Guide to Building Work Relationships CEB HR Leadership Council For Midsized Companies Research shows that the focus areas listed below, if done well, can boost the performance and morale of the employees you informally manage. Focus Areas Building Work Relationships Developing People On the Job Recognizing Employees Work FOCUS OF THIS GUIDE Providing Informal Feedback Becoming a better informal manager may also help advance your career and lead to new opportunities. This guide is specifically focused on helping you build better work relationships with your colleagues. 1
What does it mean to build work relationships? Simply put, relationships establishing a your one-on-one with your means helping to work environment Listed below are you can build and relationships: Getting to know your colleagues background and interests Understanding and respecting the different work and communication styles of your colleagues Fostering a positive, open work environment building work means solid foundation for work relationships colleagues. It also create a positive for your team. three main ways improve work What does building work relationships look like? You are building work relationships when you seek to understand how your colleagues like to work and communicate and when you share that same information about yourself. Learning about one another in this way allows you and your colleagues to understand and respect one another and improve your working relationships. For Example You and a colleague struggled to work together on a project you are managing. You did not agree on how he planned to complete his portion of the project and this caused tension in your work relationship. Afterward, you asked your colleague to lunch so you could get to know one another a little bit better. By taking the time to understand your colleague, you have a better sense of how to work with him in the future. 2
You are also building work relationships if you help to create an environment where your colleagues feel comfortable sharing and debating ideas. For Example While managing a project, you noticed that the same few people did most of the talking during team meetings. You spoke with team members on a one-onone basis to find out why and realized that team members did not want to contribute because others did not listen well and were quick to dismiss their ideas. Moving forward, you changed the nature of these meetings by requiring each team member to present their ideas without interruptions. In addition, you asked team members to provide comments in a constructive manner. Why is it important to improve your relationships with your colleagues? Although it may not be a formal component of your job, research shows that employees are more productive when they have good working relationships with their managers and colleagues. As an informal manager who works with a broad range of people on a day-to-day basis, it is particularly important that you build strong relationships with your colleagues and that you help them build relationships with one another. If you think about it You supervise the work of many different people. You have first-hand knowledge of their work and communication styles. You are responsible for numerous team-based projects from start to finish. You can provide insight that even a colleague s formal manager may not have. Building work relationships may seem soft or easy, but it is important to be good at it because even the best employees will not succeed if they cannot work well with others. If done well, research shows that you can improve the work of your colleagues by up to 17%. Think of the people you informally manage and how much you can improve their work (and yours) by building better relationships with them. How do you build work relationships? You must do three things to build work relationships with your colleagues. In the boxes below, we describe each must do and provide tools to help you do that activity better. 3
Three Must Dos for Building Work Relationships Resources to Help You 1) Get to know your colleagues background 2) Know your colleagues work and interests. style and communication preferences. A Conversation Guide for Getting to Know Your Discussion Colleagues Topics (p. 6) for Starting Projects on the Right Foot (p. 7) 3) Work to maintain your relationships over time. A Questionnaire for Assessing Relationships (p. 8) 5
Must Do #1: Get to you know your colleagues background and interests. A helpful way to build (or improve) your work relationships with your colleagues is by taking time to get to know them on a more personal level. Having a good understanding of your peers background, their likes and dislikes, interests, etc., can help you better work and communicate with them in the future. To help you get to know your colleagues better, listed below are a few tips and sample discussion topics.
Getting to Know Your Colleagues A Few Tips to Get You Started Must Do #2: Know your colleagues work style and communication Pick just a few topics to discuss. You only need 15 minutes or so to get to know them a little bit better. Make sure preferences. the conversation is two-way and that you are willing to share information about yourself. Chat in an informal setting where you are both comfortable, like taking a coffee or tea break or going to lunch together. Respect others boundaries because there may be some things they want to keep private; not everyone likes to mix their work life with their personal life. Sample Discussion Topics Professional Background What is your work background? What other jobs have you held at this company and at other companies? What brought you to this organization and this particular job? Current Job What do you like about this job and what do you dislike? What about your job do you find most interesting? Exciting? Challenging? Future Job What job would you like to do next? What other jobs interest you? Where do you see yourself professionally in 5 years? 10 years? If you could have any job, what would it be? Why? Personal Background/Interests* Where did you grow up? Where did you go to school? What do you like to outside work (e.g., hobbies, sports)? Have you traveled anywhere exciting or that you particularly enjoy? Is there anywhere you d like to travel in the future? *Be careful when asking a colleague about their background/interests. Some will be willing to share, but others will not. Stay away from topics that can be sensitive such as religion and politics. Everyone has his or her own work style and communication preferences (as well as a few hot buttons ). A relatively easy way to build or improve work relationships is to ask your colleagues what those are and to share the same information about yourself. Use the simple list of questions below to help prepare for these conversations. Starting Projects on the Right Foot 6
Discuss Ask your how colleagues you like how to give they or prefer get information to communicate and address and be potential sure to tell project them about challenges, your preferences and ask your as well. Do colleagues you and to your do the peer same. prefer to communicate by: Do E-mail? you prefer to have information written down or do you prefer to share information in person? What do your colleagues Telephone? prefer? Do Face-to-face? you prefer to schedule specific times to discuss issues or do you prefer to deal with issues as needed? What do your Combination colleagues of prefer? the three? Discuss your project management style and ask your colleagues to share the same information. Will you step back and let your colleagues do the most of the work, or do prefer to be more hands-on? What types of activities (or decisions) do you prefer to be more involved in? How often will you check in with your colleague? Daily? Every few days? Once a week? Is your colleague independent, or do they prefer that you check in with them often? Are they collaborative? Discuss your hot buttons (i.e., what you dislike, what frustrates you) and ask your colleagues what their hot buttons are. Think about the following: How do you respond when someone presses one of your hot buttons? How does it affect your work relationships? What can you do so it will not bother you? What hot buttons do your colleagues have? Are there things you can try to avoid doing? Share past experiences and mistakes you have made before when doing similar work. As an informal manager, you have experience and insight that can help your colleagues perform a task or project successfully. Share the mistakes you have made and lessons learned in advance to show you colleagues that you are human and to help them to do their jobs well. Must Do #3: Work to maintain your relationships over time. Like many things in life, relationship-building requires time and effort to get right. Relationships are affected by many things and can change quickly. Because of this, it is important to assess the health of your work relationships from time to time. Use the questionnaire below to think about your work relationships. Although you may not be able to answer each question with 100% certainty, make your best guess and try to evaluate yourself and your colleagues as honestly as possible. 7
Summary Work Relationship Assessment Assessment Questions Yes/No? Potential Action Steps Are my relationships with my colleagues mostly positive? Does my team work well together to successfully complete tasks or projects? Does my team encourage one another to share ideas and participate in decision making? Does my team feel comfortable discussing important topics with me? With each another? Do my colleagues feel comfortable disagreeing with me? And the team? Do my colleagues feel comfortable providing feedback to me? And the team? Get to know your colleagues background and interests (see p. 7). Have a team discussion of everyone s work styles and communication preferences (see p. 9). Try some fun team-building activities requiring everyone to work together, such as group lunch, going out for happy hour, etc. Make sure you know how your colleagues prefer to communicate (see p. 9). Provide all team members with a few minutes to share their ideas with no interruptions. Consider ways to make decisions that include the entire team. Set ground rules for team discussions (e.g., everyone gets five minutes to present their ideas with no interruptions). Make it clear that disagreement is allowed because it can help you and the team complete tasks and projects. Establish rules for expressing disagreement (e.g., be constructive, provide alternatives). Examine your (and the team s) reaction to feedback. Explore different ways to give and receive feedback (e.g., oneon-one conversations, group discussions, feedback forms). You should have mostly yes responses. If you do not, improve your work relationships by using the action steps listed on this page and the tips and guidelines we provided on the previous pages. Also, discuss any concerns with your own manager so you can brainstorm ways to improve your relationships and build team unity. What are the key things you should remember from this guide? Building work relationships means establishing a solid foundation for your one-on-one work relationships with your colleagues. It also means helping to create a positive work environment for your whole team. Building work relationships may seem soft and easy but, if done well, it can have a significant impact on individual performance. Research shows that if you get better at building work relationships, you improve the work of your peers by up to 17%. There are three things you must do to build work relationships: 1) Get to you know your colleagues background and interests. 2) Know your colleagues work style and preferences.
3) Work to maintain relationships over time. A Few Last Words of Advice The most important thing you can do to build better work relationships with your colleagues is to treat them as you would like to be treated. If nothing else, remember this simple rule. Show your respect for your colleagues by treating them the same way you would like them to treat you. Closely following this rule will do much to help build and maintain your relationships with your colleagues. Source Documents CEB, Helping Your Newly Promoted Peer Succeed: A Collection of Simple Tactics and Tools, Washington, DC: CEB (2007). CEB, Driving Results through Employee Development: Understanding Your Role as a Manager, Washington, DC: CEB (2004). 9