Phil Cooke

Been there….done that….and no it does not work!

It actually creates a very toxic environment to work in for all. Employees end up back biting and leaders end up frustrated because they don’t know who to listen to. The leader either spends more time being a “puppet master” because he/she enjoys it or they end up constantly turning over staff because they get frustrated with issues and agendas.

Great blog Phil!

The Gallup Organization has intereviewed tens of thousands of managers in thousands of companies worldwide. They point out (in the book First, Break All the Rules, among others) two relevant points: first, that managers SHOULD play favorites. By this, they mean that managers need to spend the most time with their best employees. We tend, as managers, to put a lot of time and work into our employees who are not doing so well in the hopes they'll shape up, get up to speed, pick up the vibe–whatever. We are spinning our wheels in most cases; great employees show themselves so pretty much immediately. There are exceptions, but for the most part, we learn how to select really good employees by spending time and interacting with and observing the talents and behavior of our best employees.

And second, they point out that in many, many cases, great managers ARE friends with their employees. They go out together for drinks, they have each other over to their homes, etc. Some managers can do this and others simply cannot create the proper boundaries or make it clear to employees the expectations necessary for business. And this is the thing: if you know how to set the boundaries and you can do it, then more power to you. But if it's not your style and you can't figure out how to keep things professional when they need to be, then don't kid yourself. I think the key is recognizing the appropriate boundary for yourself. Yes, there are times it will blow up on us–I often find that people who say, "Been there, done that," have had ONE situation that did not work out well and have decided, "Never again." We get burned and we decide it was due to our friendship and not any other flaw in the scenario.

And I agree that it is vitally important to have deep friendships outside of work. It's so true that some of our employees will never feel the freedom to say what must be said because they fear for their livelihoods, no matter how willing we are to hear.

Se você tiver a sorte de ter tido um gerente que tratou como um amigo e se preocupava com sua vida pessoal, você provavelmente vai perceber a diferença deste tipo de amizade genuína pode fazer. Os melhores gestores do mundo não são apenas especialistas em sistemas, processos e competências técnicas – eles são especialistas em sua vida. E, por isso, eles aumentam o seu engajamento e produtividade no trabalho.

Great post. The flip side, of course, is the career damage to employees who choose to tell the truth, and know they have something to loose. 

It would be advisable for those employees to have friends they don't (yet) work for.

I appreciate the photo you used for this post.  Very appropriate. :)

Very interesting article. However, I would like to submit another side. I have served as a full-time staff pastor at a couple of different churches and the one I struggled the most with was where I served under a man who really was a great pastor (one very known in our city) who had the same mind set that he couldn't be close to his staff. It was very corporate and I was glad when God released me. For the record I remained faithful to the man and he gave me a very kind send off with many very kind words.

I expect that attitude in the secular world although my secular boss was one of my great friends also and it work out great, mostly because I understood the difference between being a friend and an employee.

Thank God the church I currently serve at has a very close staff and ever since the pastor dropped the barriers and the denominational rules of "no close friends with your staff" the synergy and the momentum has continued to increase and is NOW incredible.

After being on staff now for over ten years I can say it was Not always like that. It was especially hard with some spiritually immature staff.

Now after seeing all three ways I can say there is no substitute for the later, although it is difficult to achieve. Bill Hybels book on Courageous Leadership changed our staff forever for the better. We now have competent, character and chemistry within all our 10 full-time staff pastors and it is absolutely phenomenal working there.

I can't help but wonder if perhaps secular reasoning has entered the church world. I was taught in bible school that staff should NOT be close to the senior pastor. This is probably great news if you are relationally dysfunctional, but I don't believe it's very Scriptural. Think about it, nobody told Jesus He couldn't be close to three people on his staff and how dare John refer to himself as the ONE whom Jesus loved. Maybe Jesus should have said, "from now on I call you "employees" rather than "I call you friends.""

Just something to think about

God bless

Dr. West 

Ps Phil keep up the good work, you really are one of Christendom's hero's!   

Well here is the elephant in the room. The whole notion of the relationship between 'paid staff' and people in a community of faith. When a faith community (congregation) pays a person to lead them – the 'leader' often becomes a follower because they are too scared of losing their job for preaching something from the pulpit that offends their employers.

There is also the story of young people who grow up in a local congregation and then get employed as youth pastors by the well meaning congregation. Of course the relationship changes – and too often there is a lot of pain to be endured. Rule #1 don't get a job in the local congregation you grew up in.

People need to recognise that relationships change in the space where the institutional structures come into contact with the church (proper).