From the very first day you start your job, you always hear this advice “Your colleagues at work, are not your friends”; some people listen to this advice and refuse to form any kind of relationship with their colleagues and act professionally while others just take care while doing so.
There’s no right or wrong in this matter, it actually depends on how the person feels and whether they want to make friends with their colleagues or not. What we can help you with is how to make a decision and we can do so by telling you the pros and cons of being friends with your colleagues.
The Pros Of Being Friends With Your Co-workers
A Better Teamwork
Being friends with your colleagues can help to form the perfect team.
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If you’re in a team then one of the essential factors that makes this team efficient and great is being friends with each other. When you’re friends with your team, you will find that tasks are easier and the meetings you have will be more productive.
If you compared attending a brainstorming meeting with your co-workers as friends with attending it without being friends with them you’d find that the relationship between the team members can help them generate more ideas and can make them more creative.
Creating A Healthy Work Environment
Colleagues can always create a friendly environment by helping each other.
Creating a healthy work environment requires employees to share the same dreams, goals, and values. You will be able to find help whenever you ask for it and you will have people who always encourage you to do better. You will also find appreciation and care.
You will go through a lot of fun times with your colleagues and make beautiful memories.
It Can Reduce The Stress
You will always have stressful times at work, but can you imagine going through it alone? This is when the role of your colleagues comes.
Venting out to your colleague or sharing with them a problem so you can both come up with a proper solution will definitely reduce your stress more than going through the whole situation alone.
Even if your colleague can’t provide you with a solution, the empathy coming they show will make things easier. This consolation and empathy can calm you down and can even help you think properly.
Finding Support
Ask yourself this, “When you need assistance, who’s gonna be able to provide it?” The answer is, your colleagues.
When you are on your own at work and you have a lot of tasks to work on, you most probably will feel overwhelmed, especially since you can’t ask anyone for support. This situation can change if you formed relationships with your co-workers; they can be your support system whenever you need help with a task.
Sometimes when you don’t have enough time to finish s task, one of your colleagues can do it for you or at least help you with it so you can finish on time.
Colleagues can cover for each other, for example, if you have something urgent and you need someone to cover your shift or cover the day for you, you will easily find help because of your friendship with your colleague.
Increases Your Satisfaction
Have you ever wondered why some employees spend many years in one company? Sometimes the answer is having great colleagues.
All of the previous points will increase your satisfaction and you will find yourself excited about going to work every day. In fact, making friends with your colleagues can make you even tolerate a tough manager and stressful days because, in the end, you know that someone has your back.
Despite the great Pros of making friends at work, there are some cons to it.
The Cons Of Being Friends With Your Co-workers
Unhealthy Competition
You and your colleagues will always compete, especially if you’re working in the same department but sometimes this competition can be unhealthy.
Some people are very competitive and jealous, so, sometimes being friends with someone in the same department can drive them to create unhealthy and unnecessary competition. This will affect the friendship and ruin it and can even ruin a whole team and can also create a toxic work environment.
So, you have to carefully choose the co-workers you want to be friends with.
Less Professionalism
If you’re someone who likes to go by the rules and laws, then being friends with your co-workers might annoy you.
Colleagues who are friends can treat each other on a friendly basis and not professionally. This also means that the boundaries you put for yourself will no longer exist, which can affect your privacy as they might know some details about you that co-workers can’t know. Some colleagues won’t pay attention to how they treat you in front of managers or clients, which can leave a negative impression.
Therefore, the only solution to this issue is while you’re making friends with them, set your boundaries and keep a little professionalism between you.
Can Cause Distraction
Even though being friends with your colleagues can increase your productivity, it can still distract you and negatively affect it.
Some colleagues encourage you to work while others can be a huge distraction to you. Being friends with your co-workers means that there will be a lot of chatting and joking around, and even venting out can take so much of your time, hence affecting your productivity. You won’t be able to help it as during the day there will be many people who will come and talk to you or even ask for your help, which will distract you a lot from your own tasks.
You have to choose right as not every colleague can be your friend, some of them can be toxic and distract you intentionally so you can be unproductive.
In the end, making friends at work is not a bad thing, you just have to choose the right people who are similar to you and have a similar mindset; this can transform your time at your office.