CHAPTER 29

When Your Best Friend Becomes Your Boss

Balancing the Professional and the Personal

The two of you started working for the company at about the same time, learning the ropes and navigating the stormy seas of corporate politics. You shared each other’s frustrations and victories and, over time, your professional relationship turned into a close friendship. You know each other’s families, frequently visit in each other’s homes, and have even taken an occasional family vacation together.

This morning, you sat in a department meeting as the company CEO announced your friend’s promotion to department head. Now, in addition to being your friend, she’s also your manager.

It’s not just the office romance that can create a sticky situation in the workplace. Indeed, maintaining equilibrium between professional and personal relationships is never easy, even when friends work together as peers. How then do you work for your best friend and keep the integrity of the business relationship without destroying the friendship? Conversely, how do you maintain the friendship and not undermine both your careers as well as the company’s business goals?

REINVENTING THE RULES OF FRIENDSHIP

When a workplace friend suddenly becomes your boss, the rules of the friendship must be reinvented for the office. If you find yourself in that situation, here are some basic guidelines to keep in mind.

Recognize that your working relationship is significantly changed. Even in organizations that adhere to an egalitarian philosophy, your friend is now your manager. The same rules that would govern any other two people in that situation apply to your new workplace relationship: You are now manager and direct report, and you must accord your friend the same respect you would give anyone else in that position, which means not taking liberties because the boss is your friend. For example, if you wouldn’t go barging into another supervisor or manager’s office, you shouldn’t in this situation, either. Even if you formerly operated in a mi cubicle es su cubicle atmosphere, the boundaries are now different.

Rod Hewitt, vice president of human resources, Global Supply Chain at VF Corporation, comments on these sensitive workplace situations: “I think both people have to be conscious that there is now a supervisory/employee relationship. It’s probably more important for the supervisor to make sure that both parties understand the relationship. The supervisor must be conscious that he or she is the ultimate decision maker, without being overbearing. The employee/friend should not to be scared to question ideas, but both people need to understand that the manager is ultimately responsible and accountable.”

Even if your boss wants to maintain a certain social rapport in the office, use good judgment. If you routinely have coffee together first thing in the morning or if you habitually show up expecting to have lunch together, like in the old days, you will be perceived by coworkers, and perhaps even by your new boss, as taking unfair advantage of the situation.

Know that you and your manager are both under scrutiny. Your coworkers will be watching to see if you get special treatment. It’s tempting for new managers to rely on people they know well and can trust. However, bosses who respond to employees according to their personal preferences, giving the plum assignments to their favorites and rewarding employees who flatter and bring good news, quickly lose credibility with their people. Furthermore, the recipient of that favor can suffer the wrath of those less favored and end up isolated and out of the loop. Therefore, know that signs of any favoritism will do neither you nor your new boss any good in the long term. Expect, and even demand, to be treated in the same way as everyone else.

At the other end of the spectrum, your new manager may be overly conscious of the implications of the friendship and treat you more sternly than the rest, giving others the key assignments and passing you by when promotion opportunities arise, for fear of being accused of favoritism.

If this situation occurs, you need to assess all the possible reasons for your manager’s behavior. Take a hard, objective look at your skills and accomplishments. Is your supervisor trying too hard to be fair to the others, or has he observed something about you, over time, that has challenged his confidence in you? After you’ve done your own self-analysis, arrange for a meeting with your manager. Keep the meeting professional and unemotional and treat it like a job interview or performance review. Document your accomplishments, outline your goals, and press for an honest evaluation of your potential.

Separate the professional and the personal. You may have formerly entertained your coworkers with tales of Bob’s karaoke performance at the local watering hole, but those days are over. Even something as simple as talking about a ball game you’ll be attending together may be inappropriate when you are in the presence of other employees.

When you consistently serve up personal anecdotes about your manager, not only will you appear to want people to know that you have an “in” with the boss, but you also risk diminishing the boss’s stature in the eyes of the other employees. And when you undercut the person, you weaken the position, an outcome that is not advantageous for your friend or for his or her subordinates, who expect a strong leader.

In general, your mindset should be that when you’re on the job you’re in a different world, and anything you do or say that brings the personal relationship into play is taboo.

The head of a communication and design firm says, “You have to be hyper-vigilant in your effort to ensure that a friendship doesn’t in any way compromise the professionalism of the relationship. I try to safeguard both the business relationship and the friendship by remembering that in the workplace, business comes first.”

Seek out a mentor in another area of the organization. Perhaps because of your real and perceived relationship with your boss/friend, he or she can’t provide you with the career advice and opportunities for self-development that you want and need. Any extra time or interest in you shown by the boss may result in negative responses from other coworkers.

It’s also possible that you may decide that you don’t want to work for your friend for the long term. Regardless of the reason, it may be in your best interest to find someone else in the company who can help you achieve your career goals.

Finding the right mentor isn’t always easy. Obviously, you want to align yourself with someone who is generally in favor or, even better, on the way up. The last thing you want is to hitch your wagon to a falling star.

Position yourself so that the person in senior management will want to adopt you as a protégé. Seize opportunities to ask for business-related advice, and target someone who can teach you the basics of doing a good job, share lessons learned from his or her experience, and introduce you to the right people.

If all else fails, ask for a transfer. In some cases, when your friend becomes your boss, immediately changing departments or even jobs may be the answer. “It’s not a relationship that everybody can handle,” according to Rod Hewitt. “Sometimes, the manager can’t make the jump to being the supervisor, and the employee can’t accept the friend as a boss. One or other will suffer. Either you won’t work well together, or you’ll stop being friends.” Of course, the chemistry that led to the friendship can contribute to a solid working relationship, and both of you should remember that the friendship was there before the supervisory relationship. The key is leaving work, and the manager/employee relationship, at work and nurturing the friendship away from the office.

THE BOTTOM LINE

When your best friend becomes your manager, realize that both of you will be under scrutiny.

Working for a manager who is also your friend requires the discipline to separate the personal from the professional while in the office.

Identify a mentor from another part of the organization to help coach you through this difficult transition.

If all else fails, pursue a transfer or consider a job change.