Should Your Staff Also Be Your Friends?
There should be a big difference between our friends and the people with whom we're friendly, but many of us struggle to make the distinction. We may refer to everyone in our circle as friends, but all too often if we don't see them or they fall off our radar we hardly notice or query their absence. Co-workers and colleagues can fall into that category. How often does someone we once worked closely with leave the business and later return for a social visit, only for us to realise that we've nothing to talk about after a relatively short space of time? Our friendship was primarily based on shared business considerations. But what about those times when we manage and work closely with a team of people. We see them regularly, supervise their work. Should our staff also be our friends? Few people enjoy confrontation or having to bring other people to order. But there are ways of managing a team without requiring you to choose between being popular and their friend or being v