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During the pandemic, many of us became more isolated than before. Community, which the authors define as a group of individuals who share a mutual concern for one another's welfare, has proven challenging to cultivate, especially for those working virtually. To learn more, they conducted a survey with the Conference for Women in which they asked nearly 1,500 participants about their sense of community at work before and since the pandemic and found it has declined 37%. When people had a sense of community at work, they found that they were 58% more likely to thrive at work, 55% more engaged, and 66% more likely to stay with their organization. They experienced significantly less stress and were far more likely to thrive outside of work, too. People can create community in many ways, and preferences may differ depending on their backgrounds and interests. The authors present several ways companies have successfully built a sense of community at work that leaders can consider emulating at their own organizations.

For decades, we've been living lonelier, more isolated lives. As our social connectedness has decreased, so has our happiness and mental health. And with more aspects of our lives becoming digital, it has reduced our opportunities for everyday social interaction. The nature of our work, in particular, has shifted.

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During the pandemic, many of us became more isolated than before. Community, which the authors define as a group of individuals who share a mutual concern for one another's welfare, has proven challenging to cultivate, especially for those working virtually.

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15 Ways To Be A Community Builder At Work

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15 Ways To Be A Community Builder At Work

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Dr. Vince Molinaro, CEO of Leadership Contract Inc., is a NY Times best-selling author & adviser on scaling leadership accountability.
How can it be that when technology has allowed us to be more connected than ever before, so many of us feel more disconnected and isolated?

Most of us are aware that the absence of social interaction that accompanied the pandemic eroded our health, productivity and sense of fulfillment. The continued post-pandemic shift to hybrid working models may add to those feelings of isolation. We need to find work environments that foster a greater sense of connection and belonging. It's a huge challenge: how can we combat this sense of isolation while still enjoying the freedom and flexibility of the hybrid era?

The answer comes down to one word: community.

The word "community" may come across as a big, amorphous and abstract concept, but it starts with something simple: the ability of leaders to build strong relationships and create a sense of purpose, meaning and belonging with their colleagues. These relationships create a culture of accountability, which, in turn, inspires employees to deliver results.

I've written extensively about the importance of building a community of leaders in my books because, in my global work as a leadership advisor, I often find this to be one of the greatest areas of neglect. But when companies establish strong communities of leaders, the results and impact on employees, customers and the business can be amazing.
The Individual Level
So how do you do it? Here are 15 ways to be a community builder as a leader at an individual, team and organizational level.

1. Commit to being a community builder. Think about how you approach leadership now. Are you obsessed with your self-interests? Do you waste a lot of time and energy on office politics and protecting your turf? If the answer to any of these questions is "yes," then you have some internal work to do before your peers trust you.

2. Develop a one-company mindset. Do you spend all your time focused solely on your team or department? Push yourself to think bigger. Sometimes all it takes is one leader sacrificing time or resources to help a colleague to shift a whole company's thinking.

3. Celebrate the success of peers and colleagues. With a one-company mindset, your colleague's success is your success. Take time to invest in relationships and support your peers. Make sure you are a good leader and a good follower.
The Team Level
4. Cultivate credibility and trust. Community builders work tirelessly to cultivate strong credibility and trust with their colleagues. What about you? How can you strengthen your credibility and, in so doing, build trust?

1. Connect your team to your company's purpose. Research has shown that people who work for a purpose-driven company feel much more connected and engaged than people who cannot identify a tangible purpose in their work.

2. Make work meaningful. As a leader, you must make your team's work as significant as possible. A simple way to do this is to ensure that each team member knows how their day-to-day efforts contribute to its success.

3. Conduct pulse checks during team meetings. You can check for clarity on meaning and purpose by asking your team to identify how a specific project ties back to the organization's larger strategic goals.

4. Review strategic priorities together regularly. My research reveals that one of the critical behaviors of accountable leaders is that they effectively and regularly communicate strategy to their teams. Help your team draw connections between those big-picture priorities and their job priorities.
The Organizational Level
5. Tie praise back to purpose. When you celebrate an accomplishment or compliment someone, tie your praise back to the purpose. For example: "Thanks again for your hard work on that design. It looks great, and it will help us achieve our goal of reducing waste in the manufacturing process."

1. Assess the status of your relationships. Think about the colleagues you work with most frequently. Are these relationships strong? If they are, great. If not, you need to take immediate steps to build stronger connections.

2. Reach out to peers. Reach out and connect with your fellow leaders. Be deliberate; don't sit back and wait for chance meetings. When you do reach out, make a point of sharing your challenges and asking for advice on addressing them.

3. Repair strained or weak relationships. Connect with a peer where you know the relationship needs to be better. Ask to have a conversation about how you can work more effectively together.

4. Break down silos. Silo thinking is one of the biggest barriers to effective execution in organizations. Be the leader who actively breaks down silos between teams, departments, functions and divisions.

5. Reorganize your time to prioritize relationship building. Relationship building will be even more critical as we transition to a new world of hybrid work. Do you have time in your schedule to connect with colleagues and direct reports? What do you want those check-ins to look like in this new world of work? Be deliberate about learning how to organize your time so that you can prioritize building relationships.

6. Be a unifier, not a divider. Ultimately, being a community builder is about committing to being a unifier, not a divider. Organizations are filled with leaders who create division, unnecessary internal competition and rivalry. Decide to be the leader who brings people together, not pulls them apart. If you do, you will set yourself apart as a truly extraordinary leader, and your peers and colleagues will rally around you.

Forbes Business Council is the foremost growth and networking organization for business owners and leaders. Do I qualify?

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15 Ways To Be A Community Builder At Work

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It starts with something simple: the ability of leaders to build strong relationships and create a sense of purpose, meaning and belonging with their colleagues.

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Three Steps To Create Community In The Workplace

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Three Steps To Create Community In The Workplace

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Three Steps To Create Community In The Workplace

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Community creates belonging. Belonging can motivate members to elevate their performance and dedication to what they care about most.

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Charlie Todd: The shared experience of absurdity

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Charlie Todd causes bizarre, hilarious, and unexpected public scenes: Seventy synchronized dancers in storefront windows, "ghostbusters" running through the New York Public Library, and the annual no-pants subway ride. His group, Improv Everywhere, uses these scenes to bring people together.

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The Importance Of Fostering Connection In Our Workplaces

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The Importance Of Fostering Connection In Our Workplaces

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Sharon Brous: The Importance Of Fostering Connection In Our Workplaces

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Brené with Dr. Laurie Santos on Creating Meaningful Connection at Work

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Listen to this episode from Dare to Lead with Brené Brown on Spotify. Dr. Laurie Santos is a professor of psychology and the head of Silliman Residential College at Yale University and the host of the popular podcast The Happiness Lab.

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Community Icebreaker | Where Should We Begin 

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Community Icebreaker | Where Should We Begin 

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Adapted from Esther Perel's "Where Should We Begin"

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Wordwall - Create better lessons quicker

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Where Should We Begin Storytelling | OAL Q4 2024

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Flip tiles - Explore a series of two sided tiles by tapping to zoom and swiping to flip.

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Employee Resource Groups Overview & Tools

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#027: Building Dream Community (even if you don’t live in Community)

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Brené and Barrett on Building Brave Spaces

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Key points

Experiencing a sense of belonging is vital for our psychological well-being.

A community can provide us with a sense of belonging, support, and identity.

There are specific ways that everyone can connect to and create a community.

Experiencing a sense of belonging is vital for our psychological well-being. Being a part of a healthy community can help us feel connected to others, as well as feel we're part of something larger than ourselves.

This is especially important for people who've experienced trauma or loss, or who are feeling isolated, marginalized, bullied, or alone. For those, and for all of us, a community can provide that necessary sense of belonging.

A community provides belonging, support, and identity

Being a part of a healthy community can also provide us with support. When we're going through a difficult time, it can be enormously helpful to have people who we can turn to. Community members can offer us emotional support, practical help, and advice. They can also help us to feel we aren't alone in our struggles.

A community can also help us to develop a sense of identity. When we're part of a community, we learn about shared values and beliefs. We also learn about our history and culture. This can help us feel we have a place in the world, and that we are part of something important.

Community reduces stress and isolation

Finally, a community can also help to reduce stress and isolation. When we're part of a community, we have people to talk to and connect with. This can help us to feel less alone-and therefore less stressed-as well as help us feel we're part of something larger than ourselves. Research shows that people who are part of strong communities tend to have lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol levels, and a lower risk of obesity. They are also more likely to exercise regularly and eat a healthy diet.

Thus, community helps reduce stress and isolation and, ultimately, benefits our physical health in addition to our mental health.

There are a number of ways to connect

There are a number of ways to connect to a community. Joining a club or organization with people who share your identity or values can be a ready-made way to connect. Joining a church or spiritual community can be a way to connect with people who share your values and beliefs. Support groups-led by mental health professionals, lay-led, or meetings such as 12-step programs-can provide support, reduce stress, and promote mental health.

Another avenue for community connection is through volunteering your time or attending community events. Even getting to know your neighbors and building relationships with them can provide a sense of belonging and reduce feelings of isolation.

Finding community can feel a little daunting, but it's well worth the effort, providing relief from the pain that lack of connection, support, and experiences of isolation can bring.

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Finding a community can feel a little daunting, but it's well worth the effort.

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The Importance of Community | 7 Key Benefits

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The Importance of Community | 7 Key Benefits

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Humans aren't meant to be alone all the time: connecting as part of a meaningful community is important for our mental well-being. Dee Marques discovers seven ways in which community belonging can benefit both you and those around you.

Litter picking is a powerful community action
Humans are social beings, and the need to belong is deeply ingrained in our nature. That's why since the beginning of times humans have been drawn to creating their own communities. Today, important communities continue to be formed around different shared interests of characteristics, such as religious or spiritual groups, professional associations, neighbourhoods, volunteer groups or sports clubs.

In fact, belonging to a group or community we can identify with helps us develop a stronger sense of personal and collective identity. It can also give a boost to our self-esteem and to our willingness to take on the world and make our dreams happen. But the importance of community goes beyond that.

So, just why is community important? To answer the question we can look at what happens if we don't have community we can call our own. Since we're inherently sociable beings, feeling disconnected from others can deeply affect our self perception and emotional health.

shutterstock/SpeedKingz

Indeed, some studies have linked the emotional strain of loneliness caused by social isolation to physical illness, including sleep disorders, heart disease and a weakened immune system. A Public Health study done in Canada even ranked social isolation as a higher risk factor for premature death.

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Having said that, the past year or so has been a strange one for social interaction and personal relationships. On the one hand, lockdown measures and work-from-home arrangements have made it harder to meet and connect with others, so feelings of isolation and loneliness are on the rise.

However, that hasn't undermined the importance of community. On the contrary, these changes have prompted many people to reconsider the significance of neighborhood feeling, bringing the concept of meaningful belonging back into the spotlight.

"Belonging to a group or community we can identify with helps us develop a stronger sense of personal and collective identity. It can also give a boost to our self-esteem."

For example, during the past few months we have seen communities coming together with fundraising initiatives to help those struggling financially or otherwise. Others have learnt to sew just to be able to make PPE - such as face masks - and delivered them to those who needed them the most.

The importance of community: 7 benefits it offers

To understand why neighborhood action and community is meaningful and beneficial to our well-being, we can look at seven ways in which belonging to one can help us.

1. Support and safety

Living with uncertainty has become the norm during the COVID pandemic. This has made it more important than ever to have a strong support network in place. Indeed, one of the main reasons behind the importance of community is that it can help fight feelings of hopelessness and give us the certainty that we are safe when surrounded by our community. Furthermore, the benefits go both ways, since supporting others also gives us a boost.

2. Connection and belonging

Togetherness is so central to our experience as humans; that feeling we are part of something bigger can help give meaning to our lives. Finding others with the same values, interests, and world views makes us realise that we're not alone and makes us feel valued. Indeed, belonging highlights why community is necessary: being accepted into a group gives us a stronger sense of self and can help us cope with negative experiences and feelings.

3. Influence

Sometimes we need an extra push to stop us from falling into unhealthy habits or thoughts. Experiencing the positive influence of like-minded people is another reason behind the importance of community. Studies confirm that our overall health is partly determined by our ability to look after ourselves, but sometimes we simply don't feel capable of it. Communities can influence us and motivate us to invest in our well-being and to bring positive changes to our lives.

RELATED: Happy habits - 12 ways to boost your joy levels daily

Sharing activities, ideas and feelings reinforces not only our sense of self, but also adds worth and value to the community. Indeed, the more the merrier applies in this case! That's not to mention the huge beneficial effect sharing can have on mental health: higher engagement, positive emotions, and empowerment are only some of the benefits. Sharing is caring.

Support is an important community action
shutterstock/Daisy Daisy

Communities are usually built around common interests, but that doesn't mean they're homogeneous. We can still find people within them who have different views, experiences, or beliefs, and learning from them can help us reach insights that we may not have reached on our own.

6. Acceptance

Developing community bonds with others who have different views may be challenging, but it's also an opportunity to practise acceptance. I had a personal breakthrough when I read this article and understood that acceptance doesn't necessarily imply agreement.

"One of the main reasons behind the importance of community is that it can help fight feelings of hopelessness and give us the certainty that we are safe."

This valuable lesson can bring peace and relief. And there's another side to acceptance: self-acceptance. Community belonging helps us accept that sometimes we're strong and sometimes we're vulnerable and that we need the support of others to avoid unnecessary emotional struggles and pain.

7. More connections, more chances of success

The importance of community goes beyond the personal sphere and extends to professional development. Since the pandemic begun we've seen a stronger focus on supporting local businesses, so this is a good place to start networking and building strong relationships. You never know where that could take your business idea or professional life.

The importance of community action

Communities are not abstract entities, so practical actions are needed to really take the importance of community further and make a difference. This is the basis of so-called community action initiatives. In fact, these are so important to society that many local authorities now have dedicated resources and invest in community building programmes.

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An example is the Community Organisers initiative, launched in the UK to give communities the tools to identify and solve local challenges by bringing everyone together. The Community Organisers Stafford group was aware that many people struggled to make ends meet and set up a social supermarket that was supported by local shop owners, grocery stores and volunteers.

A young food bank volunteer shutterstock/HASPhotos

Surplus food was donated and then sold at discounted prices that even those on a low income could afford. In just a few months, the programme was feeding more than 100 local families. It helped stigmatise financial hardship as well as remind residents that the community is there for them.

On that note, it's essential to remember that community action doesn't need to involve grand gestures. Sometimes the best way of contributing to our community is to give: be it time, money, or kindness to others with small daily gestures. One thing is for sure: if we look around us with the intention to help, we will find ways of doing it, and in the process we will be contributing to making our community stronger.

We can all do something to build meaningful human relationships and benefit from the healing power that comes with a sense of community and a richer perspective. So, why not set the goal of developing deeper bonds with others in our immediate community? Today is a good day to starting looking for or creating your own network and to begin to experience the importance and power of community. *

Written by Dee Marques

A social sciences graduate with a keen interest in languages, communication, and personal development strategies. Dee loves exercising, being out in nature, and discovering warm and sunny places where she can escape the winter.

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Despite claiming "people are our greatest asset," too many executives still expect employees to leave their personal lives at the door when they come to work. Yet Gallup data shows that having a best friend at work is strongly linked to business outcomes, including improvements in profitability, safety, inventory control, and employee retention. And Gallup's latest findings show that since the start of the pandemic, having a best friend at work has an even greater impact on important outcomes - like workers' likelihood to recommend their workplace, intent to leave, and overall satisfaction. With the unavoidable increase in remote and hybrid work, best friends at work have become lifelines who provide crucial social connection, collaboration, and support for each other during times of change. The author offers four ways managers can create and maintain a friendship-friendly workplace that delivers measurable results.

Millions of people suffer from loneliness. More than 300 million people globally don't have a single friend, according to Gallup data. And more than 20% of people don't have friends or family they can count on whenever they need them.

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Survey after survey shows that employee engagement at work is at an all-time low. One way to help improve engagement at work is to foster friendships. We all know them: the good old fashioned friendships created when we chit-chat, hang-out, joke, and have fun with co-workers.

Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, the online shoe retailer with over $1 billion in sales, fosters fun and friendships as part of his corporate culture. The core values of Zappos help create a positive environment for employees and cost very little to implement. These values include embracing and driving change, creating fun and a little weirdness, pursuing growth and learning, and building a positive team and family spirit.

Research shows that workers are happier in their jobs when they have friendships with co-workers. Employees report that when they have friends at work, their job is more fun, enjoyable, worthwhile, and satisfying. Gallup found that close work friendships boost employee satisfaction by 50% and people with a best friend at work are seven times more likely to engage fully in their work.

Camaraderie is more than just having fun, though. It is also about creating a common sense of purpose and the mentality that we are in-it together. Studies have shown that soldiers form strong bonds during missions in part because they believe in the purpose of the mission, rely on each other, and share the good and the bad as a team. In short, camaraderie promotes a group loyalty that results in a shared commitment to and discipline toward the work. Camaraderie at work can create "esprit de corps," which includes mutual respect, sense of identity, and admiration to push for hard work and outcomes. Many companies are engaging in corporate challenges, such as bike to work day, wellness competitions, community service events, and other activities to help build a sense of teamwork and togetherness. Best practice companies also communicate widely about corporate goals and priorities to unify everyone.

Friends at work also form a strong social support network for each other, both personally and professionally. Whether rooting for each other on promotions, consoling each other about mistakes, giving advice, or providing support for personal situations, comradeship at work can boost an employee's spirit and provide needed assistance. A recent story in the Fairfield County Gazette in Ohio highlighted the power of workplace friendship for brain cancer patient Tracy Lee. Three nights a week, one of Tracy's co-workers from the Fairfield County Board of Developmental Disabilities stops by with dinner for the family. Notes containing loving messages such as 'miss your smiley face' cover her office door. This type of support also creates a strong sense of community within the organization.

Some companies - among them Google, DaVita, Dropbox, and Southwest - have built reputations for fostering comradeship at work. Creating comradeship at work hinges on the leaders of organizations. That is, companies can and should create and value camaraderie as a competitive advantage for recruiting top employees, retaining employees, and improving engagement, creativity, and productivity.

I recently spoke with Gary Kelly, CEO of Southwest, who outlined some key points on how a leader can help foster a culture of camaraderie. First, Kelly notes that is it important for the leaders of the organization to have a vision for the culture. His advice is to "be clear in your mind on what you want the culture to be within your organization." At Southwest, they want a culture where employees feel they are part of a family. Kelly suggests leaders must "model the culture: spending time with employees, treating people with respect, having fun, being there for them personally and professionally, and putting people first - with empathy, kindness and compassion." Finally, Kelly notes it is very important for organizations to have products and services around which employees can feel proud and that organizations need to leverage the talents of the employees by letting ideas come forward.

People in organizations need to work together. So, managers and employees need to foster collaboration, trust, personal relationships, fun, and support. In an increasingly global and virtual environment, challenges for employees and managers will be to cultivate these personal relationships. Fostering friendships takes proactive effort.

Are there downsides to friendships at work? Sure, there can be bumps: professional jealousy, groupthink, negative cliques, split loyalties, loss of work time to socializing, and broken friendships. However, these are all manageable and the benefits of positive relationships far outweigh any negative outcomes.

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The Increasing Importance of a Best Friend at Work

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The Increasing Importance of a Best Friend at Work

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by Alok Patel and Stephanie Plowman

Story Highlights

Best friends at work provide essential social and emotional support

Having a best friend at work now ties more strongly to key business outcomes

Leaders, take three actions to promote workplace friendships

People instinctively want close, trusting relationships -- at work and in life. Having a "best friend" at work contributes to a thriving employee experience and to communication, commitment and other outcomes. In fact, recent Gallup data show that having a best friend at work has become more important since the start of the pandemic, even considering the dramatic increase in remote and hybrid work.

There are several factors behind the rising importance of having a best friend at work. For many employees, the pandemic caused traumatic experiences and other profound difficulties, particularly for healthcare and other front-line workers and educators. These employees found the social and emotional support from their best friends at work to be more critical than ever to get them through these challenging times.

Recent Gallup data show that having a "best friend" at work has become more important since the start of the pandemic, even considering the dramatic increase in remote and hybrid work.

Imagine, for example, the working parent who leaned on their best friend at work (who also has a child) when the pandemic required them to juggle at-home learning and their job responsibilities. Their best friend at work offered judgment-free encouragement during the toughest storms -- the kind of support that communicates, "You're not alone."

Other employees who were thrown into the world of remote or hybrid work found that their best friend at work helped keep them informed, accountable and connected to their team. For instance, an employee can ask their best friend at work "dumb" questions about changes to how things get done -- without fear of embarrassment.

And when workloads are heavy, your best friend at work is someone you feel accountable to, someone you don't want to let down. As a result, you naturally want to go the extra mile for them on a project.

On the other hand, an employee without a best friend at work became that much more isolated during the pandemic. And because they lack collaboration and a sense of responsibility to a best friend at work, their performance may have dipped too.

Whether in the office or the virtual world, a best friend at work is a necessary source of connection and support.

Having a Best Friend at Work Has an Even Stronger Connection to Outcomes Amid the Pandemic

Gallup has repeatedly shown that having best friends at work is key to employee engagement and job success. Gallup data indicate that having a best friend at work is strongly linked to business outcomes, including profitability, safety, inventory control and retention.

Employees who have a best friend at work are significantly more likely to:

engage customers and internal partners

get more done in less time

support a safe workplace with fewer accidents and reliability concerns

innovate and share ideas

have fun while at work

Our latest findings show that since the pandemic started, there has been an even stronger relationship between having a best friend at work and important outcomes such as employees' likelihood to recommend their workplace, their intent to leave and their overall satisfaction with their workplace.

Best friends at work drive outcomes because they're more than a social connection or good relationship. A best friend at work is someone you can rely on through thick and thin. Someone who has your back and genuinely cares. These authentic friendships deepen employees' sense of ownership for their work and enable employees to be more effective and sustainable, regardless of where or when they work.

Best friends at work have played a crucial role as workplaces navigate changes, uncertainty and new ways of working. Change is here to stay, and best friends at work can keep one another informed and work together to familiarize themselves with new technologies and processes.

Unfortunately, leaders are facing significant challenges supporting connections and friendships among a physically distant workforce. In the U.S., just two in 10 employees report having a best friend at work.

In Gallup's experience working with clients, the following strategies can help promote best friends at work for in-person, remote and hybrid workers:

1. Promote intentionality, starting with leaders.

Intentionality starts with leaders who celebrate and champion best friends at work, from the C-suite to front-line managers. Employees learn behavioral norms and cues from their managers and leaders -- and they need the "OK" from leaders to develop friendships on the job. Leaders should talk about the importance of having a best friend at work and exemplify intentionality in forming connections.

Employees at all levels need to make a concerted effort to get to know their coworkers and maintain friendships. For example, employees should make a habit of having special quick connects, maybe via video chat, to say hello and spark conversation. For hybrid workers, these quick connects might be on an office day, such as a lunch or walking meeting.

Fully remote workers with tighter schedules can reserve five minutes before a team meeting for interaction -- or perhaps schedule a collaborative video chat to work on a shared project together in a virtual setting. Employees should also make a point of asking for feedback and creative support.

The key is making time to connect with colleagues wherever and however they're working to maintain relationships with best friends or develop friendships with other colleagues. Don't wait for others to come knocking; look for ways to partner with and support them.

2. Create interactive opportunities for friendships to blossom.

Team structures, workflows, and other systems and practices can make or break employees' ability to develop real friendships at work. Leaders should assess how factors like performance expectations and time requirements support (or impede) having best friends at work. Do employees have time, opportunities and permission to form spontaneous connections?

Just as important, managers are responsible for promoting a local team atmosphere that encourages trust and collaboration. Wherever possible, managers should remove constraints to socialization and create an atmosphere where employees feel free and encouraged to connect and show support.

Leaders should liberate employees to pursue friendships on their own but also support their efforts with preplanned social events that give employees ample opportunities to chat, whether an off-site event or an impromptu team lunch. Scheduled friendship activities might seem like a waste of time, but this powerful investment helps every employee -- even the most isolated remote workers -- form real friendships.

Managers and leaders can also support connections by making time to talk to employees themselves. For instance, a 15-minute manager-employee conversation might highlight ways to pair team members on new tasks to promote friendships. Frequent conversations can also reveal barriers that preclude friendships at work.

3. Communicate often.

Encouraging consistent conversation and connection is key to cultivating best friends at work. It also fuels performance excellence: Through conversation, employees who are best friends can bring their authentic selves to their work and can support one another, maintain accountability, share ideas and use their strengths to contribute to a superior product.

Communication starts with leaders setting an example -- creating a culture where friendly dialogue is the norm. For instance, managers should send weekly team emails to encourage recognition, celebrate anniversaries and birthdays, and relay what everyone's working on.

To own their role, employees at all levels should maintain open lines of communication with their colleagues to show support and be available in times of need. When communication is strong, team members who are genuine friends are more likely to reach out when they're overwhelmed or struggling.

Another great practice when working remotely is to make a point of letting partners know when you're going to be unavailable or offline -- as well as when your virtual door is "open." When coworkers are best friends, these habits are second nature rather than having to be managed. Best friends want to stay connected and actively reach out.

Building a Culture of Best Friends at Work

Many successful organizations Gallup has partnered with to create the conditions for best friends at work find success in sharing public stories about their best friend at work. Consistently talking about best friends at work makes relationships part of how we do things around here -- in other words, part of the work culture.

One client organization, for example, launched a weekly companywide meeting that spotlights one employee's best friend at work. This recurring event is simple in design, but sends powerful, consistent messages about having a best friend at work that connect and inspire employees.

In these weekly best friend features, employees might describe what their best friend at work means to them or how they've benefited from their at-work support system. Regardless, it unifies employees and excites them about the incredible value of having best friends at work.

Consistently talking about best friends at work makes relationships part of how we do things around here -- in other words, part of the work culture.

For this client, consistently sharing stories fuels a "best friend" work atmosphere and offers valuable lessons about how others can benefit from having a best friend at work. Since the effort began, the client has experienced dramatic growth in the number of employees who say they have a best friend at work -- improving on this engagement element by over 80 percentile points in Gallup's global database. The organization is now an employer of choice that has been commended as a Gallup Exceptional Workplace Award winner.

A best friend at work is the gift that keeps on giving. When employees have genuine friends, they have someone who makes them feel included and cared for. Someone they can be vulnerable with. And because they care about their best friend, they don't want to let them down, so they show up for them in their performance and in a supportive role. They have their back -- whether that means prioritizing safety or going out their way on a project.

This type of support is all the more crucial in the post-pandemic workplace, where many employees are more emotionally taxed and physically distanced. Workers need not only social support, but also accountability and connection to their culture.

Having a best friend at work helps even the most remote worker stay engaged and committed, fueling them to go the extra mile no matter what challenges arise.

Build an engaging culture that fosters best friendships:

Author(s)

Alok Patel is Managing Consultant at Gallup.

Stephanie Plowman is Senior Research Database Manager at Gallup.
Bailey Nelson contributed to this article.

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The Increasing Importance of a Best Friend at Work

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by Alok Patel and Stephanie Plowman Story Highlights Best friends at work provide essential social and emotional support Having a best friend at work now ties more strongly to key business outcomes Leaders, take three actions to promote workplace friendships People instinctively want close, trusting relationships -- at work and in life.

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Why You Should Make Friends at Work | Lynda Gratton

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Many people are wary of workplace friendships, but the benefits of forming connections outweigh the potential risks.

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