The Difference Between Nice and Kind in The Workplace

Having success with your Diversity and Inclusion efforts can be largely dependent on whether your culture promotes niceness or kindness.
What does it mean when employees are nice to their coworkers, and what does it mean when they are kind?
In this episode of Know the Difference, we are going to explore the key differences between what it really means when people are nice to others and what it means when they are kind to others.
In many workplaces, there is the expectation the environment that organizations want to create is one where employees are nice and pleasant. This seems obvious, people like it when others are nice to them. The problem with niceness, is that it can sometimes become a façade that hinders long term benefits in favor of short term pleasantries.
Let’s start by first defining Nice and Kind.
Niceness is about being pleasing to others. Giving them a pleasant experience, regardless of the need or context.
Kindness is about being truly supportive of others. Giving them the help or advice that they need, whether or not it is what they want.
A really good way to clarify their difference is to think of it as…
Niceness is smiling back at someone who smiles at you. Where Kindness is letting that person know they have spinach in their teeth.
Ideally you want to be BOTH nice and kind, where you help someone out in a pleasant and friendly way. But when it comes to the workplace, it is better to be kind then be nice. It is important to provide people the real support they need, not just smile and pacify them with pleasantries while you watch them struggle.
Now where these difference becomes really important is when you are talking about creating inclusion and belonging in the workplace.
One of the dangers with a workplace that reinforces nice over kind can be what enables discrimination and systemic inequity.
Because niceness is often about avoiding uncomfortable situations and trying to put a pleasing face on circumstances. This can make it hard to have difficult conversations, deal with real challenges, and make it hard to shake up complacency or the status quo, when they are protecting inequity.
When kindness is prioritized, it means that the expectation is for people to do what is best for others, and allows for opportunities to have hard conversations that support the greater good.