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Office Space, Bonding in an Office Space |
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What does it mean to bond with someone else? When two people bond, they connect on a more personal level. With bonding, comes caring. With caring comes a sense of responsibility. Mothers bond with their children even before they are born. Children can bond with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and caretakers. When a child grows up, it is no different. Humans need a sense of bonding with other humans. They need a connection to another human being.
What does bonding mean in an office space? For one thing, a person is more likely to help another person if they feel a close personal bond with them. It is demonstrated every day in the news. People walk away from someone in trouble because they are strangers. It is not that they don't care. It's simply that they feel it is none of their business, or they fear for their own personal safety. With someone they have bonded with they don't fear putting themselves in harms way if it means that the person they have bonded with will be safe.
In an office space, bonding is just as important. Not in the sense that one employee may have to risk injury to help another. More likely, if one employee gets an update about the company, schedules, or meetings, they will feel it almost a duty to tell the other what they have found out. Say a company email has gone out and there is a mandatory meeting that has been moved up two hours. Any employee tardy or absent from the meeting will receive disciplinary action. If the two are strangers, one will assume the other has read it and not mention it. If the two have bonded one may say something to the other about last minute changes. The other will be confused and the first will pass on the vital information. Here one has saved the other in the office space from disciplinary action.
How can a company promote bonding in an office space? Encourage sharing mealtimes with a break room available to all employees. Plan functions that are casual and away from the office for the employees to get to know each other on a personal level. For managerial staff, encourage spending time with their staff. Plan a meeting that will invite criticism of issues involving the office space with no negative impact on the employee. When two employees can complain about the same thing, they realize that they share some things in common and this promotes bonding. Not only will this point out issues to management, but it will improve employee and employer relations.
Bonding is not something that happens immediately, but it can happen. Businesses often benefit from bonding in the office space. Employees who have bonded often work better together and employees who work well together improve productivity. Bonding can be as simple as a shared interest, a simple conversation, or a shared experience. Give employees an opportunity to bond in their office space. Bonding can be a very good thing. |
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