This week we tackle a topic that people seem divided on: Do you (or should you) think of your company as a family? We have been seeing this topic everywhere lately and Hallie just finished reading the book Work Won’t Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted, and Alone, which has kept this question top of mind. When we polled our social media followers, it was split 50/50 as to whether you should view your company as a family or not.
To address the pros and cons of this way of thinking, we first defined what we mean by work, or a job, to give some context for our discussion. We talk about the conditions that accompany a work family vs. a traditional family, and why it might be harmful to equate the two. Then, we discuss the intentions behind the support leaders give employees, and why it’s important to be thoughtful with the benefits you provide in your organization.
Hallie also wrote an article on this topic on our Founder and Force Multiplier blog that you should check out.
Take a listen and let us know what you think with a comment below! If you like what you hear, make sure to subscribe and share with a friend.
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Timestamps:
[2:10] Hallie defines work for the context of our discussion: to perform work or fulfill duties regularly for wages or salary. Or, an activity that a person engages in regularly to earn a livelihood.
[5:10] Why will work never love us back? It’s impossible for anything that we are doing outside ourselves to love us back.
[6:30] For those in our organization, we feel a responsibility to support them but not when the relationship ends. While we are on a team together and rowing in the same direction, you will get all of it, but it doesn’t always extend beyond the workplace, which is part of why it doesn’t always make sense to refer to a company as a family.
[8:49] Hallie talks about working hard so that she can spend time with her family.
[9:01] Yes, it’s a relationship, but at work, our relationships are conditional upon us doing work, whereas our family relationship can be unconditional.
[10:39] The mistake people can make is thinking their company is a family and thinking that it is unconditional and forever. That can be harmful to people because you may overwork and expect more than you get.
[11:15] Another school of thought is that you can be working when you’re not getting paid to work. Tutoring your kids, learning how to cook, playing the piano, it can all be work, but that is not how we are defining work for this conversation.
[20:34] You don’t do things to be happy, you should be happy to do things.
[24:12] People want to enjoy what they do more than any time in history. In the Great Resignation over the past year, millions of people (nearly one in four) have quit their jobs to go find a job that they actually had more joy in, or were more fairly compensated for.
[24:38] People tell you that it’s hard when things are bad in business, but they don’t tell you that it’s hard when things are going well, too.
