The Sunday Mail
HUMANITY simply means the quality of being human or humane.
Changing Perspectives
Rutendo Gwatidzo
It is that state of being that keeps us together with a common understanding.
It is also the state of being that makes us different from other living creatures like animals. I believe we should always fight the good fight of maintaining our state of being humane. I had an encounter this past week that broke my heart and challenged my humanity. I was driving in Harare along Domboshava Road.
It was in the evening, after peak hours, and cars were moving smoothly on the road. However, as we were approaching Sam Levy’s Village in Borrowdale, there was a lot of traffic and I wondered what was causing the congestion.
I then realised there was a man who had been hit by a car as he was trying to cross the road from the shops.
Due to the confusion of being hit by a car, the man started talking to himself, walking up and down. What then broke my heart was the responses from the people around. Instead of checking if the man was really okay, many concentrated on taking pictures and videos, laughing at what he was saying. Generally, he seemed okay, but judging from what he was doing and saying, it was clear something had really gone wrong with him.
The best thing to do was probably take this man to hospital to check if he had not suffered internal injuries. Sadly, a lot of those who were present did nothing until the man’s relatives arrived and took him away. I felt it was a bit inhumane to focus on taking a video to put on social media, instead of assisting a person in need.
I also know of another accident where the driver of a truck that was carrying soft drinks and beer failed to negotiate a curve and the vehicle overturned.
Instead of helping the three people who were in the truck, including the driver, the crowd concentrated on stealing the soft drinks and beer.
Martin Luther King once said: “An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines on his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”
I believe love, compassion and kindness are necessities of life that we all need in order to survive.
Organisational status
The challenge in many organisations is that many employees exercise transactional relationships. In most cases, if someone encounters a challenge, he or she is most likely to suffer in silence for fear of negative reactions.
For many, instead of getting help, they actually receive resentment, judgement and blame. This is one of the reasons many employees experience loneliness and depression.
Emotional or mental support does not require money most of the time.
It only requires people who can empathise, share words of encouragement, share their own stories of a similar nature or make prayers. In my human resources (HR) experience, I have come across many team members who suffer mental sickness more than financial challenges.
It is important to note that we all go through mental sickness.
We go through experiences that challenge or mess with our mental state.
Examples of things that cause mental sickness are broken relationships and inadequate finances. The experiences employees go through at their homes significantly affect their work performance.
Sadly, there happens to be a lot of competition, jealousy and envy in the workplace to the extent that if some hear about the challenges a colleague might be facing, they tend to use the information to further destroy the individual.
They should, instead, console and assist the person to make the situation better.
Inhumanity can manifest itself in various ways and it significantly contributes towards poor performance in the workplace. Both management and employees should jointly make efforts towards building healthy relationships, instead of transactional ones.
It is often easy to transact when a relationship is good. Management should invest in offering services like counselling and team-building activities to promote humanity and oneness in the workplace.
General facts
Humanity is what keeps us alive.
There are different kinds of people on earth but one thing that enables us to mix, mingle, inter-marry or do business involving different continents or races is humanity. Bit by bit, sometimes without realising it, we can lose our humanity.
I believe we need to be intentional about fighting for humanity.
One anonymous author once said, being human is given but keeping humanity is a choice.
Be challenged and inspired to be deliberate about keeping humanity in everything you do. If we all do this in our different ways, together we will achieve much more.
Rutendo Gwatidzo is the managing consultant at The HUB HR Consultancy. She is a culture and change management specialist, multi-award-winning leader, speaker and coach. She is also the author of “Born to Fight” and “Breaking the Silence”. Contact detail: 0714575805/ [email protected] / Rutendo Gwatidzo Official fb public page.
