Personal Relationships - Where to Draw the Line

March 31, 2005

Most people would agree it's important for a manager to maintain a friendly relationship with his or her employees.

The more you get to know your employees on a personal level, the more likely you can establish a strong bond that helps you work well together.

Taken too far however, personal relationships with employees can interfere with your judgment and your ability as a manager to make sound business decisions. Some managers become overly concerned with maintaining the relationship to the detriment of the business.

The challenge, therefore, is in striking the right balance in your relationships with employees. Where do you draw the line, for example, between being friendly and being friends?

Here's a simple two-part test. Answer the questions below as honestly as you can. Then see if you are more likely to err on the side of being too cold and distant or being a bit too friendly with the people who report to you.

1. Do you treat your employees with the same warmth and civility as you do with your friends?
    
2. Have you taken the initiative to get to know each employee on a personal level? For example, their background, family, personal interests, etc.
    
3. Do you know the career aspirations of each employee?
    
4. Do you look for opportunities that would help each person on your team further develop his or her skills and abilities?

If you answered yes to all of these questions, then give yourself a pat on the back. Your responses indicate that you are effectively demonstrating an affiliation for your employees.

If you answered no to one or more of the questions above, you might want to look at the situation more carefully. Consider your current management style and whether it is serving you as well as you'd like. If you're not sure, discuss it with another manager or someone outside the organization and ask them for honest feedback.

Now, for the second part of the test.

The purpose of this next part is to determine whether you have too much affiliation with your employees. Answer the questions as honestly as you can.

1. Have you ever failed to make a decision or chose not to take action because you feared it might be unpopular with one or more members of the group?
    
2. Have you ever awarded special privileges or handed out a favored assignment to someone or shared inside information because of your friendship with that person? In other words, have you played favorites based on friendship?
    
3. Have you avoided confronting inappropriate behavior or poor performance with any of your employees because you didn't want to jeopardize your relationship with them?
    
4. Do you have difficulty excluding people from a team project even when the team is already large enough?

A 'yes' to any of these questions indicates that you may be placing too high a value on your personal relationships with employees. Consider the extent to which your management style and your affiliation with your employees support or detract from the business needs.

If find yourself in a difficult situation that requires you to make a choice between serving the needs of the business and maintaining a good relationship with employees and you're not sure what to do, talk it over with your boss or with another manager. They can often help you get an appropriate perspective on the situation.

Best regards,

Stephen Foster, Ph.D
Expert Supervisor, LLC
1493 Market Street
Tallahassee, FL 32312
(850) 893-5699

E-mail me at: Steve.Foster@ExpertSupervisor.com