“If you have to teach kindness, then you have already lost.”
“If you have to teach kindness, then you have already lost.”
Do you think that's true?
A NY Times article, “Walmart Wants to Teach Store Managers Compassion,” caught my attention, and the comments made me think.
2.1 million people work at Walmart, and every year they bring about 2000 managers to their headquarters to help them relate to and motivate their people.
“Managers take part in breakout sessions about how to make all of their workers, from the mechanics in the car repair department to the overnight shift workers mopping the floors and those restocking apples in the grocery department, feel as if they’re contributing.”
Throughout, trainers reinforce a foundational message:
“Walmart’s success is possible only if the store managers take care of their workers and the customers and community where they operate.”
Many commenters applauded the effort. But others made it clear that compassion and kindness should be intrinsic traits or instilled elsewhere.
“It seems to me that if you have to teach it. You have promoted from within entirely incorrectly. Or you have a huge problem with how you are recruiting. If you have to teach kindness, then you have already lost.”
“'teach compassion’ oy vey! If you have to teach it….”
My own experience is that we have normalized inhumane behavior in the workplace for a very long time. And so "re-teach" is a good word for what’s required. We need to help employees re-normalize, re-learn, and re-experience the better angels of our nature in the workplace. We need to show how these behaviors serve us as individuals and also as a collective.
What’s your opinion? Does it help to teach people how to relate to each other in the workplace? Or is it too late?
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Note: Here is the LinkedIn post about the article from Walmart CHRO Donna Morris where the comments I cited appeared.
Does it help to teach people how to relate to each other in the workplace? Or is it too late?