges.
If we want a city that hums with life and if we want neighbourhoods that exude safe relationally, we may need to foster the one thing that money and legislation can never create: kindness. By re-engaging the Art of Kindness we may be doing more for this city than any program could create.
It is not soft or weak to be kind, in fact it may require courage and deep generosity of character to be kind in the midst of fearful cultures. What does the Art of Kindness look like in your family, workplace, or neighbourhood?
