Last week Laurie wrote a post over on Lemondrop about women showing their boobs at work. One particular section kicked started my thinking gears:
One of the readers of the original post wrote a comment that spoke to me: “There are no friends in the workplace.”
I’m not sure I agree with this. Work is emotionally tough and taxing on the soul, especially in this rotten economy. Telling someone not to have friends at work is like telling a thirsty person not to crave water. We’re not robots; we seek out connections and meaning. Sometimes we confide in our colleagues, sometimes we share secrets, and sometimes we show one another the results of our going under the knife.
I sort of agree with her statement. I support the basics; we all need someone in the office that we can talk to and vent about the crazy things ‘they’ did. But we don’t, under normal circumstances, get to choose those people; hiring managers or other recruiters decided our cubicle mate was going to be our coworker.
They’re involuntary friends, as we call them in our office.
We encourage the staff in my office to confide in each other and make friends but there’s a fine line between friendly coworkers and friends or confidants. There are plenty of personal things I will discuss with my two best BFF’s but I wouldn’t dream of discussing the same topics with my coworkers. And on the same token, my closest friends just wouldn’t fully understand the insanity of what goes on at my office; that’s why I have a few work friends.
It’s a fine line that sometimes gets crossed and people get offended. But that happens and we learn a lesson about what we can say, or show, to some people and we move on.
Do you have close, involuntary friends at work? Am I just over thinking this? It’s very possible since I’m in Chicago with a book I finished reading the first night I was here.
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Hmmm, interesting post. I’m not sure our work friends are any more involuntary than our high school friends, college friends, softball team friends, neighbors, play group mom friends, or hey, even Twitter friends, for that matter!
We meet our friends a myriad of ways, but regardless of the circumstances, only time will tell whether each person will become a ‘voluntary’ friend once those circumstances have changed.
Just a thought.
In a related vein, is it harder to have close friendships at the office when you work in HR?
If I remember rightly, the Gallup approach to employee engagement includes a question along the lines of “I have a best friend at work” which I always thought slightly strange. But working in HR I think it sometimes even harder as you need to keep a stricter line between your professional and your personal.
I have work friends. They are friends but within certain constraints. My true friends could never be at work.
I agree with TheHRD. My best friends, the ones I can be truly honest with, are outside the workplace. My online presence reflects that. Many professional colleagues are “LinkedIn” with me, but no one I directly work with or under will ever be my Facebook friends, where I tend to post honestly and frankly about all things, including the workplace. If I wasn’t in HR I’d probably worry less about profesional boundaries, since we spend a quarter of our lifes in the workplace. But so far my approach works for me
You can have friends at work, I still keep in touch with a couple of former co-workers because we clicked at work. Of course, it is easier to be more open with them now that we no longer work together. It’s a fine line.
@Krista – I was asked the same thing during the interview for my job. You just have to be aware of who you are talking to and what you can and cannot share.
@HRD – You and me, on the same page.
@Charles @HRMinion – My very best friend is a former coworker. I do feel like I can be more open with her now that I dont have a censor what I’m saying. I remember the old days of not being in HR and joining my coworkers around the water cooler to gossip; now I just keep my mouth shut and listen.
Well I’m teaching a class of adult students and one of the female students who has a beautiful figure and big gorgeous breasts comes into class wearing tight skimpy tops and tight pants which emphasize her breasts and her figure. She often asks me over to her desk with a question. And she gave me a present. She’s friendly to me and comes up to my desk to ask something . She must know that it really turns me on. Or is she just being friendly – I don’t know why she dresses like that in my class. I want her to get her exams so she can get into university. I want to focus on her brains rather than her boobs but shes making it difficult for me to concentrate with those boobs in my face. Ladies what do you think?
Ross