Doing what I can for my team

Sometimes it's hard to know where to start with kindness and generosity. You might say hello to a lonely neighbour every now and again, or you might say yes to that donation when you pay for something. But, you might have a bad day or a bad week and suddenly you don't do any of that. Are you a bad person for it? No, because in those moments where you showed kindness, it made a difference. That lonely neighbour didn't feel so alone for a week. That donation helped a charity afford something for their cause.

I think sometimes we forget that small moments can be huge for someone else. Something we don't even think has made someone else happy, has done and it's really given them a huge boost. I live to give those moments to anyone I come across in life. So, hopefully by the end of this piece you'll have more of an understanding of the small things you can do to help.

Many of us live a normal life and just try and get by as best as we can. We don't have the financial capabilities to donate to every charitable cause, even though we'd very much like to. Your colleague at work or family member has made this huge contribution to a charity. Maybe they've gone above and beyond and raised this money themselves. It is incredible what people have accomplished to raise money, but it's not the only thing you can do. Don't feel like you're not a kind person because you haven't.

Random acts of kindness is really what we can all do. So, when I saw this up as a challenge, I wanted to see what more I could do in my day to day life to help those around me. As the leader of a small team of people, I'm the one they get their motivation from. More on that later though.

I want to mention something I did in my personal life to help someone else, but I was able to see what it did for them. I broke up with my girlfriend of three and a half years last year. It ended in a civil way, and as much as it hurt at the time, we both got on with it. I said to her I'd still support her growing TikTok account and I did as much as I could. We hadn't spoken for a couple of months but I saw she uploaded a video and was really confident in the way she looked. Suggesting she's was a 10 out of 10 and I really appreciated her confidence to post it. Now, with social media we know it can be a truly horrible place to be and unfortunately her video received a very negative comment.

It felt heavy on my heart to read it and I felt truly awful. I didn't know what to do, but I had the idea to make a secondary account and post a positive reply in response. So she knew someone out there was supporting her. I caught up with her a couple of months after that and she mentioned that it gave her a little bit of confidence when she was really struggling for it. It took me all of 10 minutes to make someone feel happier. It actually made me feel better too. That's what I'm trying to get across.

Moving on to what I'm trying to change in my workplace, I'm going to start with a bit of background. I won't name the company I work for, but it's in the retail industry. An industry which is almost constantly changing and adapting to new struggles. The pandemic has caused new strains that we've never had to deal with, and a lot of companies are trialing new solutions. Some of these solutions aren't working and it's creating a lot of tension between colleagues and management. In our particular business, our owners are creating a chain of fear. If you don't do the job right, you're out the door.

The colleagues are the heartbeat of any industry, without them then businesses collapse. A happy colleague is a happy work place and I think that's incredibly important. It also could mean a happier home life too which is also under enormous pressure. With all that in mind, it only takes me a few conversations to understand the issues that the colleagues have. They feel a real disdain towards upper management and feel like they're left to pick up the pieces. Tidy up the mess they didn't cause, but are then asked to work harder when they can't clean it up.

So, I've made it my mission to bring every single one of my colleagues a brighter and happier day. I know they'd rather not be there at all, but if I can make it slightly easier for them then I feel like I've done my job. I get told to lead in a certain way which I don't agree with. I endeavour to lead in the way that gets the most out of my colleagues. Leading from the front is how it should be and making the load lighter for those around me. Spending a few minutes chatting to them, making them laugh and listening to them. Especially for the quieter colleagues who could spend a whole day not talking to anyone.

You can see the happiness on their face when I take that interest in their lives. It allows for them to come out of their shells a bit more and interact with other colleagues, something which can unite the team. I will then take the time to appreciate what they've accomplished in the day and they can go home feeling a little better.

To summarise, I believe that kindness is shown in moments. Whether it's small or large, but also not to be hard on yourself if you don't go out of your way to brighten someone else's day. Sometimes you need to be left alone and that is totally okay because you made a stranger's whole week last week just by talking to them for five minutes. So, I'm trying to make more of those moments in work and everywhere else I can.