Friendships at Work

(This post is from Day 40. January 8, 2016.)

The Presidential Election of 2044 is on November 8

(10,533 days from now)

The company I work for is called Phired Up Productions. We are an education company that helps fraternities and sororities grow their organizations through developing quality relationships. Simply put, we teach, train and coach people on how to make friends.

Given the objective of our team — help people make friends — relationships is an extremely important internal value for our company. We refer to ourselves as a “Phamily”, our company retreats feel like sleep-away camp, and we truly are invested in each other’s lives outside of work. I recognize this is not the culture of every company nor would it be appropriate for most. However, this is who we are. This is what we do. And it works for us.

Even if your team or company isn’t centered around relationships, it is important to get to know your colleagues and co-workers. Putting in a “Hey, how are you?” call makes the “Hey, I need something” call much easier. Also, personally, having meaningful relationships with my co-workers makes me want to collaborate more and strive to be more reliable.

So, stop by your co-workers desk. Ask better questions than “How was your weekend?”. Invest some energy into creating a personal relationship with your colleagues. At the very least, you’ll be happier waking up for work the next morning.

Lessons Learned from Today

Relationships in the workplace matter.

The smallest gesture of kindness can make the biggest impact.

It is easier to care about the numbers, figures, projections, when you first care about the people.

Here are few few articles about the importance of relationships in the workplace.

“Importance of Relationships in the Workplace” — Chron.com

“Building Good Work Relationships” — Mindtools.com

“How to Improve Your Relationships at Work” — Forbes.com