Of all the ideas leaders have proposed to increase employee productivity—from returning to the office to refocusing on core priorities to hinting at layoffs for underperformers—one usually doesn’t come up: encouraging friendships.

There’s a growing body of evidence showing that in post-pandemic hybrid-work environments, the quality of relationships among colleagues is deteriorating. Absence of work friendships is an important but overlooked trend that could have important financial and talent repercussions for companies as the year unfolds. With corporate revenue growth on the decline and strong economic headwinds expected, the absence of friendly ties could make the financial environment even more tenuous.

With the “Great Resignation” saga, the hardest part was people taking a new job and leaving behind concept of people and friendships. Bonds coworkers form are the “connective tissue” that propels organizational growth. Without those ties, it’s easier to walk away. Lack of work friendships can be seen as the subtle start of a domino effect in which employees leave jobs that companies are unable to fill, because of the labor shortage. This leads to retention issues among the remaining employees and, eventually, to decreased productivity and financial performance.

In such a scenario, organisations can create cultural conditions that fosters friendship at work. Apart from having new onboarding process which involves seasoned employee to serve as an internal mentor, companies can pair up new hires from different areas of the firm to “boost each other along the way.” Apart from job rotation opportunities at work, communicate more in person, and be creative about planning informal time for team members and coworkers to spend together. Encourage culture to foster “network analysis” to identify influencers in the organization and tap them to serve as connection points to bring people together. Have you done your ‘Network Analysis’? Reach me for more.