Kindness effect can be priceless
By Carol C. Harder
Kindness is a virtue that surpasses a person’s professional or economic status in life.
Randy Pausch was an American professor of computer science, human/computer interaction and design at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In September 2006, Randy learned he had pancreatic cancer and the following August 2007, learned he had only 3-to-6 “good months of health” left. On September 18, 2007, he presented an upbeat lecture – “The Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” – at Carnegie Mellon. It became a popular YouTube video.
Randy then co-authored a book – “The Last Lecture” – on the same theme. He died of complications from pancreatic cancer on July 25, 2008.
In this book, Pausch shares a personal and poignant experience that he and his younger sister had when their parents took them to Disney World when they were children.
The children were only eight- and 10-years-old at the time, but their parents felt safe enough in that setting to let them explore the Magical Kingdom on their own.
To give thanks and appreciation to their parents for allowing them this freedom and respecting their common sense abilities enough to allow them to search about unrestricted, they decided to buy them a gift.
Eventually they decided on a unique salt-and-pepper shaker they found in a gift shop that featured bears hanging from a tree.
This treasure cost them a total of $10.
However – Randy accidentally dropped the shakers – and one of the bears was broken.
The shopkeeper took note of not only the broken shaker – but the children’s broken hearts. He swung into action, assuming responsibility for the incident. “You know, I should have wrapped that little fellow better. Here, let’s replace that broken set with this new one here,” he said, as he wrapped up a brand new salt-and-pepper set.
After giving the gift to their parents, the children shared with them the kindness of the employee – a story of kindness and caring that was not lost on the Pausch parents.
Years later, Randy was sitting with the executive board of directors for the Disney Corporation when he asked them the questions, “Can you show me on your spreadsheets what the return was for that one act of kindness from that employee of Disney World who empathized with the two heartbroken children? Can you show me the return on the $10 salt-and-pepper shaker set he gave them to replace the broken one?”
The corporate execs looked dumbfounded, and admitted that their bean counting numbers could not answer those questions.
“I know you can’t compute the return on that $10,” Randy presented to them, “but let me tell you this – you who only seem to understand what you see in your monetary columns of debits and credits – that act of kindness made Disney World over $100,000.
“My parents were so impressed by the genuine kindness of that one shop employee,” Randy continued, “that they returned with us kids and other children to the point where they brought Disney World more than $100,000. Now, that is not a fact shown on your spreadsheets, but it is a very important related fact of which you need to be keenly aware.”
Impacts of kindness for others cannot be measured on a spreadsheet. No dollars and cents value can be placed on what was done; but the effect can be priceless. Few people have the power to actually change the direction of the entire world, but each and every one of us can make a difference, changing the revolving world directly around us.