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The premise is pretty basic. Think Barbra Streisand . Instead of belting out traditional lyrics of " people who need people are the luckiest people in the world" substitute instead, "People who need people are the best workers in the world."
According to Gallup research, people who have a best buddy at work are seven times more likely to be engaged in their job then those worker bees without that special friend.
It's part of the findings in Vital Friends: The People You Can't Live Without published by Gallup and written by 13 year Gallup Veteran, Tom Rath. I found that tidbit of information during the 35 minutes I needed to "process" yesterday at the hair dressers.( Oh, I think we call it a hair salon now-just my southern roots showing)
Having not read a Ladies Home Journal in I don't know-- a decade-- I thought it would be fun to see what kind of stuff the magazine was writing about these days.So as I was thumbing through the issue , I found a blurb on Vital and immediately thought-- can I now deduct this hair treatment since I have spent my time doing research for BlogHer?
As part of that research I discovered that Gallup Press published the book in August 2006. It 's ranked #23, 863 on Amazon. Either Ladies Home Journal is really late on its press coverage or Gallup is "regifting" this book.
In writing about Vital Friends back in 2006, USA Today wrote,
People who have a best friend at work are seven times more likely to be engaged in their job. They get more done in less time. They also have fewer accidents, have more engaged customers and are more likely to innovate and share new ideas. That's noteworthy because many companies frown on workplace friendships, both between co-workers and between workers and management. The underlying communication in many offices is that work life should be separate and distinct from non-work life.
Which brings me workplace spouses. Everything2.com provides a definition and brief history of work spouses.
A work spouse is a co-worker with whom one has a close connection, but a wholly platonic relationship. A work spouse relationship can develop for many reasons: similarities in position, similar duties, proximity, or a mutual hatred of other co-workers. Work spouse relationships are modeled on a marriage relationship, with partners providing support for each other for both work and non-work related issues.
Few write about more poignantly about the joys and perils of work spouse relationships than JM Bratton in Confessions of a Work Wife[1].
Twenty years ago, I promised to love and cherish the man I married till death do us part. And so far, I’ve honored my wedding vows, realizing all along one marriage is all I ever wanted.Twenty years later, however, I think a colleague and I were pronounced Husband and Wife at the company that employs us both, and neither one of us got the memo.
It sounds so scandalous, so…wrong. But the vast majority of work marriages, including mine, are platonic relationships that thrive in today’s current business climate, where the most titillating things to ever happen usually involve voicemail glitches, staff terminations or an unexpected box of donuts.
For Bratten that relationship changed when her work spouse took on a new assignment in the company.
It became apparent my swing-set buddy had deserted me on the corporate schoolyard, and from now on, I would have to fend for myself. I was forced to take a closer look at our friendship, which outside of a few shared interests and assorted weekend text-message and e-mail banter, had been cultivated on the job. I had provided my friend with an infinite galaxy to explore his work and occasional life frustrations. I was his audience of one, a confidant who never betrayed his secrets, the proverbial “good listener.” Not that I minded, though. He is decent and smart, and he made me laugh like no one else. And those office visits, daily phone calls and monthly three-hour lunches? I doubt he knows how much I came to look forward to them.
I fought this sudden, drastic shift in our relationship as hard and for as long as I could until the battle finally wore me out. Defeated, I had to know: After all these years, does he regard me as just another one of his work friends?
And the
