Why Companies Need Kind Leaders

Mario Suglia, general manager

“Gentle leadership in companies evolves into collaborative leadership. We discovered the importance of relationships, precisely when physical presence and proximity were taken away from us.”

We could say it all started with an elephant. Probably an elephant mother. And with her “gentle” push to the little one – who, to be fair, weighs a ton as soon as he’s born – perhaps using her trunk, guiding him on the right path, teaching him social habits, and encouraging him to make decisions, without wasting time. Above all, to prevent the little elephant, if he were ever aware of it, from asking: why are you treating me badly?

The question is the one posed by Guido Stratta, Human Resources Director at Enel, when discussing his book “Ri-evoluzione. The Power of Gentle Leadership,” co-written with psychotherapist Bianca Straniero Sergio (Franco Angeli Publisher). It’s a question he often asked himself at the beginning of his career and one that he has frequently heard from some of his younger colleagues when dealing with their “superior.”

Corporate machismo should be put aside, especially when we draw inspiration from pachyderms. The image of the elephant mother and her calf is the one that stays with us on the cover of “Nudge” (the gentle push, indeed), published in 2008 by Richard Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein. Behavioral economics has broken through the barrier of hierarchical and assertive habits that for a long time seemed like the only way to organize and lead work.

It is the awareness of fallibility – Thaler’s behavioral economics is based precisely on the “limited rationality” of the decision-maker – that should make us kinder. Stratta is keen to emphasize – in his book and in the conferences, almost always webinars, over the past year and a half, of course – that the kindness he talks about and wants to attribute to the new leadership has nothing to do with etiquette, nor with biology (in the sense of an individual’s more or less natural propensity for cordiality and courtesy). Gentle leadership is a choice. An intelligent choice, meaning a beneficial one. It may seem like a discovery of the post-pandemic era, when we had to adapt to distanced relationships, somehow more diffused, where the outburst of anger – the slammed door or the voice rising by two octaves – is less feasible and even less effective.

In “distant” relationships, there is an apparent slowness that rewards kindness; the choice to avoid exacerbating situations, rather, to foster understanding already weakened by communication that had to do without much non-verbal communication. Less instinct and more thought. It takes a bit more time to listen, and time imposes softer choices, ones filled with “positive energy,” as the authors say.
In the era of rediscovered sustainability – environmental, social, and organizational – relationships between people who work together are once again central, especially if they are sustainable. Even psychologically. Relationships make and will continue to make all the difference. Without going to the extremes of Johan Huizinga – the great medieval historian argued that friendship was the key difference in relationships between rulers and the ruled – it can be said that in the post-Covid era, relationships are fundamental in the connections between collaborators. One must fiercely compete with oneself, but always collaborate with everyone else.

Gentle leadership in companies becomes collaborative leadership. We have discovered the importance of relationships, precisely when physical presence and proximity were taken away from us. We discovered connection when we had to reinvent it beyond the screen of a computer. Kindness is the trait of the relationship rediscovered in its essence. The relationship – between people, between brands and consumers, between brands and stakeholders, between companies and local communities – is growing stronger. Therefore, it requires care, attention, kindness, and, of course, beauty.
It is the fate of design. Design is the representation of essence, of the soul once of the object and now of the relationship. It is the representation in a process dimension, and thus in a continuous state of becoming.

In this context, brought about by the digital age, brand design combines both material and immaterial dimensions, redefining the sense of community in a contemporary way. It is a much more complex process, impacting everything, and recovering the value-based meaning as the point of connection between those who propose and those who choose, according to principles focused on dialogue. This is why, today, the brand plays a very important role. In a time of crisis, many companies are looking to the future with the desire to reinvent themselves. They are redesigning themselves, placing more and more importance on their values, and rediscovering their identity. And this is precisely where the brand comes in: to represent the idea of the future, values, and aspirations.

The brand shapes the relationships between the company and its stakeholders, and among all internal collaborators, and like the elephant mother, provides the gentle push to make the company a… kind leader.