Staff Management

How Much Friendship is Too Much with Your Employees?

By Jennifer Jabaley, OD

Feb. 24, 2016

Establishing friendly relations with your staff is important to encourage a positive work environment, but how much friendship is too much?

The other day, when I was sitting at my desk scanning a chart, one of the techs came into my office. She sidled up next to me and plopped her cell phone down on my desk, and said, “look at that.” On her phone, a Facebook page of a mutual acquaintance was pulled up. It was a funny post, and I gave her the little obligatory giggle that was expected, but as she left, I got a feeling in my gut that something was very wrong with the entire scenario.

For one, I know she would never have done the same thing to my husband, one of my partners in the practice. The staff’s relationship with him is different. And that’s when I realized perhaps I had made a fatal mistake. I had allowed myself to become friends with my office staff.

Is that a bad thing? Most people spend 40, or more, hours a week at their office. The staff’s faces are the main ones you see and interact with during waking hours. In my particular situation, our staff is all female, most all fall within a ten-year age bracket, and we all have children who attend the same school and activities. We cross paths outside our workplace. We shop at the same stores, eat at the same restaurants, workout in the same gyms. So, it feels natural to allow personal ties with our employees to emerge.

But a question arises: Are workplace friendships career-savvy or destructive?

Complicated Dynamics

Friends are equal. They offer support, entertainment and social outlets. You can’t have a horizontal relationship with a subordinate. There are subtle power and control issues.

A boss-subordinate relationship is not equal. Even if a boss keeps her authority hidden the majority of the time, occasionally, it will still be necessary to use it. During such incidents, not many friendships could survive obvious status inequality. The employee can be left feeling hurt or back-stabbed by a friend, rather than criticized or reprimanded by a superior.

Perception of Favoritism

If you do try and maintain a friendly, comfortable dynamic with your employees, it can be difficult to get the relationships right. Gut feeling and natural chemistry might pull you toward a closer tie with one person, and instinctively push you away from another. You chitchat and joke around with everyone, but are drawn toward one personality over another. This can certainly lead to a perception of favoritism among the co-workers. Favoritism creates messy politics and dynamics that can be toxic to a well-working staff.

Difficult Evaluations

It can be difficult to evaluate a friend. Lines between business relationships and friendships can blur at review time. It can be difficult to be critical of the work performance of someone you consider a friend. How uncomfortable will it be if you have to discipline an employee, but you know you will be seeing them that weekend at a Super Bowl party? Chances are, as a boss, you will sweep a lot of undesirable actions under the rug in an effort to avoid an uncomfortable conversation.

Additionally, when it comes time for a year-end evaluation, bonus or raise, it can be difficult to accurately judge their work performance. An employee may have an expectation that as a friend, the boss will take care of them. Even if the boss is generous, and feels like she has given a fair evaluation, bonus or raise, an employee might feel shortchanged.

Online Friendships

Is it smart to be friends on Facebook or follow Instagram pages with your employees? I’ll admit I’ve received friend requests from every one of my staff members, and it can be difficult to know the correct response. If you decline, will they take that as rejection? But do you really want to be privy to all the information they post? As a boss, it certainly will put you in an uncomfortable position if you scroll through your feed and see your employee posting inappropriate pictures from a wild weekend party. Or what if they post politically or religiously offensive things? It’s hard enough to negotiate the politics at work, let alone the virtual politics of your employees’ private lives.

Perhaps it’s best to create an office policy for social media similar to what school systems demand from their employees. Let your staff know that they are representatives of your office and your brand. Therefore, on social media it is expected that they will maintain the same level of professionalism. Photos on Instagram of weekend partying or inappropriate posts with offensive or foul language will not be tolerated. If everyone agrees to maintain a level of professionalism online, it might be easier to accept the friend request.

However, if as a boss, you prefer to keep your office and professional worlds from colliding, simply say: “Thanks for the friend request, would you mind connecting with me on LinkedIn instead? I prefer to keep my professional connections there.”

Striking the Right Balance

For a boss, who is social and likes to interact with her employees rather than sequestering herself to a back office, how do you strike the right balance of a friendly office culture while maintaining authority? Try positioning your staff into a role as a team, and the boss as the coach. Let your employees know that everyone shares a common goal. It can eliminate a lot of bureaucratic formality of the traditional boss/subordinate relationship. Make sure each team member has the support and resources to do their best. Speak with honesty and encouragement while maintaining an appropriate boundary.

Tell your staff to think of a great coach they had as a child. She cared for you, but if you didn’t perform as expected, or didn’t try your very best, she would sit you on the bench. Not because she didn’t like you, but because it was the best move for the team.

The relationship between a boss and her employees shouldn’t be driven by friendship or control, neither affection nor authority. Rather, it’s a subtle balance of connection and caring coupled with a common purpose. Being friendly, but maintaining boundaries, can help you create a working relationship where the primary goal is positive work performance.

How do you create a friendly work environment in which you are still able to effectively manage employees?

Jennifer Jabaley, OD, is a partner with Jabaley Eye Care in Blue Ridge, Ga. To contact her: jabaleyjennifer@yahoo.com

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