Program Summary
Moving from Midwest Nice to Midwest Kind
Every leader in your audience is carrying a conversation they haven't had yet. In Midwest organizations, the problem usually isn't what people leaders say. It's what they don't say, and how long they wait to not say it.
WHAT IT COSTS EVERY TEAM IN THE ROOM
- In Midwest Nice culture, we don't say things that might hurt someone's feelings. We find a way around it. We quietly move the work to someone else, absorb the frustration ourselves, and call it kind.
- But protecting someone from hard feedback isn't kind. It's borrowed time, and on every team someone pays it back. Strong performers pay in extra hours. The employee who needed the feedback pays when the problem finally surfaces in a review they never saw coming. And the leader pays in trust, because the team can see what's being avoided even when no one names it. Your members live some version of this every week, whatever industry they work in.
- Who was actually being protected?
THE SESSION
- Part teaching, part practice. Dr. Laura walks the room through the difference between Midwest Nice and Midwest Kind, then has every attendee take a live self assessment to see where their own habits land. From there, they learn two strategies for moving from nice to kind and practice them on a real conversation they've been putting off. They go back to their own organizations with the words for that conversation.
WHAT ATTENDEES WALK AWAY WITH
- A clear distinction between Nice (protecting the relationship at everyone's expense) and Kind (putting the other person first, even when it costs something)
- A personal self assessment score showing where their own habits land
- Two practical strategies to move from nice to kind, practiced on a conversation they've been avoiding
Speaker Bio
Dr. Laura holds a PhD in Communication and an MBA. She is a communication researcher, executive coach, and author based in Kansas City, and her work on listening and workplace communication has shaped how leaders across the Midwest think about the habits they never questioned. Midwest Nice is the subject of her forthcoming book with Streamline Press.
