Coworkers are not your friends. But coworkers are
lso not your enemies. So of coworkers are your
riends, and they aren't your enemies...
What are they?
Especially the coworkers you don't really like?
Well, that's exactly what we're talking about
today. Hello, my friends. I'm so excited that you
are here hanging out with me today. If you are new
here, welcome. My name is Jennifer Brick, I'm your
new career bestie. And around here we talk about
career success, toxic workplaces, and difficult
coworkers kind of like what we're going to be
talking about today. If you're like, I need more
of that in my life, tap a subscription button and
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Also, I do post daily onto LinkedIn. And I try to
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want to go chat with me in those places, the links
are down below.
Let's just start with Mythbusters. This is one of
my favorite things to do. So let's just get into
it. Coworkers don't have to be your friends that
me and you already agree on. But didn't you
realize that you don't even have to like your co
workers to have a good working relationship with
them. Right? I know. While it is much easier to
work with people that you like, and maybe you're
friendly or even friends with liking your co
workers is actually quite optional pack, I'll even
throw your boss in there. You don't have to like
your boss either. You don't have to like anyone in
my opinion. However, that does not mean that you
cannot work with those people, or that they
shouldn't have a positive experience of working
with you. So let's get into it. today. If you
watched my should I trust my co workers video, you
will already heard my spiel about developing
positive and productive relationships. If you
missed it, I highly recommend that you check this
video and after this, but here is the TLDR version
of it. Even if you don't like your coworker, your
co worker doesn't like you, you still need to be
able to work together. And that still needs to be
an overall positive experience. You don't want
them saying bad things about you. You don't want
to be saying bad things about them. But most
important, you need to be able to collaborate and
work together so that you can do your job and do
it well. And while this is much easier when you
work with people that you like, and maybe even if
you are friends with your co workers, it is not
impossible to have a positive and productive
relationship with a co worker that you don't like.
In fact, it's totally possible for you to get
along professionally regardless of how you feel
about each other personally, which probably leaves
you with the question, How can I build a positive
and productive relationship with a co worker that
I don't like or a toxic co worker or a difficult
co worker? Well, it really comes down to a few
simple steps. First and foremost, do your best to
add value help your co workers out when they need
help. If you can offer advice on a project or a
problem that they're working on that is going to
get them unstuck or more successful, go ahead and
do that. And you should absolutely be flexing your
ua q in your relationships with your co workers.
And if you don't know what that is, make sure that
you get your ua q starter kit, it's free and the
link is down in the description bar. I know
especially if you have a contentious relationship
with a co worker can be like, I don't want to help
them. But think of it this way. You're not really
helping them, you're helping yourself. Because
when you're adding value to someone else, you are
building your personal brand, showing your talents
and standing out as a leader on your team. And if
your manager knows that they're not necessarily
your favorite person, you're also demonstrating
your ability to work successfully with other
people, regardless of how you feel. And look when
it comes down to it. I'm all for being petty. But
you don't want other people to look bad, you
especially don't want a co worker on your team to
look bad, because that makes your team look bad,
which makes you look bad. And how you treat other
people actually doesn't really say a lot about
them. It says everything about you. And especially
in those situations where you have a difficult co
worker where your co worker is definitely not your
friend, adding value and giving support to this co
worker can actually be a pivotal moment in your
working relationship where they really become a
fan of you. And we'll come back to how important
that is in just a little bit. The next thing that
you should do in order to establish positive and
productive relationships with your co workers is
to be likable. Don't get me wrong. This does not
mean that you have to walk around being
inauthentic ducking up and brown nosing to
everyone around you. No one likes that person. And
honestly, I really feel like if you're not
authentically being yourself, other people sensing
and that can actually even exacerbate a situation
because no one likes to feel like you're putting
something on you know what I mean? I'm actually
thinking about doing a whole video about boosting
your likeability at work. Let me know in the
comments if you would be interested in watching
that video, but I'm going to give you a couple of
tips that are super easy to implement. First, the
easiest way to make someone like you is to make
them look good or make them feel good. So if you
can compliment them if you can showcase their
work, if you can brag about them. If you can send
them a note telling them what a great job that
they're doing on something that you're working on
together. This is going to make them feel good
about themselves and then it's going to make them
like you another thing that is easier for some For
others is just empathizing with them? Are they
stressed out? Or are they going through something
challenging, if you make someone feel understood,
that is going to be something that helps you
connect. And that can be the bedrock of a really
good working relationship with the person, even if
they're not your friend. The next tip, I want to
know if you have ever been in a situation where
someone was not willing to do this and what you
thought about them, you need to be willing to
collaborate and work with your co workers, even
your difficult co workers, even your co workers
you don't like there is absolutely nothing worse
than a passive aggressive co worker who just
doesn't fulfill their end of the bargain makes
everybody else Miss deadlines, Miss targets, all
of those things. Okay, so maybe there's worse with
like actual toxic co workers. But being passive
aggressive is not a good look for you. And while
it might help you accomplish your goal of
frustrating them, they're not going to be the ones
who look bad in the situation you are, especially
if they are the type of coworker who is going to
go in telling you to your boss, you're going to
have a splaining to do it is not going to be
something that is improving your personal brand
and your career trajectory blast when you're
collaborating, especially with people with
different perspectives, different viewpoints,
which the person probably has, especially if
they're not someone that you would actually hang
out with outside of work, this can actually lead
to greater outcomes. So it's really in everyone's
best interest to collaborate. Next, make sure that
you're communicating effectively get the people
that you work with that need information, that
information and don't become the bottleneck do not
become the cog when in doubt over communicate and
over share information, especially when you're
working towards a shared outcome. This is never
going to hurt. And honestly I've seen way too many
comments that say things along the lines of I
don't talk to my co workers. And I get it if
you're working with very toxic co workers but but
if you were just refusing to communicate with your
co workers, you might be the jerk in the
situation, which I'm coming back to in a hot
second. But first, I want to mention that in your
work with this person, in your communication in
your collaborations in your discussions. As much
as possible. You want to construct Win Win
situations, if you are only looking out for
yourself, if you're throwing everyone else under
the bus. This is going to have some career karma
that comes back to visit you later on. You don't
want that. So even if the person that you're
working with definitely is not your best friend,
let alone friends, you still want them to succeed
because their success is tied to your success. And
that brings me to my main point, which is make
sure that you are not being a difficult co worker,
I am here for work life boundaries. As I already
mentioned multiple times in this video, you do not
need to like your co workers, you do not need to
be friends with your co workers, you do not have
to hang out with your co workers after work, trade
secrets and braid hair. However, what you do not
want to be is the unpleasant coworker at work. And
I'm not saying that it's everyone that is
commenting is being the difficult person. But I
can guarantee some of you are the difficult person
and we need to be introspective and realize we're
we're bringing our baggage our bias I'm really our
issues into the workplace. I know this is hard
when you've been burned by co workers before when
you've escaped a toxic work environment. But think
about the things that you want people to say about
you when you're not in the room. What are the
things that you want people to tell your boss or
your boss to put about you in your performance
review and then act accordingly. And quite
honestly, when you do all of these things, even
with your most difficult co workers, you can still
have a positive and productive relationship.
Personally over the course of my career. These
exact strategies have helped me disarm difficult
passive aggressive, abrasive and insecure co
workers. In fact, most of them ended up becoming
people that I really enjoyed working with some of
them even turned into friends and others even
advocated for me to progress in my career. And in
fact, it's really only been when I had two very,
very toxic co workers that these strategies didn't
resolve the situation. They helped the situation
we were still able to work together productively
just not necessarily positively. But that was on
them. It wasn't on me, I did my part. And everyone
looking into the situation could see that didn't
see your goal at work is to not make friends you
were there to get your paycheck to do your job
maybe to advance in your career, building these
positive and productive relationships are actually
going to help you develop a key tenant of career
success. And that is developing a network of
advocates. Having a strong network of advocates is
an absolute game changer in your career. This can
be your peers, your manager, their manager, other
leaders in your organization, even people outside
of your company in your industry depends on what
your actual career objective is. Your network of
advocates are going to be the people that are
bragging about you when you're not in the room,
connecting you with opportunities, and even
creating opportunities for you to step into. These
people could even be instrumental if you need a
quick exit from a job. So that's my thoughts on
the matter and I actually really love to hear from
you. What do you think productive relationships
look like at work do you have Criteria what has
helped you succeed in working with everyone from
people that are legitimate friends at work to
difficult co workers? Let me know in the comments
down below. No underlying all of this there is one
more thing that I want to speak to you about today
when we're thinking about coworkers not being our
friends, but people that we need to have good
working relationships with. And that is trust.
Because when you have a difficult coworker, when
you have a passive aggressive coworker, when you
have an insecure co worker, one of the things that
can actually be a big struggle is establishing
trust, and when you don't trust them, they won't
trust you and vice versa. That's why figuring out
how to have a baseline level of appropriate trust
with those coworkers is so important. If this is
something that you are struggling with. I want you
to go and watch this video right now where I
really deep dive into trust at work but before you
go, let me know if this video helped you by
tapping that like button. It really helps my
channel and it makes you my favorite career.
bestie so there's a win win situation for you
right now. As always my friend thank you so much
for watching for hanging out with me today. I will
see you in the next video. Bye for now.