I enjoyed 11 days away from work over the holidays – enough to make going back today a shame. I started the mental on-ramp last night by cleaning up my mailbox a little. But there was an unspoken agreement with the people I work with – not a single soul sent a single email. Frankly, I think we were all burned out. Before being sucked back into the vortex of endless emails and deadlines this morning though, I walked around the office swapping pleasantries with my colleagues. “Happy New Year…did you have a good holiday?” I was secretly hoping to hear at least one good “My crazy Uncle Al ruined Christmas dinner and we wound up driving back that night” stories, but everyone’s holiday was “fine”. We’re all from incredibly normal families, very polite or very private.
I work with great people, but just two that I have any contact with outside work. A few more that are real buddies – lunch partners and “conspiratorial friends” who share my views and humor about workplace Stuff. But it’s different from my early jobs. I remember a time when work was a major source of friendships. We cared more deeply about one another; we had pizza parties and company picnics with our families and we went out for drinks at the end of the day. I miss that. Colleagues still care; they show up for the big stuff like your family funerals, but many people intentionally don’t want to develop closer ties with colleagues.
The many ways the workplace has changed contribute to that. There is less job security, so I think people invest less into work relationships. It often doesn’t seem to go much deeper than the cordiality necessary to be LinkedIn connections in case you need a referral someday. Companies have taken offices away from people, forcing them into steno-pool type environments, which in turn makes people choose to stay home and work virtually instead.
Well, I invest effort into making deeper connections – indeed, friendships – with people at work. I go to work nearly every day, even though I could telecommute. I don’t eat lunch at my desk and I leave the building for lunch every day with anyone I can convince to join me. Those lunches are often work-talk, but it’s far more than that just because of the relaxed setting. I organized and run the group lottery pool – a non-work reason (other than that we all plan to retire together if we win) to interact and to share a common dream. And I am rewarded with some good work friends, one of which I even spent Christmas with.
This summer I am going to co-plan a reunion of friends from my old company, AlliedSignal/Honeywell. I did a small one about three years ago and everyone loved it. This one will be bigger, hopefully drawing in even those from our work family that moved out of state. Those were great days that we still look back on as unique in our careers. I don’t know if it was the specific blend of people or the leaders, but those of us still working report never finding a work situation like that again. While one of my friends bemoaned the loss of those retiring great leaders that united us into both a high performing work team and a group of friends, I reminded him that it was our turn to step up and emulate the leaders we respected. Guess that’s what I’m trying to do at J&J now. There’s no reason we can’t be both colleagues and friends.
I work with great people, but just two that I have any contact with outside work. A few more that are real buddies – lunch partners and “conspiratorial friends” who share my views and humor about workplace Stuff. But it’s different from my early jobs. I remember a time when work was a major source of friendships. We cared more deeply about one another; we had pizza parties and company picnics with our families and we went out for drinks at the end of the day. I miss that. Colleagues still care; they show up for the big stuff like your family funerals, but many people intentionally don’t want to develop closer ties with colleagues.
The many ways the workplace has changed contribute to that. There is less job security, so I think people invest less into work relationships. It often doesn’t seem to go much deeper than the cordiality necessary to be LinkedIn connections in case you need a referral someday. Companies have taken offices away from people, forcing them into steno-pool type environments, which in turn makes people choose to stay home and work virtually instead.
Well, I invest effort into making deeper connections – indeed, friendships – with people at work. I go to work nearly every day, even though I could telecommute. I don’t eat lunch at my desk and I leave the building for lunch every day with anyone I can convince to join me. Those lunches are often work-talk, but it’s far more than that just because of the relaxed setting. I organized and run the group lottery pool – a non-work reason (other than that we all plan to retire together if we win) to interact and to share a common dream. And I am rewarded with some good work friends, one of which I even spent Christmas with.
This summer I am going to co-plan a reunion of friends from my old company, AlliedSignal/Honeywell. I did a small one about three years ago and everyone loved it. This one will be bigger, hopefully drawing in even those from our work family that moved out of state. Those were great days that we still look back on as unique in our careers. I don’t know if it was the specific blend of people or the leaders, but those of us still working report never finding a work situation like that again. While one of my friends bemoaned the loss of those retiring great leaders that united us into both a high performing work team and a group of friends, I reminded him that it was our turn to step up and emulate the leaders we respected. Guess that’s what I’m trying to do at J&J now. There’s no reason we can’t be both colleagues and friends.