It's All About Being a Good Person

Let’s talk about something that rarely makes it onto CVs, award stages, or LinkedIn being a good person. The kind of person who’s decent, collaborative, generous with credit, and impossible to panic in a serious meeting. The kind of colleague who doesn’t throw others under the bus when something tanks, and who genuinely celebrates someone else’s win.

In other words: good people.

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In the marketing world, we love to talk about innovation, disruption, and creativity etc. But we rarely stop to ask: Who are the people behind the ideas? And how are they treating one another? Because being a good person is not some feel-good bonus feature. It’s not “nice to have.” It’s not what you do after you hit the KPIs. It’s a core part of how great work happens, and more importantly, how sustainable work happens.

The old-school myth of the “diva” is finally collapsing under the weight of reality. Because in 2025, we know better. And companies know better too. People aren’t just buying ideas anymore but they’re buying the teams behind them.

When people feel safe, they take risks. When they feel respected, they speak up. When they’re not constantly watching their backs, they can focus on the actual work, not office politics, backhanded comments, or credit battles. Being a good person doesn’t mean being soft. It means being solid. It means:

• Saying “great idea” when someone else says what you were just about to say.

• Letting a junior take the mic in a meeting.

• Correcting a mistake without making a scene.

These things aren’t sentimental. They’re strategic. And they build teams that last.

Culture isn’t the ping pong table or the Aperol at the agency party. It’s what happens when no one’s watching. So if we say we care about purpose, values, and community, but can’t handle basic kindness in our own teams we are doing something wrong.

In an industry (both academia and marketing) obsessed with performance, being genuinely good is often mistaken for being weak. It’s not. It’s a choice. A brave one.

It’s choosing collaboration over competition. Clarity over chaos. People over politics.

It’s knowing that success isn’t measured just by awards or ROI but by how many people still want to work with you after the project ends.

So here’s a radical idea: Let’s stop treating being a good person as a personality trait, and start seeing it as what it really is : a professional superpower. Because at the end of the day, creativity without kindness is just noise. And no one wants to work in an industry that’s all noise.