“Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.” The author Brené Brown uses this saying in her leadership book Dare to Lead. She writes that she “first heard this saying two decades ago in a 12-step meeting.” One of her examples of unkindness is “not getting clear with a colleague about your expectations because it feels too hard,” and then blaming that colleague for not delivering.
Her team turned the idea into a habit. They used to ask, “What does ‘done’ look like?” Now they simply say, “Paint done.” Brown says the request “unearths stealth expectations and unsaid intentions.”