A recent article, 6 Ways Work Friendships Benefit Your Business – and 7 Ways to Encourage Them by Rieva Lesonsky says that friendships at work benefit your employees as well as your company. Having close friends at work promotes employee happiness, harmony and engagement, thus positively affects company productivity and profitability.
Here are a few tips to encourage work friendships in your business in a commercial office space.
- Spend valuable time with your team. There’s a lot of work to get done, but it’s also very vital to build relationships with the people who help you do it. Take a real interest in your employees by spending some time to get to know them and learn about their lives. Friendship begins with you.
- Use a buddy system to welcome new employees. Look for employees who are sociable and friendly and pair them with a new hire so he/she can get along easily and comfortably with other members in your team office space Philadelphia.
- Eat meal together. Order pizza or bring in lunch once a week, orthrow a monthly potluck. Chatting over a meal is a great way to build rapport.
- Hold offsite meetings. Aside from regular strategic planning or training in meeting space Philadelphia, get your team offsite for a day or a weekend once or twice a year to allow employees to spend plenty of time for just hanging around and having fun.
- Get active. Encourage employees to participate in a wellness and fun activity during break time like an afternoon “dance party” where everyone gets up from their desks and dances around for 15 minutes. Doing funny things together loosens people up and builds camaraderie.
Conclusion
You shouldn’t compel people to become friends, but you can provide them many opportunities to build friendships naturally. Providing your team a workplace where they can share their knowledge and expertise freely is a great way to foster friendships. YourOffice has come alongside hundreds of business looking for everything from staffed flexible offices to agile office space. We know your business is unique, and your office space shouldn’t be any different. Let us match the perfect space or service to fit your business needs.
What can you do to promote friendships among your employees? Feel free to share your thoughts. You can also visit us on Facebook and Twitter.