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We like to think of our personal and professional lives as separate. Our personal lives consist of “real” relationships: romantic partners, family members, friends. Our work lives exist in a parallel universe of less meaningful interactions. But this division is a pretense. We spend most of our adult waking hours working and spend more time interacting with coworkers than with any other type of relationship partner (Sias & Perry, 2004). This makes our workplace relationships more important than we often care to admit. Indeed, workplace relationship health predicts both professional and personal outcomes. When our workplace communication and relationships are satisfying, we achieve more professionally and feel happier at home. When our workplace communication and relationships slip into dysfunction, on-the-job productivity and relationships outside the workplace suffer.

In this chapter, we look at interpersonal communication and relationships in the workplace. You’ll learn:

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Whether it’s a church, a branch of the military, a corporation, or a nonprofit charity, an organization exists and functions because coworkers communicate and form relationships with one another (Contractor & Grant, 1996). All of the information sharing, decision making, and emotional and practical support that occurs in the workplace does so in the context of coworker relationships (Sias, Krone, & Jablin, 2002). Consequently, interpersonal communication and relationships are an organization’s lifeblood.

Any affiliation you have with a professional peer, supervisor, subordinate, or mentor can be considered a workplace relationship. These involvements differ along three dimensions: status, intimacy, and choice (Sias & Perry, 2004). First, most organizations are structured hierarchically in terms of status, with people ranked higher or lower than others in organizational position and power. Thus, a defining feature of workplace relationships is the equality or inequality of relationship partners. Second, workplace relationships vary in intimacy. Some remain strictly professional, with interpersonal communication restricted to work-related concerns. Others become deeply personal. Third, workplace relationships are defined by choice—the degree to which participants willingly engage in them. Although most of us don’t get to handpick our coworkers, we do choose which coworkers we befriend.

Like all interpersonal involvements, workplace relationships provide us with both benefits and costs. On the plus side, workplace relationships can enhance our professional skills through the insights others provide, and increase the speed with which we rise through the organizational hierarchy (Sias & Perry, 2004). They make work more enjoyable, bolster our commitment to the organization, improve morale, and decrease employee turnover (Sias & Cahill, 1998). On the negative side, workplace relationships can spawn gossip and cliques (Albrecht & Bach, 1997). They also can add additional stress to our lives by forcing us to shoulder not only our own professional burdens but the personal challenges of our workplace friends.

As we’ve stressed throughout this book, interpersonal relationships are forged and maintained within the broader context of social networks and surrounding ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic class cultures. Workplace relationships are no exception. However, in addition to being shaped by all of the previously mentioned forces, workplace relationships are also strongly influenced by each organization’s unique culture, networks, climate, and technology.

THE CULTURE OF THE WORKPLACE

Like many teens growing up in the United States, my first two jobs were in chain restaurants—six months at an ice cream parlor and three years at a pizza restaurant. The two workplaces couldn’t have been more different. The ice cream parlor had a strict behavior code, and violations were grounds for termination. Managers snapped orders at employees and rarely socialized with them outside the workplace. Few people developed close friendships with coworkers. The pizza restaurant was the opposite. Workers socialized after hours, and supervisor-subordinate relationships were friendly. A sense of camaraderie permeated the restaurant, and management encouraged close friendships through outside activities, including a softball team and waterskiing parties.

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In the same way that different cultures have unique traditions, each workplace possesses a distinct set of beliefs regarding how things are done and how people should behave, known as its organizational culture (Katz & Kahn, 1978). Organizational culture influences everything from job satisfaction and organizational commitment to service quality and staff turnover (Glisson & James, 2002). An organization’s culture derives from three sources, the first of which is workplace values: beliefs people share about work performance, dedication to the organization, and coworker relationships. For example, both places I worked in my youth stressed the values of employee excellence and productivity. But the ice cream parlor discouraged friendships between coworkers, whereas the pizza restaurant encouraged such relationships. Other examples of workplace values include beliefs regarding corporate responsibility to the environment, commitment to stakeholders (customers, employees, business partners, shareholders, etc.), and worker integrity.

Workplace values create workplace norms—guidelines governing appropriate interpersonal communication and relationships (Eisenberg & Goodall, 2004). In each organization, expectations evolve regarding the frequency and tone of communication. In some organizations, informality is the norm. For example, you might be encouraged by your supervisor to challenge his or her ideas, regardless of your place in the hierarchy. In other organizations, people are expected to strictly observe authority.

The final influence on an organization’s culture is its workplace artifacts—the objects and structures that define the organization (Schein, 1985). Workplace artifacts include everything from the physical layout of your work space to dress codes and even motivational items, such as hallway posters urging you to always perform at your best.

When you join an organization, you are socialized into its culture through formal and informal encounters with established coworkers (Miller, 1995). During my first day as a dishwasher at the ice cream parlor, for example, my trainer (another dishwasher) told me, “People work here for one reason: the paycheck.” My training at the pizza restaurant was conducted by the manager. He encouraged me to stay after work and enjoy free food and drink with my coworkers, an activity he called “new employee training.”

NETWORKS IN THE WORKPLACE

Just as each of us has social networks of acquaintances, friends, and family members linked through communication, workplaces also have systems of communication linkages, known as organizational networks (Miller, 1995). Organizational networks are defined by three characteristics: the nature of the information that flows through them, the media or channels through which the information flows, and the frequency and number of connections among people in a network, also known as network density.

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In each organizational network, the types of information flowing through the network are diverse (Farace, Monge, & Russell, 1977). In some parts of the network, participants exchange work-related information. For instance, people in product development may interact regularly with people in marketing to create the right advertising campaign for a new product. In other parts of the network, participants share personal information. The “rumor mill”—by which coworkers pass along gossip and speculate about one another’s professional and personal lives—is an example.

The second characteristic is the media or channels through which people in workplaces exchange information. These include face-to-face encounters, cell-phone conversations, instant-messaging, and e-mail exchanges. Some networks may be virtual networks—groups of coworkers linked solely through e-mail, social networking sites, Skype, and other online services. Virtual networks are increasingly prevalent, as the cost of fuel for transportation skyrockets and more people opt to telecommute (work from home and communicate with coworkers via phone and computer). For example, 2.6 percent of the U.S. workforce (3.3 million people) consider home their “primary place of work,” and the number of people who telecommute either part or full time has increased a whopping 79.7 percent since 2005 (Global Workplace Analytics, 2013).

Last, networks are defined by their density: how connected each member of the network is to other members. In dense networks, every worker regularly interacts with every other network member. By contrast, members of loose networks may have contact with just one or two other members. Density is influenced by a variety of factors, including job requirements (some jobs simply don’t allow for much interaction between network members), physical layout of the work space (whether network members are widely separated or clustered together), and organizational culture (some workplaces encourage frequent interaction; others discourage it). However, two of the strongest factors are familiarity and intimacy: networks in which members have known one another for a long time and are personally close tend to be denser.

Organizational networks come in many forms. Some are formally defined by the organization—the supervisors to whom you report, the employees you oversee, the peers with whom you collaborate. Others are informal and are created by coworkers themselves. Sometimes workplace cliques emerge—dense networks of coworkers who share the same workplace values and broader life attitudes (Jones, 1999). Within any workplace, a number of cliques may exist: a clique of “slackers” who do the minimum work necessary, a “fast track” clique of ambitious young workers, an “old boys” clique of longtime employees, and so forth.

Workplace cliques educate new employees about whom they can trust and which networks they should belong to, helping people quickly assimilate into the organizational culture. They also provide information about how things work in the organization. For example, when the copier breaks down or you need to expedite a shipment, members of a workplace clique can provide you with the assistance you need. But cliques can have disadvantages. For example, they may espouse workplace values contrary to those advocated by the organization—priding themselves on being “rebels,” or disparaging bosses behind their backs. Worse, they may encourage unethical workplace behavior, such as punching a friend’s time card to cover up the fact that the friend is absent.

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Regardless of the form that organizational networks take, they are the principal wellsprings from which people get their workplace information. As a consequence, it’s vital to keep two things in mind. First, the private is public in the workplace. Because all workplace relationships occur within organizational networks, your communication and behavior will serve as material for discussion among network members. Presume that everything you say and do will be shared throughout your organization.

Second, the organizational networks to which you belong can strongly determine the kinds of opportunities—and obstacles—you’ll encounter as you advance in your career. For this reason, it’s important to build interpersonal ties with coworkers who are both respected and connected. Try to develop relationships with organizational insiders, workers who are reputable, knowledgeable, and connected to dense organizational networks. The coworkers you befriend will strongly determine your experiences in the organization.