You need a best friend at work. Here’s why - and how - to make one, even if you work for yourself.

Pink Flowers against Blue Sky with text overlay Why you Need a BFF at Work to Succeed, and How to Make One by Rikki Goldenberg, Executive Leadership Coach, Career Coach, Work BFF

Why is it so important to build strong relationships at work?

We spend a lot of time at work. A lot of time. Like 90,000 hours. (Source: Happiness at Work.)

That’s a third of our lifetime spent working.

A third of our lifetime is spent with people who (usually) are not our family or friends.

That means it’s wildly important to form strong relationships with those that you work with - for your mental health, and work performance.

What does the data say about the importance of friendships at work?

  • Those who [have a best friend at work] are seven times as likely to be engaged in their jobs (Gallup)

  • For younger employees (age 18-24), it improves their happiness, motivation, and productivity (Lighthouse)

  • Seeing a friend on most days is the psychological equivalent of earning $100,000 more each year (The Atlantic)

  • 63% of employees believe having a work best friend makes work more enjoyable (wildgoose)

  • 76% of employees feel more creative, 74% feel more productive if they have friends at work (JobSage)

So how can we build friendships at work?

It’s tricky. As much as I want it to be like that scene from Step Brothers that you simply list things in common, we can still learn a bit from this.

It’ll take a mixture of trust, opportunity, and creation. So here are some tips/tricks that will help you build friendships at work. Try them on.

  1. Take your time. Building friendships is a slow process. This is the first thing to recognize when you’re building relationships. It’s rare that you’ll be able to hop directly into friendship with someone you barely know. We were great at is at kids, but, as we age, we’re more cautious about how and with who we spend our time. With busy schedules, crammed work requirements, and a slew of personal obligations already in the mix, it’ll take a minute. It’s easy to build acquaintances, and, as we go deeper, they’ll transform.

  2. Create (considerate) opportunities for connection. If you’re running an organization, there are lots of options to introduce connection points within your team. Team lunches, happy hours, 1x1 randomly generated coffee dates, yoga hours, hackathons, etc. Bonus tips to make these really shine: A) These events don’t need to include or be centered around alcohol or after work hours. Alcohol lowers our guard, and can create false connection, but it also puts your team in uncomfortable positions if they don’t drink. B) Having events after hours means that those with children or caregiving responsibilities have to find childcare support that they pay for. Consider offering babysitting services if the event has to occur outside of work hours. Your team already pays childcare support to come to work. Don’t make them pay more to hang out with you.

  3. Find the connective tissue. Building on the tip above, try lots of different event-based connection points. For the fitness/mindfulness folks: you may offer an in-house yoga session, a breathwork tutorial, a HIIT class. For the team-based approach: try a soccer or dodgeball team. For the brainiacs: a trivia event. For the culinary: a cooking class or cook-off. For the bookworms: a book club or an outing to a speaker event. For the artistic: a painting class. For the culturally-inclined: a theater trip or cool event. For the “always want to work”: an adjacent workshop or leadership expansion.

  4. Have 1:1 time. Setting up 30 minutes coffee dates or zoom chats can be a great way to really get to know folks, over time, in your organization. Not all of us do well in big groups (my hand is raised!) and actually thrive in forming connections 1 on 1. We generally tend towards bigger events because it’s easier, but, they’re harder to find connection when you’re shouting over the loud music in a crowded restaurant.

  5. Open up - about what feels safe to share. It took me a looooong time to admit that I absolutely adore fantasy novels. I was used to keeping that quiet since I had the impression that folks thought fantasy books weren’t “real” books, and too low-brow. Imagine my surprise when I blushingly admitted what book I was reading in a meeting and found out that EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN THE MEETING LOVED FANTASY NOVELS. From then on, we were able to swap recent book faves and it immediately created connection. I say start with what feels safe because some of us may have passions that feel private or contradictory to the work that we do. It’s essential to recognize if you don’t feel psychologically safe at work, you do want to consider what you share. It’s disappointing, but a harsh reality.

  6. Follow-up consistently. We don’t form friendships overnight. It takes consistent effort to build a friendship with someone. That means that you’ll have to create more opportunities to connect, chat, and share. Consider adding a monthly or quarterly hang to your calendars. Maybe you saw something that reminded you of them, send it over! You can even simply reach out and say hello! This takes effort.

  7. Keep it aboveboard. One of the things that set us apart from most other mammals, is the way we leverage gossip to form connection. There’s a deep desire in all of us to leverage shit-talking to create connection. “Can you believe what Susan in Accounting did?! I heard…” is a common way that we believe connection is formed. While it’s 100% true that gossip and shit-talking does create connection, it also releases toxicity into a workplace. It’s a quick-trip to connection, and quick-trip to opening everyone to more backstabbing. Instead, consider creating relationships that either don’t have work as the connective tissue, or, they actually leverage each others expertise. It looks more like, “Hey, I’m working on this project with Susan, and I know you’ve worked with her in the past. I’ve been getting tripped up with this action with her, have you run into this and what worked for you?” Bonus tip: you should also talk to Susan about this. The last thing you want is to find out that someone through a game of telephone told Susan a warped version of what you shared.

  8. Consider the hierarchy. This one pains me to highlight, but if you manage a team, you do have to be cognizant about building relationships with your direct reports. Most managers have the priority of being well-liked. And they will try to share and open up. The danger? We ultimately are drawn to some folks, and not others, so, you actually need to be more cautious. If you do find yourself closer with one employee, you need to take a concerted effort to never share something with them that you wouldn’t - or haven’t - shared with the rest of the team. It doesn’t mean that you can’t have friendships with your team members, but you have to be extremely aware that a friendship doesn’t impact the performance of the team. It’s often safer to attempt to build relationships with those that are the same level as you or on other teams.

What if you work for yourself?

Great question! In a Bureau of Labor Statistics 2022 labor report, roughly 9.9 million of Americans are self-employed. That makes it a tiny bit tricker, but, we can snag a couple ideas!

  1. Partner with folks who do the same thing as you. If you work for yourself, find others that do work similar - or adjacent - to the work that you do. If you’re a developer, you may hunt UX or Product Designers, as well as other developers. A writer might find speakers and entrepreneurs. Check your LinkedIn, or past colleagues.

  2. Attend events on topics that you’re interested in. Whether it’s a fiction class, a speaker panel or a five-day conference and workshop, go where you want to learn. Then you can meet people who also are interested in what you do!

  3. Access your current friends. You probably already have friends. So you may not need work friends! But, if you do, you may ask your friends for introductions to relevant folks.

  4. Join relevant groups. The online world is FULL of groups on specific topics. Hop on in, and start chatting after you introduce yourself. You may find your people super easily.

  5. Give into even more transparency - when it feels good. Building businesses is HARD. And when folks get together, there’s a tendency to ego it up, and talk as if everything is going amazing, speaking in generics. As you get closer, explore being more open and honest about how hard it is to the work that you do - you may find a fellow commiserator or an incredible strategist to help get better!

You’ll still have to do things like follow-up and take your time, but, one of the benefits of working for yourself is you don’t have to be quite as concerned about revealing too much to the boss - or someone who’ll tell the boss. You’re the boss! That’s fun.

Happy friendship building.

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