Sometimes nice is mistaken for right. Of course, it's awesome to be nice--when you're nice, people feel better and you're more approachable. But sometimes, people choose nice over truth or right. They may choose to be nice, but not do what is right.
In general, the aim needs to be nice and right. For example if you're asked a tough question, and you know the answer will not be welcome. You can be right and nice. You can answer with empathy, care, and kindness, and tell the truth too. That happened to me recently. I asked a tough question. The response was empathetic which made the tough answer a lot easier to take.
If you take the advice of the book, Getting to Yes, which is to go hard on the problem, not the people, it's a lot easier to be nice and right because instead of taking the situation personally, you remove the people from the problem and focus hard on the problem with the question, How can we make this better?
Nice and right are two ways of being that intersect time and again. This is another area of organizational life I want to think more about. Onward.
