Do you care about your business?

Being kind is good for business. It makes customers happy, it builds relationships, and it can even lead to more sales. You don’t have to be a saint to be kind – in fact, being genuine and authentic is the best way to go.

When your kindness shines through in your interactions with others, they feel seen and heard. That’s what we all crave – connection. And when people feel connected to you and your business, they want to stick around for the long haul.

Listen to this podcast to see how kindness can help your business succeed!

Do you want your business to be successful?

Kindness is one of the most important aspects of a successful business. In fact, it's one of the most important aspects of any relationship. When kindness is missing, so too is trust, and without trust there can be no success.

Being kind doesn't mean being weak or ineffective. It means that you're strong enough to put yourself in someone else's shoes and understand their perspective. It means that you're able to forgive and forget, and that you're always looking for ways to improve things for everyone involved. That's what makes a kind person a great leader.

Listen now to this podcast to see how kindness can help your business succeed!

Conclusion

So, what have we learned? Kindness, Being kind is good for business.  Moreover, it is essential in business and it can take many different forms. You don't need to be Mother Teresa or Gandhi to show kindness in your professional life - something as simple as a smile or a thank you can make all the difference. And if you're ever feeling down about work, remember that being kind to others is one of the best ways to feel good yourself. Listen to this episode for more great tips on how to bring kindness into your business dealings and subscribe so you never miss an episode!

For more business and finance, news, advice and tips, don’t forget to subscribe and watch our weekly videos on I Hate Numbers, listen to our weekly podcast I Hate Numbers.

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Listen to find out more.

Furthermore, my mission is to inform, inspire and educate you to get closer to your numbers.

You can make more profits, save tax and time, improve your well-being and your money mindset.

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Kindness in business. Kindness in business is something that's not often heard, or something hasn't been until now. Nowadays, kindness in business is seen very much as inexorably linked, and it has a very strong part to play in the business world and in your business. Now, folks, in this weekly episode of I Hate Numbers, I'm going to be looking at kindness, particularly what it is, why it's so important to have that embedded into your business culture and your business practice and the way that you deal with things in your business life and also share some tips and tricks as to how to embed kindness more actively in your business life.

You're listening to the I Hate Numbers podcast with Mahmood Reza. The I Hate Numbers podcast mission is to help your business survive and thrive by you better understanding and connecting with your numbers. Number love and care is what it's about. Tune in every week.

Now. Here's your host, Mahmood Reza.

Hi, folks. Welcome to another weekly episode of I Hate Numbers. The podcast that’s got a mission to improve your financial awareness, improve and increase your money mindset, help you make more money, save tax and time. What more could we ask for? Let's crack on with a podcast. Kindness, at its core, is about being considerate of other people's feelings. Everything, if you wish, being helpful and being generous, not just with your wallet, but with your time as well. For many people, kindness is considered a sign of weakness. It's not an active action that we should see in the business life, and we should be more alpha male, we should be more beating the chest. And kindness has no part to play. And that's palpably incorrect. If anything, kindness has that real positive effect, as much for the giver of kindness as it does for the individual or entity that is receiving kindness. Now, what actually is kindness? We've said it's about having empathy for other people's feelings. It's been helpful and it's being considerate, certainly a sign of weakness it is not. Now, kindness does not mean being soft. It does not mean that you won't be faced with difficult decisions in your business life, which is something that's going to be quite prevalent. If we imagine that situation where you have to go and visit the dentist or some other unpleasant experience, no disrespect to dentists out there, then a dentist can still be kind. A dentist can still show empathy, and a dentist can still show consideration for the patient they're sitting in their chair. You may have in your business life very difficult, tough decisions to make. You might have to make somebody redundant, you may have to talk to somebody about their work performance, but you can still act with kindness and still be firm at the same time. So don't conflate. Don't confuse kindness with weakness. Don't confuse kindness with being a pushover. Don't confuse kindness with actually agreeing to what everybody else says. It's about empathy and it's about being considerate or feelings. Now, kindness can exhibit itself in many different ways in our businesses. It's going from the way that we interact and deal with staff. So that actually complement of the work that's being done well, that actual recognition of a task that's been delivered possibly is an act of kindness. And it has as much, if not more, of a motivating effect on that individual's performance as money in their bank account does. Obviously, having the two combined money in the bank as well as being kind is a real double bonus. You can be kind to your customers, kind to your suppliers, the way that you deal with them, the language that you adopt, being receptive to their ways of working. Kindness can manifest itself in lots of different ways. Now, as a heads up folks here, you've got to act with genuineness here. So if you go through that false idea of praising an employee and there's no real sincerity beyond your motivation, then that can be definitely displayed to the receiver and that is counterproductive. So if you're going to act kindly, which I would thoroughly recommend, make sure that you do it as a genuine action. False actions can be definitely recognised and they will be counterproductive and they will bite you in the bottom words of encouragement doing acts. So whether it's from being eco friendly, looking at products that can be recycled, your carbon footprint, being considerate of the products that you're buying are all examples of being kind. And kindness has a reinforcing effect when it comes to employing people, recruiting people. Employees these days look as much of the work culture, the work environment as they will do in terms of the pay packet, the bonuses and the benefits they will receive. Money in itself is not the only motivator in life. It's certainly a powerful one, but it's not the only thing. If that wasn't the case, then many people would not go into vocational professions or choose careers where the pay levels are not as well paid and remunerated as comparative companies. Now, if you're in a situation where in your firm you recognise that you need to be more kind, then I would definitely recommend small micro steps to be undertaken. It could be anything from a small act of kindness, of smiling more, being less stressed, looking after yourself. Being kind to yourself is as important as being kind to the members of your team, your suppliers and other stakeholders in the business. Kindness is good for the world that you operate in. Kindness is good for everybody that encounters that. We feel much more strongly, we feel much more aligned with the people that we deal with. And business is fundamentally about people. We buy from people, so it’s said. And therefore, if we are acting kindly with genuineness here, if our culture and environment has a degree of compassion, has that degree of empathy, and how we treat people, then that's only going to reinforce our position in our marketplace, and it's going to make it a much more attractive place for people to wish to join, and also is a definite decider in retaining your existing workforce. Now, kindness spreads across the board. We know that it can really encourage collaboration, productivity and loyalty. Here and again, it's really about the matter and how you interact with customers and suppliers, as well as your own work team, and also how kind you are to yourself. Kindness definitely is a subjective matter. It's not a one size fits all and we have to treat this very carefully. It could be anything from how we interact with our colleagues, those people that we work with, whether we leave our grumpiness at the door. It's being recognised by the fact that people's lives are quite mixed and varied, but when they come into the work environment, they may not all come in with the same amount of baggage. Is there something in policies and procedures that can be looked at and that we can actually create a much kinder work environment? Some tips and tricks to share on top of what we said in the broadcast is lead by example. If you want your work environment, your business, to be kinder, then you must set the tone. You must lead by example. There's no point in asking others to be kind if you don't exhibit that same kindness and compassion that others do. The language itself might be off-putting for some, though respect might sometimes be an alternative term, it has the same resonance behind it. Make sure all your staff understand the rationale behind what you're doing. Get them involved in those conversations. Get them involved in discussing how the work environment can be a kinder place. Make sure you encourage open communication. Make sure that you can encourage that space where people feel they can air what they want to. It might require training and development. You might feel that's unnecessary. But if we've got set pants of behaviour by language and how we interact with each other, how we sort of exhibit that towards our suppliers and staff, then an external facilitator, some form of training and development to make us recognise those facets may be a good step forward. Some companies use reward schemes, incentive schemes, where they encourage others to contribute ideas to make the workplace a kinder environment. You may have a kindness day where you encourage members of staff to contribute their time and energies to volunteer, whether it's for a day, a project or anything else. And being kind and connecting with those in the community in which you operate to represent and produce a kind of work environment can be really, really productive. OK, folks, let's wrap up. What have we learned? Kindness is definitely not weakness and definitely it's not a sign of softness. It might feel a bit woo woo. It might feel a bit out there, but it's definitely something that should be encouraged it has a more positive impact on a firm's ability to operate. The strength, the resilience, the loyalty, it can build up the productivity amongst your own team. Those are all definitely sticking points. If you feel you want to make a transition and we can all be kinder in our businesses, then do it one step at a time. Recognise where you need to be kinder, whether it's language, whether it's communication, whether it's being more upfront and honest with people, whether it's being comfortable making difficult decisions, but doing that in an empathetic way, then that's what you need to work on. Folks, I hope you've got some money from this podcast. If you have, I'd love it if you could share that with those who will benefit. If you've got some feedback and comments to share, please let me know accordingly, and on feeling that. Have a very excellent, kind week.

We hope you enjoyed this episode and appreciate you taking the time to listen to the show. We hope you got some value. If you did, then we'd love it if you shared the episode. We look forward to you joining us next week for another I Hate Numbers episode.