By David Creelman

It is ironic that some of the workplaces you expect to be the nicest are the most dysfunctional. I’ve come across bitter pettiness in a university religious studies department, yoga studios that treat teachers callously and small consultancies set up by friends that quickly destroyed that friendship. Even lovely hobby activities like a community garden can reveal the unlovely side of human nature. One woman spent days laboriously carting away “her” soil when she was leaving a garden plot, because she hated the idea of the next person benefiting from it.

Nice people working in nice professions often inadvertently create nasty workplaces. This surprising outcome delivers some lessons in good HR management.

People frequently make two mistakes in understanding what makes for good workplace; one is called the fundamental attribution error and the other is a mistaken dislike of structure.

The fundamental attribution error, is assuming behaviour is driven by personality rather than by the situation. If you see a sales representative arguing with an accounting clerk, it’s natural to assume it’s because one of them isn’t being nice—we attribute the behaviour to the personality of the people involved. If you are in a nice profession like religious studies, you assume that this sort of thing simply won’t happen because everyone will work hard to be good. In fact, human behaviour is frequently driven by the situation rather than personality. If a sale representative feels they need to entertain clients, while the accounting clerk has been told to be strict on allowing entertaining expenses, then conflict is bound to arise. Conflict usually arises because of the situation, not the personalities.

The second damaging assumption is that rules and structure are just annoying bureaucratic practices we are better off without. This assumption occurs because we notice when things go wrong, not when they go right. We scarcely notice when our computer operating system is working correctly, but when something goes wrong we are quick to curse it. The same thing happens in organizations: the rules, the structures, the hierarchies, all come to our attention when they get in our way. Nice people think they can get rid of these troublesome traditional features of organizations.

These two incorrect assumptions lead people to rely on niceness to create organizational harmony and that is simply not enough to get a group of people to work well together.

What Leads to Good Workplaces

What actually leads to good work places? Two important elements are structure and results.

Structure includes all those organizational elements HR puts into place like clear expectations, conflict resolutions procedures, unambiguous reporting lines and well-defined processes. Structures don’t need to be particularly rigid or bureaucratic, but they need to be there to minimize conflict. Continually working to keep the structures working well will lead to a happier workplace.

The other factor in a good workplace that may be overlooked by nice people is results. People are generally happier when the organization is achieving its goals. The objective of the organization need not be particularly noble for people to find success highly motivating, even if the mission of a team is as pointless as kicking a ball into a net, it can ignite great passion. The telling point here is that people will happily put up with a lot of problems if their team or organization is achieving great results.  This is not a matter of compensation or bonuses (although these can be important too), people are driven to achieve goals, and an organization that achieves its goals can often be a great place to work.

Dr. Bob Sutton wrote a well-loved book called The No Asshole Rule encouraging organizations to show no tolerance for jerks. However, organizations should also pay attention to the “No Bozo Rule” which argues that organizations should show less tolerance to people who are nice but are hopeless at doing their job. People like getting things done and bozos make for an unhappy workplace.

A Role for Niceness and the Role of HR

Before we give up entirely on niceness, it is worth noting that having nice people in the organization does help. Sutton was right; we should fire people who are jerks. Furthermore even if people are not nice by nature we can train niceness as a skill.  Managers can be taught to ensure everyone has a chance to voice their views in meetings. Leaders should learn to debate issues respectfully, even when they strongly disagree. It should be an expectation that employees reach out and be inclusive towards other employees.

The lesson for HR professionals is that, HR is the group with expertise on the factors that lead to an effective workplace. Too often, HR people seem to end up in narrow silos where they are the expert on labour law or recruiting practice or compensation design. These specialities are important, but the bigger role of the HR professional is being the person who understands how people and organizations work and know the elements required to make a workplace that is effective and yes, a workplace that is nice.

Why Nice People Create Nasty Workplaces

David Creelman is CEO of Creelman Research providing writing, research and commentary on human capital management.   He is investing much of his time in helping organizations report on human capital. He works with a variety of academics, think tanks, consultancies and HR vendors in the US, Japan, Canada and China. Learn more at www.creelmanresearch.com.