Watch Out For "Nice" Leaders | Ep 238
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- Being nice can actually be really cruel. Let me tell you this story. Six years ago, I learned how destructive nice leadership can be. I had a leader in my company who appeared to have built a great department, and then one day, I got a message from someone on her team asking to resign. She said,

I can't be here. I am getting paid to do nothing. When I was investigating it, I discovered that most of the team was underutilized. They were answering just a handful of emails a week. They were barely talking to customers and they were barely doing their job to the degree that most of them had about three hours of work. And this was spread amongst 15 people.

When I approached the leader about it, her response shocked me. She said, "We'll have to find work for them." What she did in that moment was she avoided confronting the real issue, was that she overhired. Her solution was to fabricate work that didn't help the business, didn't help the team, and didn't help the culture. And so when I suggested

"Hey, you over-hired. "We probably need to figure out "what we need to do with these people." She said, "I'm not doing that. "I'm not laying people off. "I will not stand and work at a company "when people do that." And then she sent her resignation to me the next morning.

Ultimately, what I had to do was I had to step in, I had to reorganize the department, and I did have to let people go. And to be honest, it was one of the hardest times that I've ever had in my leadership. It was one of the hardest decisions I ever had to make, and I was vilified for it in my company. But what it taught me is that

true leadership is not about avoiding tough decisions. It's about what's doing what's right for the long-term success of the team and the company. And sometimes it doesn't look good in the short term. The experience taught me the difference between being nice and being kind, right? Kindness is addressing issues head on, upholding our standards and creating an environment where excellence thrives. Niceness often leads to mediocrity, broken trust,

and unsustainable practices. Leadership demands making hard choices even when they're not popular, even when people misunderstand you, even when people don't like the decisions you make. So let's look at what happens when we choose niceness over kindness and why kindness is the way forward if you want to be a great leader. There are really three costs to being nice. Let's start with the first one. The first is that avoiding conflict robs people of growth.

Okay, nice leaders always shy away from the tough conversations. They don't give honest feedback because they're afraid of upsetting somebody in the moment. But by avoiding that conflict, what you do is you rob your team of the growth that comes from addressing their weaknesses and helping them improve. Nice leaders think that they're sparing people pain. They're making them feel good. They're keeping the peace. But in reality, they're prolonging and deferring the pain.

And by avoiding those hard conversations, they prevent growth, not just for that individual, but for the entire team. Here's the thing. Being nice doesn't win games.

Nice doesn't drive things forward. Nice isn't really honest. Kind is. Nice leaders want to be liked more than they want to win. And that's why they don't attract winners. So while avoiding conflict might feel like kindness in the moment, it is actually creating dysfunction in the long run. This brings us to the second cost of being nice.

which is it focuses on short-term comfort rather than long-term success. Here's the thing, nice leaders think short-term. Nice leaders focus on instant harmony. They make decisions that feel good right now, like saying yes to every request or avoiding tough calls and decisions. But these decisions often

often undermine the future of the entire organization. Because the truth is, the best decisions often don't feel good in the moment. Often what feels good is not what is good for you. Honest feedback, tough choices, pushing people out of their comfort zones, those are all uncomfortable things to do, but they are necessary to grow without dysfunction. Being nice often results in actually being mean in the long run because you sabotage your company and your people. Embracing discomfort leads to short-term pain.

Unironically, it also leads to long-term success. And the funny thing is that nice leaders often lose the very thing they're trying to build, trust and respect.

Which brings me to the third point. Nice leaders lose respect. Okay, this is one that I did not realize early in my career. When leaders prioritize being liked over being honest, people see them as inauthentic. Okay, think about it like this. Who trusts a leader who only tells them what they want to hear? Who trusts a leader that they know is holding back feedback? Who trusts a leader who saves face by avoiding conflict? Nice leaders think that they're building trust by avoiding discomfort,

But the opposite is true. Respect comes from honesty, not people pleasing. Niceness is what you do to be liked. Kindness is what you do to be respected. Genuine relationships are marked by a mutual respect and authenticity. If being nice creates all of these issues, it avoids conflict, it's short-term thinking, and you lose respect,

then what does it look like to lead with kindness instead? Now here's the four reasons why kindness wins. Okay, the first is that kindness requires honesty. Kind leaders give feedback that people need to hear, even when it's uncomfortable, because they value honesty because they know it builds trust in the long term.

Now, honesty is not easy, but it is essential because when you're honest, people know that they can trust you whether the news is good or bad. They at least know that you're no bullshit. It's kind of like real friends talk shit to your face. Fake friends talk shit behind your back. And here's the thing. Honesty is how you respect your company and your team. It's about reminding people of the standards and values unapologetically.

the more honest you are with your team, the more they normalize and habituate to you being honest. Therefore, the more honest the entire team is. But here's the thing, honesty alone is not enough. The second reason that kindness wins is that kind leaders set boundaries. Kind leaders care deeply about their teams.

but they do not compromise their values or mission to avoid discomfort. They set clear expectations and they hold people accountable, even when it's hard, even when it's painful, even when you really don't want to do it, even when you're really nervous and you're really scared. Boundaries aren't barriers. They're tools that protect your team's growth and your company's mission. Here's the thing. Leadership is not about making promises to please.

It's about setting expectations to succeed. The only people who get upset about you setting boundaries are often the ones who benefited when you had none. And while boundaries are critical,

Kindness also means understanding your team's perspective, which brings me to my third point, empathy. The third reason that kindness wins is that kind leaders lead with empathy. Kindness does not mean being indifferent or cold. It means understanding where your team is coming from and using that understanding to guide your decisions. You want to lead with empathy, not by empathy. And

Empathy should inform your decisions, but it should not cloud or stop your judgment from doing what's right and what's necessary to make sure that the company goes in the right direction, is abiding by the mission, and abiding by the values. Empathy is a tool, but it's not a crutch. When used correctly, it's going to help you communicate effectively, and it's going to help you build trust without compromising your values. So what you want to do is you want to use empathy as a tool to guide how you communicate.

but not an excuse to avoid tough decisions. Empathy taken too far becomes sympathy. And when we feel bad for people and we feel sympathetic for people, we avoid hard conversations. Empathy is seeing with the eyes of another, listening with the ears of another, and feeling with the heart of another. Okay, the fourth reason that kindness wins is because kindness prioritizes the long term. Kindness is about making the decisions that work

benefit the organization and its people in the long run, even if it means enduring discomfort today. It's about investing in your long-term success of your team. And you do that by helping people grow. And you help people grow by giving them feedback as you push them out of their comfort zone. And so being kind is not about being comfortable. Being

Being kind is actually really uncomfortable because you're constantly pushing people to be better. You're pushing yourself to be better and ultimately the organization by prioritizing that kindness. And so the uncomfortable truth is this. Short-term pain is often the cost of long-term growth. The most undervalued growth strategy is patience. It's consistently doing the uncomfortable thing day in and day out, knowing that you're not going to see the result today.

but that you will see it in a week, a month, six months, a year from now. Niceness feels good in the moment.

but it creates long-term dysfunction in a team. Kindness, while a harder skill to hone in, builds trust, it drives culture, it drives growth, and it creates a culture of excellence. So the next time that you are in this situation, you now have the self-awareness to know based on these principles, are you being nice or are you being kind? And as a leader, your job isn't to be liked. It's to make decisions that will move your team and your company forward. If you

If you think about the best bosses and the best coaches and the best mentors you've had, they probably haven't been super nice and coddled you. They've probably pushed you a little. They probably made you a little uncomfortable, but they've made you better and they've helped you become the person you want to be. The kindest thing that you can do for your team is push them to be better, is push them to become the versions of themselves they've told you they want to be.