Are you friends with your boss / employees?

How friendly are you with your boss and/or your direct reports?

do you have lunch with them, drinks at the pub on a friday etc or do you keep your distance?

ever had problems with a poorly performing report who you are friends with (or a serious professional disagreement with a boss you are friends with)?

interested to see how people compartmentalise their work lives

I am friendly with my staff, but not friends with them. Some come to me with their personal issues if they think I can help, and I do where I can, but otherwise, I maintain a safe distance.

Interestingly during her performance review, one of my girls recently told me she views me as a boss and as 'like a big brother'...this was nice.

Also interesting, one of my staff, and one of our regular suppliers, came to my birthday party last year. As polyrock800 from SF (who was also there) can report, that night was a little reckless. 300 odd people, and me on amphetamines running around in camo gear with a vodka laden squirt gun.

The surprised feedback..."my boss is reeeeeally fuuuun!" - a good indication that generally I keep the game face on at work, and keep the lines between work and play pretty clear.

One of my mates runs an ad agency here, and basically his best friends are his staff. I think this is all fucked up. Those boys are out hammered until 5 am like six nights a week, stumble home, sleep 2 hours, and go to work. Do a fuckload of pills together, go whoring, whatever.

I just don't want my subordinates seeing me in that light (I am not that bad anyhow, I go out a lot, but weeknights I am generally in before midnight, 2 at the latest), and similarly, I don't want my subordinates showing up three-hours-post-tequila and facing my clients.

That said, he seems to make it work, so who am I to judge, but still....

yet to fill out a job application so I guess I have always been friends with my bosses beforehand

I ain't really friendly towards management at all... I respect one manager, and despise the GM. I respect one of the Chef's, but don't really respect the other one. I am extremely difficult to get along with, but I do the work of two people, so management pretty much leaves me alone.

I've always maintained a good distance from by bosses even though I have genuinely liked some of them.

I have no issues with my bosses but choose not to socialize with them after work hours when I have been invited to. I have no direct subordinates here so that's not an issue.

After finishing graduate school I taught a couple courses as an adjunct at my university and that was a different story. I quite often would go to the bar after classes (and sometimes before) with professors an the head of the department as well as my students.

Truthfully you are not friends with your co-workers/boss.

When you cease your employment there, will you continue to spend time with them?

If you were fired, would you find them in a bar and saddle up with them as if nothing happened? Would they accept you?

In the end, you should be friendly with the people you work with, but you are not their friends.

If you would stop seeing them simply based on the termination of employment you are not friends.

I maintain professional distance.

Yeah, I would say friendly. There are a lot of smaller offices (3-5 people) within my building, so sometimes there will be an e-mail blast announcing a happy hour or group lunch in a conference room. The staff likes to hang out with each other and the vast majority of them are fairly young, intelligent and fun.

Friendly with my boss but I still treat her with respect and all that. None of the first-name-basis stuff.

Originally Posted by Hehlol

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Truthfully you are not friends with your co-workers/boss. When you cease your employment there, will you continue to spend time with them? If you were fired, would you find them in a bar and saddle up with them as if nothing happened? Would they accept you? In the end, you should be friendly with the people you work with, but you are not their friends. If you would stop seeing them simply based on the termination of employment you are not friends.
I worked as an associate with another attorney for two years. I left that law firm, he stayed. We see each other usually once a week at the bar for a couple of drinks. I regularly refer certain types of cases to him. When he needed a ride to the airport I was happy to help him out. I don't consider him my best friend but I do consider him my friend. I've always considered the real test of friendship is whether or not that person would bail you out of jail if necessary. This person passes that test for me.

Originally Posted by Michigan Planner

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I have no issues with my bosses but choose not to socialize with them after work hours when I have been invited to. I have no direct subordinates here so that's not an issue.

After finishing graduate school I taught a couple courses as an adjunct at my university and that was a different story. I quite often would go to the bar after classes (and sometimes before) with professors an the head of the department as well as my students.

Eastern??

I was friends with my last boss, but was not friends with anyone that reported to me. We were friendly and would even have a drink once in a while, but nothing beyond that.

In my new job, I'm friendly with people, but prefer to keep my friends and work separate. I'm with a large organization and feel that it's better to keep things separated.

I am friendly with my directs and hold the occasional happy hour, lunch, or breakfast for them. I always take the team out for dinner at Xmas. My #2 in command I am most friendly with, have shared drinks with him dozens of times, but there is still a distance kept even there.

I've always worked under the "us and them" principle. I changed over to being "them" a long time ago and have been the top "them" for nearly three years now. Remembering this keeps you out of certain kinds of trouble.

ive found with some direct reports it works well being friendly - having drinks, getting coffee etc. we travel alot so often have dinner together etc

but some reports i need to maintain a professional distance from - they try and take advantage of your friendliness or something

usually strong performers fit into the first catagory, weak performers into the second.

Originally Posted by Connemara

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Friendly with my boss but I still treat her with respect and all that. None of the first-name-basis stuff.

i work in a 10,000+ employee company and call the CEO by his first name if i see him in the lifts

Originally Posted by Mr Herbert

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i work in a 10,000+ employee company and call the CEO by his first name if i see him in the lifts

And yet you refuse to do that with yourself.