Work BFF: Why companies should prioritize coworker friendships

Having friends in the office has always been good for employee morale, but now it looks like it could be even better for business.  

Workplace friendships are key to employee engagement and job success, according to a recent report from management consulting company Gallup. The data indicated that having a best friend at work is strongly linked to business outcomes, including profitability, safety, inventory control and retention — and it's in employers' best interest to leverage these findings. 

"This loneliness epidemic is a very real thing being experienced by employees in a variety of different ways," says Annie Rosencrans, people and culture director at HR platform HiBob. "Pre-pandemic, it was pretty much the norm to come into an office and interact with others regularly. Many companies have since evolved into a new structure and we're seeing the impacts of those decisions and those policies on how people are feeling about friendships at work and their isolation from other people." 

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As a result, workplace friendships have begun to completely revolutionize employees' experiences. In fact, 44% of employees with best friends at work were likely to recommend their workplace in 2022 compared to 21% without one, according to Gallup, and 32% of employees with friends at work also agreed that their workplace satisfaction increased post-pandemic compared to 15% without. 

Workplace friendships even had a strong impact on retention despite trends like the Great Resignation, which accounted for more than 50 million workers quitting their jobs in 2022. According to Gallup, the number of employees with a best friend at work willing to leave their jobs dropped from 44% in 2021 to 37% 2022 while for employees without a best friend at work, this figure only dropped from 50% to 49%. 

"Overall employee satisfaction and retention in the organization is going to be greater if employees have someone that they connect with and enjoy working with every day," Rosencrans says. "A friend at work can serve as a sounding board and a person who you can air your grievances with, express yourself and be open and honest with. That way some of those [workplace frustrations] don't end up bubbling up or getting expressed in unhealthy ways." 

And while employers can't force employees to get along, much less become friends, there are ways they can encourage meaningful connection between colleagues as they build their return to work strategies. 

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"Things like shared lunch, happy hours, common social activities — these things are largely authentic and have the most success because they are typically employee driven," Rosencrans says. "And this results in better business outcomes because these people who weren't previously connected now have a relationship with one another and will more readily approach one another in the office with questions and concerns." 

For employees looking to foster friendships, Rosencrans suggests taking advantage of instances where there is opportunity to collaborate with new teams. She also urges employees to sit with people they've never met before at large gatherings and introduce themselves to people at employee events and functions. Fostering a community should be a priority company-wide. 

"The way organizations set up their work site is going to dramatically impact what direction everything moves in," Rosencrans says. "The more we understand that the more people will see the value of being together physically and that loneliness that that many people are feeling will hopefully start to subside."