Precisely 603 – work bffs

“I want you boys to know, you’re both my best friends. And Hank Mardukas.”

By now, we’ve all been in the workforce several years now, and one thing that remains constant, at least from my experience, is that you inadvertently develop a synergistic relationship with someone you work with – they could be your labmate, someone you met early on in your employment, or even just the only other person in the company who’s your age. Regardless of how you come together, they usually become the person you talk to, see and share experiences with the most – sometimes even more than your significant other. This person – your work BFF – inadvertently plays an integral role in your enjoyment of your job.

Now, I’m definitely speaking from personal experience and there are definitely lone wolfs and small groups who won’t necessarily get this feeling. But when I worked at my first job out of grad school, I was surrounded by people my age, fresh out of school. The guy seated two doors down (and the first guy our recruiter introduced me to) ended up playing that role, and it gave just that much of a boost to morale and motivation during the workday. We slowly grew a group on our floor that all fit the same description – newly minted engineers, working across similar projects, distracting each other, eating lunch together, and grabbing drinks with after work. For some of the not-so-great projects and workdays, we’d be around to support each other and just take stress off.

There are two things that have made me really appreciate this seemingly natural and sometimes unnoticed connection with a coworker: 1) when that coworker leaves and 2) when you leave yourself. As selfish as it is, I remember when the aforementioned guy was interviewing for a new job, I was secretly (not seriously, of course) hoping that it wouldn’t work out – who wants to lose that connection? Who likes change? No one likes change! (just kidding.) When he bounced, work wasn’t the same, the projects weren’t as fun, and it took a little while to recover. Of course, people move on, and I still had a good network of buddies at work. When it came time for me to leave, I joined a small company of mostly very established and experienced professionals with 20+ years of experience under their belts; I was the young kid coming in (at 28, HA), in a two-man department, and that opened up my eyes to how integral the people I had left at my old job were to my day-to-day enjoyment of the type of work I was doing.

I’ve noticed the same effect among a few friends who’ve gone through the same thing; they started with a pretty strong work BFF relationship with someone, and then as people move companies in order to move up, as our generation tends to do, the aspects of the job they had that the work BFF made easier by going through with them together became more apparent, and motivation went down. Whether they move departments, or across the street, or across the country, the result is always the same: it will never be the same.

So what can you take out of this? That we’re all dependent and that no one likes change? Absolutely not. While losing your work BFF can drastically change your dynamic at work, at the very least it speaks to and solidifies a very real bond with someone that wasn’t just situational.

You’ve gained a good friendship that can hopefully pass the test of time and/or distance, and you’ve both improved each other in the game of life.

TL;DR: hank mardukas.