THE POWER OF KINDNESS
A collaborative approach
Last year, we launched the inaugural Kindness & Leadership 50 Leading Lights campaign, celebrating 50 phenomenal, kind leaders working in the UK today. Our goal was to radically challenge the leadership conversation, which has traditionally overlooked the power of kindness in leadership and the immense impact that it has in all areas of business. We wanted to recast perceptions of ‘strong’ leadership – to present kindness as a strength, as a quality and a currency that empowers change.
It has only been a year since we placed the spotlight on our 50 Leading Lights, but we’ve witnessed a significant shift in the leadership landscape. Against a background of uncertainty and rapid change (political, environmental, technological), we’ve seen kindness move to centre stage, with more leaders, schools and industries acknowledging its clout. As so superbly illustrated in this booklet, put together by Saïd Business School and Hall & Partners, kindness has the ability to build trust, confidence and loyalty – it’s the leadership style that will achieve change in a fragile world.
And so, it’s tremendously exciting to see our 50 Leading Lights campaign grow and to announce our 2019 Kindness List, in association with Unilever. This year, we will also launch the campaign in Southeast Asia, together with sponsor, Asia Square.
I urge you to get involved. Connect with us and let’s work together to determine the style of leadership that succeeds.
Pinky Lilani CBE DL, Founder, Women of the Future Programme
THE RESEARCH
INSIGHTS FROM KIND LEADERS
How fortunate we were to be given the opportunity to interview ten of the leaders named as 50 Leading Lights of Kindness and Leadership in 2018. Gender balanced and drawn from financial services, utilities, high technology, logistics, publishing and professional and public services, the group share a strong belief in the value of kindness in organisations. Their responses to our questions about kind behaviours and actions and their impact on organisational culture and performance were remarkably consistent, as you will see throughout this booklet. Women of the Future has also included quotes from several of the 50 Leading Lights 2018 to bring additional support to our interview findings.
LALIT JOHRI AND GAY HASKINS
Saïd Business School, University of Oxford
AN EMPLOYEE PERSPECTIVE
The Hall & Partners team is excited and honoured to have the opportunity to once again partner up with the Women of the Future Programme. Working with the Saïd Business School, we have taken the insights from their work and combined them with our own research, pulling together an insightful and thought-provoking booklet. It asks: What makes a leader kind? What does kindness in leadership look like in the workplace?
To help us answer these questions, we conducted an online survey of 1,000 nationally representative people in the UK who are currently employed by an organisation. Those who took part in the survey work across a whole range of industries and come from all parts of the UK. This gave us a comprehensive view of how kindness is perceived and experienced in the working world.
Thank you for reading this booklet. We hope you enjoy it and that it inspires you to be kind. However small, it will have a big impact.
VANELLA JACKSON AND THE HALL & PARTNERS KINDNESS TEAM
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