I’ve been thinking quite a lot about kindness recently, probably because I work with somebody who is genuinely one of the kindest, most big-hearted people I’ve met. I was really, really touched by something she did for me last week, and it got me thinking about all the people at work\/school that I’ve encountered throughout my life who’ve shown me kindness, often in ways they’ve probably thought very little about afterwards, but which I’ve remembered for years. I wonder how often we realise the influence we have on other people, particularly when we’re just doing something nice because we want to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Make Kindness Cool<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve been thinking quite a lot about kindness recently, probably because I work with somebody who is genuinely one of the kindest, most big-hearted people I\u2019ve met. I was really, really touched by something she did for me last week, and it got me thinking about all the people I\u2019ve encountered throughout my life who\u2019ve shown me kindness, often in ways they\u2019ve probably thought very little about afterwards, but which I\u2019ve remembered for years. I wonder how often we realise the influence we have on other people, particularly when we\u2019re just doing something nice because we want to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The people who stayed with me<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I once had a boss who was a proper hard-arse with me! She had incredibly high expectations, pushed me enormously and certainly wasn\u2019t somebody who let me get away with doing things half-heartedly. Yet, when I was probably the most ill I\u2019ve ever been, I woke up in my apartment to find her sitting beside my bed holding my hand. She\u2019d persuaded security to let her in, and there she was, making sure I was drinking, giving me medication, checking my temperature and trying to make me comfortable. I was too ill to freak out about the fact she\u2019d somehow got into my apartment! I learnt that being a tough boss and being a genuinely caring human being aren\u2019t mutually exclusive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I think about the people who\u2019ve shaped who I am, obviously family has had an influence, but there are so many others who\u2019ve come into my life along the way. I was painfully shy at primary school, never put my hand up and didn\u2019t even know I was bright until a teacher told me. She worked hard to build my confidence and knew I loved singing, so naturally I\u2019d sit right beside the piano in assembly, hoping she\u2019d hear me and tell me I\u2019d done well. Too shy to put my hand up, but apparently not too shy to fish for a compliment! Subtle. Then there was my headteacher, David Hudson, who believed in me and is probably the reason I ended up in the sciences. Years later, when he received his OBE, I emailed to congratulate him, and he remembered me! I was absolutely delighted. Outside school, I worked in our local Chinese takeaway, where Janet made me feel part of her family when I was just an employee. I spent evenings working and reading to her young children, although I\u2019m not sure my Yorkshire accent did much for their pronunciation! She taught me so much about hard work, recognising people\u2019s different strengths and being part of a team. I wonder if any of them realise how much of an influence they had?<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve been fortunate to work with some wonderful people throughout my career too. A fantastic head of department, a deputy head who taught me an enormous amount about how we show genuine care towards children in schools, and a head of school who saw what I was capable of and advocated for me to move through threshold early. I\u2019ve had people take me under their wing, encourage me to do things I wasn\u2019t entirely confident about and put their faith in me when they could quite easily have concentrated on their own work. Some of them were tough, some were wonderfully nurturing, and quite a few managed to be both. I look back on those relationships with an enormous amount of affection because I know how much I learnt from them, and because somebody taking a genuine interest in your development is something worth appreciating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are smaller comments I remember too\u2026 When somebody whose judgement you respect recognises your expertise, or notices the quality of something you\u2019ve put an enormous amount of work into, it\u2019s a really lovely feeling. What might be a passing comment for them can be an acknowledgement of years of effort for the person receiving it. Sometimes I think we assume that people who are experienced or appear confident don\u2019t particularly need anybody to tell them they\u2019re doing well. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s true at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m surrounded by some wonderful women through WISE who seem to recognise that the confidence I project isn\u2019t necessarily the confidence I\u2019m feeling. They\u2019ll pick up on a hesitation, listen to what I\u2019m saying (and what I\u2019m not), and give me a pep talk before I go into something. I absolutely adore them for it. It takes a bit of effort to know somebody well enough to recognise when they need a lift, particularly when they appear perfectly capable of managing without one. How bloody kind is that?!<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve always loved people who genuinely celebrate the success of others. People who share their knowledge, recommend somebody for an opportunity or are delighted when somebody they\u2019ve supported goes on to do well. I\u2019ve never quite understood why another person\u2019s abilities should make us feel less secure about our own. Surely there\u2019s far more to gain from learning from people and helping one another along? I\u2019ve certainly met people who seem to find it difficult to celebrate others. How much nicer would life be if we were all a bit more generous with our encouragement?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why don\u2019t we talk about the opposite?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s an expression we hear quite often, hurt people hurt people, and whilst there\u2019s some truth in that, I\u2019ve been wondering why we don\u2019t talk more about the opposite. Kindness is contagious too, surely? We don\u2019t just learn from how people treat us, but from watching how they treat others. I think about that deputy head and how much I learnt from seeing genuine care for students in practice. I\u2019ve watched people go out of their way to help somebody, celebrate other people\u2019s achievements or make sure somebody feels included, and I think those things influence us more than we realise. When you see somebody being genuinely kind, it makes you want to be a bit more like them. I\u2019ve also experienced people being unkind, as I\u2019m sure we all have, but I\u2019d much rather take my lessons from those who\u2019ve shown me how lovely people can be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t for a second imagine I\u2019ve always got this right. I\u2019m sure there have been times when I\u2019ve been too busy to notice somebody\u2019s efforts, or when I could have taken a little more time to check how someone was doing. There are probably people I\u2019ve never properly thanked, and I\u2019d like to think that some of the kindness I\u2019ve experienced has found its way into how I treat others. Perhaps we should make a bit more effort to tell people how much they\u2019ve meant to us whilst we have the opportunity, as I don\u2019t think we can assume somebody knows the difference they\u2019ve made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let\u2019s make kindness cool<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019d really love us to make kindness cool. Not by turning it into another slogan or announcing how wonderfully supportive we all are, but by actually doing nice things for people. If you think somebody\u2019s brilliant at something, tell them. If they\u2019ve made a difference to you, let them know. If you can help somebody, why wouldn\u2019t you? We can still be demanding, direct and have high expectations. Some of the kindest people I\u2019ve known have been all three, and I\u2019ve loved them for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If hurt people hurt people, then surely kind people can help create other kind people. I\u2019d quite like us to make a bit more effort with that, because doing something lovely for another person really is a rather nice thing to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Who is under your wing?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’ve been thinking quite a lot about kindness recently, probably because I work with somebody who is genuinely one of the kindest, most big-hearted people […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4067,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,86,4,6],"tags":[150,13,15,149,42],"class_list":["post-4031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leadership","category-professional-learning","category-school-culture","category-well-being","tag-caring-schools","tag-communication","tag-educational-leadership","tag-kindness","tag-school-culture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/geralt-love-10175788_1920.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4031"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4077,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031\/revisions\/4077"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduflections.blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}