Balancing work friendship and professional responsibilities: India Inc shows the way

At Future Generali India Life Insurance, a separate budget is earmarked for team lunches/dinners encouraging our employees to connect outside of work context and build a bond of friendship.

In the modern workplace, the lines between professional and personal lives are increasingly getting blurred, with close friendships among colleagues becoming a norm rather than an exception.

HR leaders have observed that such bonds can significantly impact productivity, fostering a collaborative and supportive environment.

However, a closer look reveals that these friendships often form along demographic lines, raising questions about their implications for organisational diversity goals.

As companies strive to build inclusive cultures, HR leaders have adopted a cautious approach of fostering friendship at work without imposing a mandate.

To promote friendships across different age and demographic profiles, TVS Industrial and Logistics Parks has implemented regular team dinners, lunches, and outings that cut across functions and levels.

Further, the ‘buddy programmes’ for new entrants perpetuate a friendship environment within the company, ensuring that every new employee feels welcomed and integrated.

“In our organisation, which relies heavily on the interdependencies of various departments, friendships across teams have proven invaluable in resolving conflicts and bridging service gaps, more particularly in our on-site industrial environments, ensuring seamless operations,” Baskaran Subramanian, Head of Change Management and Business Process Re-engineering at TVS Industrial and Logistics Parks, told Moneycontrol.

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In 2022, Gallup data indicated that having a best friend at work is strongly linked to “business outcomes, including profitability, safety, inventory control and retention”.

Further, people having best friends at work are more likely to recommend their company to outside talent, fuelling employer branding.

In a 2019 research, Microsoft found that 56 percent of new hires who met with their onboarding buddy at least once in their first 90 days said their contact helped them to become productive on the job quickly.

That percentage jumped to 73 percent for those who met two to three times with their buddy, 86 percent for those who spoke four to eight times, and 97 percent for those meeting more than eight times.

Pharmaceutical major Merck is utilising employee referral programmes and buddy systems for onboarding. Despite the prevalence of remote working, the leadership actively encourages in-person team interactions and uses tools like ‘Viva Engage’ to help colleagues connect across teams and continents.

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Similarly, at Ishan Technologies, with an average employee age of 29, many young managers have grown up the ranks together, promoting “camaraderie and cohesiveness”.

To further support these relationships from day one, Purvi Kotecha, co-founder and director, said the company has introduced the i-PHREIND (Ishan Pal for Holistic Reference, Information, Engagement, Nurturance & Development) buddy policy, designed to nurture friendships and collaboration among colleagues.

Maintaining a line

While friendship bonds at the workplace can enhance job satisfaction and teamwork, they also bring many challenges and concerns. Navigating potential conflicts of interest, managing perceptions of favouritism, and maintaining professional boundaries are just a few of the complexities that arise.

HR professionals are cautiously changing their strategy to navigate these complexities, striving to balance the benefits of workplace camaraderie with the need for professionalism and equity.

At Future Generali India Life Insurance, a separate budget is earmarked for team lunches and dinners to encourage employees to connect outside of work context and build a bond of friendship.

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Further, CHRO Reena Tyagi highlighted that maintaining a required degree of professionalism while being friends is important and drawing a line between the two may be a little difficult for those just entering the workforce, as this is typically learned through experience.

“HR can address this by building in required checks and balances in processes and ways of working with clear responsibilities and accountabilities,” she said, adding that an open-door policy encourages our employees to walk up to any of our leaders or the HR team to discuss any issue concerning professional boundaries.

Similarly, Shiv Kumar, Head of Human Resources at Merck India, said: “We respect that everyone has his/her comfort level with work relationships. Some prefer to keep it strictly professional, while others enjoy blurring the lines a bit. What matters most is mutual respect. By creating an environment where friendships can thrive within appropriate boundaries, we ensure a workplace that is both supportive and productive.”