Should You Be Friends With Your Employees?

One question that I notice some leaders asking is “Is it OK to be friends with your employees?”

Through my coaching and training work I talk to lots of leaders, and this seems to be a situation that can cause trouble if we don’t keep an eye on it.

But as usual, there are no rules for leadership and there is no rulebook to follow!

So in this post, I take a look at some of the potential challenges with being friends with your employees, and what you might try to do instead.

Why Do Leaders Become Friends With Their Employees?

One question you might ask yourself is why you want to be friends with your employees in the first place. There are lots of other people out there to be friends with, so why does this situation happen so often?

A recent Gallup survey highlights that having a best friend at work has become increasingly important. As such, I don’t think is something that should be ignored.

Having a friend at work can make it much more fun, and give you a valuable source of support when you’re going through a challenging time.

Many leaders are also in the position where they have been promoted to lead the team that they were once a part of.

This means they may have built previous friendships working alongside their peers, but now they find themselves managing them!

I’ve also noticed that some leaders believe that a team who are all friends will experience less conflict.

However, it’s worth remembering that conflict is a valuable part of work. Conflict gives rise to new ideas, improvement opportunities and prevents “groupthink”.

Groupthink is the phenomenon where a group of people prioritise the group’s harmony over offering differing opinions or criticisms that could result in conflict.

If a team has groupthink going on, there is a chance that the best ideas or actions are being ignored… because people don’t want to rock the boat.

Learn More:  Thoughtful Leader Podcast #132: Would You Rather Be Liked or Respected?

The Challenges of Being Friends With Your Employees

In general, I would suggest that you should not be friends with your employees. This doesn’t mean you can’t be nice, or act in a friendly manner.

However, I also think it’s important for leaders to make that decision for themselves, and to go into the situation intentionally, with their eyes wide open.

So next, I’m going to take a look at some of the common challenges of being friends with your employees.

Then, I’ll consider some potential approaches to managing the situation.

Challenge #1: Difficulty in Holding People Accountable

An important part of leadership is to be able to hold people accountable. That is, to reinforce positive or negative consequences for poor behaviour or performance, or to encourage a certain standard of results.

When you’re friends with your employees, you may have a tendency to “let things go” or “look the other way”. This is because holding someone accountable can feel uncomfortable.

Being a friend can make any constructive criticism feel like a personal attack, which can tempt us to avoid it altogether.

Unfortunately, this is likely to lead to poor outcomes in the long run, because it leads us to challenge number two.

Learn More:  Team Members Won’t Take Accountability? Consider This.

Challenge #2: Perceptions of Favouritism

If you’re friends with one of your team members, you might find yourself spending more time together. Going to lunch or having coffee for example.

Over time, this can cause tension as other team members feel that you’re favouring your friend over the rest of the team.

While this may not actually be true, perception is often reality. This can undermine your credibility as a leader, and start to erode trust in the team.

Part of this problem arises because spending time with your friend can increase their perceived status in the workplace. Spending more time with the boss can signal a higher standing amongst peers in the team.

Once you are perceived as favouring people in your team, you might find yourself having to deal with “cliques”, forming as a result of other team members bonding over your relationship with your friendly employee.

Learn More:  Got a Favourite Employee? Watch for These Traps.

Challenge #3: Greater Potential For Inappropriate Sharing of Information

When you’re friends with your team members, you’re also at risk of potentially sharing information that you probably shouldn’t.

As a leader, you’ll often have access to inside information that is only available at the management level. This might involve various goings on in the company like staff movements, issues or team restructures.

If you start to tell your friends this sort of information they could use this to their advantage, and this is a form of favouritism like in the previous point.

Or, you may violate the privacy of the people you’re speaking about, which will damage trust when people find out.

Even if you don’t tell your employee friend this info, you might still feel tempted. This can increase stress levels as you agonise over what you will tell people, and what you won’t.

If your own boss finds out that you have shared information with lower level team members, you may also find that this can erode trust.

This may lead them to withhold information from you that you could actually benefit from.

Learn More:  Struggling at Work? Try Building a Better Working Relationship With Your Boss.

Challenge #4: Lack of Credibility

The final challenge I’ll raise here is the potential for a loss of perceived credibility in your leadership skills.

Sometimes leaders need to make sacrifices and set clear boundaries so that they can remain professional and treat people fairly.

Being friends with your employees can run counter to that. You may be perceived as somebody who struggles to separate the business and personal aspects of your working life.

Some people may see a leader who is friends with employees as a risk. As somebody who may not be able to make the hard decisions, or do what they need to do to ensure the team and business is profitable and successful.

You may also be perceived as somebody who is desperate to be liked, rather than respected.

Unfortunately, this can make people think that you aren’t really “management material” which could impact your potential future promotional opportunities.

Learn More:  3 Ways to Build Your Leadership Credibility In a New Team.

What Should You Do Instead of Being Friends With Your Employees?

Some people reading this may say “I can manage it – it’s not a problem for me”. It might not be an issue right now, but it puts you at potential risk of compromising your leadership standards.

I have seen examples of, and heard several stories through my time coaching and training of usually good leaders who have displayed a lack of integrity because they are attempting to safeguard their workplace friendships.

So, what can we do instead? Well, below are some options.

You might not like them, but if you’re in a leadership role you have a responsibility to your team, your boss and your organisation – not just to your friends.

How to Handle Workplace Friendships

Here are a few suggestions to handle the situation if you find yourself being friends with your employees.

Every situation and person is different, so see what works, and try out the strategies that suit you.

Option 1: Limit the time you spend as friends at work

The first thing to do is to limit the time you spend as friends at work.

This might include time getting coffee, lunch or any other forums where you would have lots of one to one contact.

This has the effect of creating some space to limit the perception of favouritism between you and your friendly employee. You can be sure that if you continue to spend a lot of time together, others are watching and may form unhelpful opinions based on this.

Option 2: Limit socialising after work

I also recommend reducing the amount of time you spend socialising with your team, especially when it comes to work functions or after-work events.

These situations can get even more tricky when alcohol is involved. So if your team are going to party, it may be a good idea to make an appearance, and then heading for an early exit.

Depending on the industry you work in, this can be seen as a very difficult step to take. Some leaders find it very difficult to stop being “one of the boys or girls” and feel that they need to continue to attend social events with their teams.

The more you do this, the greater chance that difficulties will eventually occur.

Option 3: Set clear boundaries

Next, you may find you need to set clear boundaries about how you will behave in your leadership role.

Usually this works well when you have an open and direct conversation with your employee friend, to make sure they are clear about the situation.

In this sort of situation, you might discuss:

• The reasons why being friends with your employees can be an issue – so they’re clear on why you’re having the conversation
• What information you will and won’t share in your leadership role
• How you will handle work-related social events
• The need for fairness amongst the team, and why you may need to limit the time you spend together.

This option is one to consider when you already have a friend at work, who you now lead.

You might need to have a conversation to discuss the challenges posed by the friendship directly, and work out a way you can work together without experiencing issues.

Of course, there are people who say they have no issues with leading a friend at work. And I believe it is possible to maintain friendships with people you lead, but it will all depend on the strength of your relationship and the personalities of the people involved.

Option 4: Go somewhere else!

When I discuss this topic during leadership training sessions, the answer comes back loud and clear:

It is much easier to lead people who you aren’t friends with.

So if your career and reputation are very important to you, you might make it easier on yourself if you find a new role where you are a newcomer to the organisation.

This way you can preserve your friendships outside of work, without potentially compromising your leadership.

It’s nice to have friends at work though, so if you must, it might be time to find friends at a different level. Perhaps in other departments and at your level of seniority.

It’s great to have friends, but they may just make leading even more difficult than it needs to be.

Have you had to manage being friends with your employees? How did you do it? Share your ideas with all the thoughtful leaders in the comments below!