Your Work Relationships Need TLC Too
Don’t lose touch with your work spouse just because you can’t joke in the break room anymore
The bright side of everyone working from home right now is that we’ve all got plenty of people to commiserate with. As the last few weeks have shown, there’s also plenty to commiserate about, from kids reluctant to be homeschooled to spouses who loudly “circle back” on conference calls all day. But there’s one challenge of working from home that still seems to be flying under the radar: growing apart from your colleagues.
I’ve been working remotely for six years now, and trust me when I say that this issue never magically resolves itself. Keeping up work relationships when you’re not in the same physical space every day is always hard. Virtual communication certainly helps, but it’s not the same as the impromptu meetups that happen when you can just stroll over to someone’s desk.
“Even if we use videoconferencing, those interactions are likely to be less often and to be briefer than if they were in the office,” says Timothy D. Golden, a professor of management at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. “Moreover, the communication media — email, phone, videoconferencing — they all have characteristics and properties that change the information that is conveyed compared to face-to-face…
