Someday you'll realize that your co-workers and customers are/were/could-have-been your friends.
This is what I told a person sitting next to me on a flight this week. On this five hour journey, trapped in captivity, he and I talked about our businesses and eventually, Facebook. He's an agent for insurance and financial services with his own office (and various social media pages in their infancy). I asked him, "Do you friend all your customers, suppliers, partners, etc.?" to which he replied,
"Only if they were already friends. Work isn't personal. And besides, I'm not sure I'd want them all as friends."
Wow, I thought, it must be awful to have to work with people you don't like. But I think that was more of a throw-away line, really. He was really just conveying a conventional idea: Work isn't personal. If you need a friend at work, bring your dog. I've heard this before countless times when working in companies and during my travels on the lecture circuit.
We don't purposely try to make-friends with other people in our business life. If it happens, then that's cool, but we should still avoid actively seeking friendship. To some, being friends compromises their professional relationships. But I wonder if that's really a statement about them, and their lack of willpower when it comes to obeying 'the rules at work.' I treated my friends the same, be they direct reports or cash paying clients. I mean, we connected well, so we likely spent more time together...but that's actually a good thing from a team-innovation point of view.
When I say making friends, I mean that we establish an emotional connection with someone, and decide that we like them and want them to be successful or happy. If we want to maintain this connection, we invest in them, both being a resource as well as a sounding board. In my business life, I try and do this with ANYONE I'm going to rely and spend time with. My speaking manager (Karen) is my friend. My top vendor-partners (Rapture and OutThink) are my friends. Same goes for bureau agents, meeting planners and editors at magazine like One+. I cannot imagine having a professional-distance relationship with any of them. What about you? Do you seek to capture or create value with your work contacts, or do you seek to build a connection with them - and coproduce something great together?
If you'd like to make friends at work, here are a few tips:
1- Be on the lookout for someone doing something right or produce a (sustainable) positive mood at work. These are the type of people that you will easily be attracted to and want to help.
2- Always consider cube mates or frequent contacts, as they are the easiest friendships to form. Research from The Likeability Factor indicates that people like others in many cases, due to the "proximity effect." In the case of air travel, I find this the case often. You sit next to a person long enough and you'll find a connection.
3- Connect at the passion to passion level to deepen the bond.
4- Invest time and effort into giving-forward in friendships. Make it a point to find opportunities to share valuable knowledge, or network your friends together to connect-the-dots and create value.
5- Prepare this short speech for times when things go wrong (you have to fire them, raise the rates, enforce the rules): "This business is a baby, and it can't take care of itself without our help. The rules protect the baby, and that's why we are here. Our friendship should only help the company succeed." If that doesn't work, remember, the other person is being a bad friend by asking you for special considerations. It's not your company, never forget it. If it is, then it's your right to decide how you want to enforce rules or make exceptions. (read The Law Of The Ledger, taught to me by Stanley Marcus Jr.)
What do you get out of making friends at work? You create an atmosphere of trust, where there's likely to be innovation and collaboration instead of cynicism and playing Devil's Advocate. You'll have a place you enjoy spending time at, instead of doing-time-at-for-the-man. You also get the satisfaction of living a better life, where your 9-5 existence is as emotionally pleasing as your social or home life. Really, it's up to you to 'get over' the stigma that you keep work mates at arms length. So make the leap, and be a Lovecat. Remember, nice smart people succeed.
