{"id":2468,"date":"2013-09-19T11:00:08","date_gmt":"2013-09-19T10:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/?p=2468"},"modified":"2013-09-19T15:21:44","modified_gmt":"2013-09-19T14:21:44","slug":"fake-compassion-inaction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/fake-compassion-inaction\/","title":{"rendered":"Fake compassion (in)action?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am just back from Sweden, where I found all train, hotel and airport staff hugely kind and helpful. \u00a0I loved the cheery greetings of \u2018hay’.\u00a0 I was so struck by the culture that I looked on Google to see if online troll-like behaviours, or ODE<\/a>, were less likely in the land of the Trolls <\/a>.\u00a0 Sadly I couldn\u2019t find anything to support this hunch!<\/p>\n

However, when on the train to the airport (with phenomenally fast internet speeds, by the way), someone sent me this piece on compassion in health care from the Daily Mail.<\/a>\u00a0 At the end of the piece, I note some comments verge on the uncivil – and interestingly the ‘worst’\u00a0rated comments are the ones supporting\u00a0Dr Smajdor\u00a0(with some of\u00a0the early trollish ones apparently removed at the time of publishing this blog).<\/p>\n

Having read the piece, it makes me wonder more about what the vilified author was\u00a0actualy trying\u00a0to convey.\u00a0 For me, the piece made me reflect on the difference between compassion\u00a0(a feeling)\u00a0and kindness (an act).<\/p>\n

You might know of our interest in compassion in health care, at www.idenk.com\/compassion<\/a> from 2008 and this<\/a>, a bit more recently. Actually, with hindsight, we would have probably been much better to be part of a social movement for greater warmth and kindness\u2026and maybe the NHS Constitution is not that helpful using the \u2018C\u2019 word.<\/p>\n

Why?<\/p>\n

Some days it is hard to feel compassion (even after hours of mindfulness or Buddhist meditation)\u2026.and some people are hard to love at any time.<\/p>\n

So kindness is good enough.<\/p>\n

Actually this is true in all sectors: civility and helpfulness is the benchmark in a shop or restaurant too. The author Caitlin Moran argues that at the heart of all civil rights movements is the demand to be nice to each other. US academic Bob Sutton points out that jerks in teams\u00a0are the bane of organisational life.<\/p>\n

So all any of us need to do (in any sector and any role), is to act kindly to our customers and co-workers – act warmly, even if frustrated. \u00a0This is something I have personally learnt (and keep relearning) the hard way (!) through conflicts and judgements I would now rather avoid.<\/p>\n

And what\u00a0we might find is, that when we overrule our emotions with our logic (as in CBT<\/a>),\u00a0our feelings actually change.<\/p>\n

For a few decades now, in western countries,\u00a0we have all had to to be nice in public to those\u00a0who are\u00a0gay\u00a0or from a\u00a0minority ethnic community, for example. I don\u2019t think it is unrelated that now opinion polls\u00a0support gay marriage and we are more tolerant to people with different non-white skin colour.<\/p>\n

This \u2018fake it till you make it\u2019 route might work in health care too\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026in today\u2019s UK health system, post Mid Staffs,\u00a0it is increasingly the case that staff are no longer allowed to appear unkind.\u00a0However, it should be ok not to feel compassion I reckon \u2013 and be open about this in 1:1 supervisions, for example (honesty that will help avoid burnout and cynicism along the way too).\u00a0\u00a0This act first (and feel it later) approach will end up shifting the culture faster, I predict.\u00a0 And if you are doing this surrounded by colleagues acting the same, it actually might be quite easy…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am just back from Sweden, where I found all train, hotel and airport staff hugely kind and helpful. \u00a0I loved the cheery greetings of \u2018hay’.\u00a0 I was so struck by the culture that I looked on Google to see if online troll-like behaviours, or ODE, were less likely in the land of the Trolls […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[156,154],"tags":[50,32],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2468"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2481,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2468\/revisions\/2481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idenk.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}