Ending Friendships At Work

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Narratives of workplace friendship deterioration Patricia M. Sias Washington State University

Renee G. Heath University of Colorado, Boulder

Tara Perry Western Washington University

Deborah Silva Walla Walla College

Bryan Fix FEI Co

ABSTRACT

An exploratory examination of workplace friendship deterioration processes was conducted using employees’ narrative accounts of their experiences. Narratives revealed five primary causes of workplace friendship deterioration – personality, distracting life events, conflicting expectations, promotion, and betrayal. Narratives also indicated that individuals relied primarily on indirect communication tactics, including avoidance of nonwork topics in conversation, nonverbal cues, and avoidance of socializing away from the workplace to disengage from workplace friendships. Consequences of workplace friendship deterioration included emotional stress, reduced ability to perform tasks, turnover, and altered perceptions regarding the role of friendships in the workplace. Discussion and suggestions for future research are provided. KEY WORDS:

narrative analysis • relationship deterioration • workplace friendship • workplace relationships

All correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Professor Patricia M. Sias, Edward R. Murrow School of Communication, Washington State University, Pullman, WA 99164–2520, USA [e-mail: [email protected]]. Sandra Metts was the Action Editor for this article. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships Copyright © 2004 SAGE Publications (www.sagepublications.com), Vol. 21(3): 321–340. DOI: 10.1177/0265407504042835

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Relationships are the essence of living systems and the basis of organization (Wheatley, 1994). As information-sharing, resource-distributing, decision-making, and support systems, relationships are essential for both organizational and individual well-being (Kram & Isabella, 1985; Rawlins, 1992). Accordingly, Wheatley (1994) suggested that scholars focus attention on ‘how a workplace organizes its relationships; not its tasks, functions, and hierarchies, but the patterns of relationships and the capacities available to form them’ (p. 39). Individuals engage in a variety of relationships at work, including supervisor–subordinate, peer, and mentoring relationships. These workplace relationships often grow closer, developing into affiliative bonds known as ‘friendships.’ Friendships are unique workplace relationships in two primary ways: (1) friendships are voluntary – although individuals do not typically choose with whom they work, they do choose which of those individuals to befriend; and (2) friendships have a personalistic focus in which individuals come to know and treat each other as whole persons, rather than simply workplace role occupants (Sias & Cahill, 1998). Thus, employees choose to spend time with their friends, both at and away from the workplace, beyond that mandated by their organizational roles. Because of these characteristics, workplace friends function as important sources of social and emotional support and enjoyment for one another (Kanter, 1977; Rawlins, 1994). Workplace friendships are also distinct from other types of friendships in that coworker friends share unique knowledge with respect to workplace experiences and activities, enabling them to communicate about work-related issues with a depth and efficiency unavailable in other friendships (Ray, 1987). In the only extant examination of workplace friendship development, Sias and Cahill (1998) focused on the ways that friendships become closer, but not how they deteriorate. Examination of workplace friendship deterioration is important because friendships contribute to the work experience of individual employees as sources of emotional and instrumental social support (Kram & Isabella, 1985; Sias & Cahill, 1998), enjoyment (Fine, 1986), and career development (Kanter, 1977). Thus, for individuals, losing a friend at work means losing an important source of support and intrinsic reward. Moreover, because workplace relationships are essential to organizational functioning, the deterioration of close relationships such as friendships is likely to impede work processes. Accordingly, examination of why and how workplace friendships deteriorate can provide useful knowledge for both individuals and the organizations in which they work. Of particular importance is an understanding of the deterioration experience from the perspectives of those involved. As Duck and Pittman (1994) noted, ‘people create personal meanings for themselves about social and personal relationships’ and these meanings influence their social behavior (p. 680). For instance, people make attributions regarding others’ personality and motivations from the other’s behavior, and these attributions ‘. . . direct or influence social behavior and communication’ (Duck & Pittman, 1994, p. 680). Thus, the accomplishment

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and consequences of relationship deterioration are filtered and influenced by the perceptions and understandings of those involved. Accordingly, the present study used narrative methods to address the following general question: Why and how do workplace friendships deteriorate and how do individuals experience and interpret such deterioration? Research questions Relationships deteriorate for many reasons. Some of these are the mirror images of factors associated with relational development, such as proximity, liking, trust, and similarity. Research suggests, for instance, that loss of proximity (e.g., moving away) can lead to the dissolution of friendships (Rawlins, 1994; Rubin, 1980). Relational partners may express undesirable personality traits after the initial stages of friendship development, leading partners to alter their view of the other and decrease the closeness of the friendship (Duck, 1982; Rodin, 1982). Just as trust is the foundation of a healthy relationship, betrayal has destroyed many relationships (Fehr, 1996). Workplace friendships may also deteriorate because of an inability to manage the dialectical tensions experienced when individuals ‘blend’ workplace and friend roles (Bridge & Baxter, 1992). These tensions challenge the friendship and, if not successfully managed, can destroy it. The instrumentality and affection tension refers to the tension between the workplace role that carries utilitarian and instrumental expectations and the friend role that assumes affinity based on affection rather than instrumentality. The impartiality and favoritism tension refers to organizational norms of impartial and objective treatment of employees and friendship expectations of unconditional support. Openness and closedness refers to expectations of openness and honesty among friends, on the one hand, and organizational expectations of confidentiality and caution about information sharing, on the other hand. Autonomy and connection refers to the benefits of contact for friends and the possibility that ongoing and daily contact among coworkers may provide little autonomy for the relationship partners, ‘jeopardizing their friendship through excessive connection’ (Bridge & Baxter, 1992, p. 204). The judgment and acceptance tension refers to expectations of mutual affirmation and acceptance among friends, and organizational requirements of critical evaluation. In sum, workplace friendship deterioration may result from a variety of factors including loss of proximity, dissimilarity, or an inability to manage relational dialectic tensions. To this end, the present study examined the following research question: RQ1: Why do workplace friendships deteriorate?

In addition to why friendships deteriorate, an understanding of how friendships deteriorate is an important question to examine. This study conceptualizes relationships as categories of meaning constituted in interaction (Sigman, 1995). Relationships are not entities external to the relationship partners, but are mental creations that depend on communication for their

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existence and form. Duck and Pittman (1994) noted that talk ‘serves to embody the relationship through its simple occurrence and presentation to the two individuals of their views of the world’ (p. 680). Communication essentializes relationships; it makes them what they are in the minds of the partners or, as Duck and Pittman (1994) stated, ‘. . . talk is the relationship’ (p. 680, emphasis added). If relationships are constituted in communication, they are also changed through communication. Accordingly, an examination of friendship deterioration requires attention to the ways in which such deterioration is communicatively accomplished. Research suggests that individuals rarely use direct communication (i.e., telling a partner the friendship is over) to accomplish friendship deterioration (Baxter, 1985; Blieszner & Adams, 1992). Instead, individuals rely primarily on indirect tactics such as general avoidance and withdrawal strategies (Baxter, 1982). Among such strategies are ‘other negation’ in which an individual gives cues that the other is not liked, ‘difference’ in which an individual communicatively highlights areas of dissimilarity, ‘costrendering’ in which one partner makes participation in the friendship more costly or unpleasant for the other partner, ‘disinterest’ in which an individual stops soliciting information about the partner, ‘self-presentation’ in which an individual behaves in a less personal or negative way, and ‘exclusion’ in which an individual avoids spending time with the relationship partner (Baxter & Philpott, 1982). Friendship deterioration, however, has been examined only in nonwork relationships (Baxter, 1982; Cody, 1982; Rawlins, 1992). No known research has examined deterioration in workplace friendships. This omission is important because, although these friendships share features in common with other friendships, they are also distinctive. Perhaps the most important distinction is that partners must continue to work together after their friendships have deteriorated. The deterioration process may be particularly difficult to negotiate in workplace relationships in which continued, frequent contact is mandated. ‘Exclusion,’ for example, may be difficult unless one partner quits or is transferred. Thus, we examined the following: RQ2: How is workplace friendship deterioration communicatively accomplished?

Workplace friendship deterioration is likely to have important consequences. For individuals, losing a friend may mean losing an important source of both instrumental and emotional support. Moreover, the attempts at avoidance that usually accompany friendship deterioration may make it more difficult for employees to carry out tasks effectively. The deterioration of a workplace friendship may also present a threat to the security and privacy of the partners in that one or both former friends may worry that the ‘gossip’ they shared in confidence as friends may get back to the target of the gossip once the friendship ends. The present study, therefore, examined the following: RQ3: Which consequences are associated with workplace friendship deterioration?

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Method Data collection and sample Data were obtained via in-depth interviews with a convenience sample of 25 adults employed full-time. Theoretical saturation (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) was reached at 19 interviews, after which no new substantive information was obtained. This is consistent with Alexandersson’s findings that saturation of categories in interpretive research is typically reached with approximately 20 participants (Alexandersson, 1994, as cited in Sandberg, 2000). All researchers interviewed participants formerly unknown to them. Interviews were conducted at each participant’s choice of location and lasted 30–90 minutes and were audio-taped and transcribed. Eleven participants were male, 14 were female. Their mean age was 33 years (range = 20–57) and their mean organizational tenure was four years (range = 2 months to 21 years). Participants represented a variety of occupations, including clerical, management, accounting, aircraft maintenance, nursing, budget analysis, steel fabrication, ministry, physical therapy, and restaurant service. Nineteen participants described friendships that deteriorated within one year of the date of the interviews, two described friendships that deteriorated within two years of the date of interviews, three discussed friendships that deteriorated approximately four years prior to the interviews, and one participant discussed a friendship that deteriorated 13 years prior to the interview. Eleven interviews concerned the deterioration of a friendship between peer coworkers, nine described the deterioration of a friendship between a supervisor and subordinate employee, and five interviews described the deterioration of a friendship between (formerly peer) individuals whose relationship status changed when one partner was promoted to a position of formal authority over the other. Thus, same-status and differentstatus workplace relationships were represented relatively equally in the data. Respondents each described the deterioration of their friendship by reporting why the relationship deteriorated, how the deterioration was communicatively accomplished, why they thought particular communication strategies were used to disengage from the relationship, and how the deterioration changed the communication with their relationship partners. In addition to these four primary questions, participants were asked to include all information that they felt was necessary for a full description of the deterioration experience. Thus, the interviews provided respondents ample latitude in describing their deterioration experiences. Analytic method All participants produced narrative accounts of friendship deterioration. This was not surprising given Sarbin’s (1986) observation that people are, by nature, narrative beings who ‘think, perceive, imagine, and make moral choices according to narrative structures’ (p. 8). According to this ‘narratory principle,’ when asked to describe their experiences, people naturally do so in narrative form (Sarbin, 1986). Narratives are chronological accounts of events that imply causality and provide interpretive structures for individuals, helping them ‘make sense of the flow of events in their lives’ (Skinner, Bailey, Correa, & Rodriguez, 1999, p. 482). Narratives include information regarding individuals’ interpretations of and meanings derived from events, feelings, and emotions experienced during and after the events, and ‘lessons learned’ from the events (Blyler & Perkins, 1999; Greenhalgh & Hurwitz, 1999), including important, transformative life events (Hones, 1998). Analysis of narratives was, therefore,

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particularly appropriate for the present study concerned with employee experiences of relationship deterioration. Analysis of narratives was also an appropriate analytic method because it focused researchers’ attention on individuals as agents and on the consequences of events perceived by the individuals who experienced those events (Franzosi, 1998). Following Denzin (1997), Hones (1998) distinguished between ‘analysis of narratives’ and ‘narrative analysis.’ As Hones (1998) explained, ‘Analysis of narratives begins with the stories told and moves toward common themes; narrative analysis uses the stories told to construct a larger story’ (p. 228, emphasis added). Because the research questions sought information regarding common themes of deterioration events and processes, the present study involved analysis of narratives, examining stories for common themes relevant to the friendship deterioration experience. According to Labov (1972), narratives vary in complexity and the extent to which they contain any of six basic narrative elements: an abstract (a summary statement of the whole story), an orientation (identification of the time, place, and persons, their activity or situation), a complicating action (the plot or ‘what happened’ in the story), a resolution (description of events occurring after the high point of the narrative that resolve the high point action in some way), an evaluation (an emotional assessment of the meaning of the narrative), and a coda or signal that the narrative is over. Narratives vary on a continuum with ‘minimal’ narratives containing only a complicating action and ‘fully formed’ narratives including all six elements (Labov, 1972). Not surprisingly, the narratives provided by respondents in the present study varied in their complexity. All, however, included the three narrative elements most relevant to the research questions: a complicating action (‘trigger’ event or cause of deterioration), resolution (how the deterioration was accomplished), and evaluation (deterioration interpretation and consequences). These three components were the focus of analysis. Transcripts were examined using a constant comparison method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to identify general themes relevant to each of the three narrative components. For example, a respondent’s description of her coworker being promoted to supervisor and displaying ‘authoritative’ behavior was considered the ‘complicating action;’ that respondent’s interpretation of her friend’s authoritarian behavior as ‘fine because that’s her duty’ was considered part of the ‘evaluation’ component of the narrative. Information for each of these components for the 25 narratives was placed on master lists (one list each for complicating action, resolution, and evaluation). These lists were then examined to identify general themes for each of the narrative components. A second individual coded 12 interview transcripts to assess coding reliability for these themes. Cohen’s Kappa coefficient was .89 for complicating action component themes, .90 for resolution component themes, and .94 for evaluation component themes, indicating coding reliability.

Results Results are organized around five primary narrative types derived from the data and identified by the complicating action component: ‘problem personality’ narratives (10), ‘distracting life event’ narratives (3), ‘conflicting expectations’ narratives (5), ‘promotion’ narratives (5), and ‘betrayal’ narratives (2).

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Resolution and evaluation components are discussed within these narrative types. The problem personality narratives Complicating action The ‘problem personality’ narrative comprised the bulk of the deterioration narratives, with 10 respondents tracing the deterioration to one coworker displaying a personality trait or behavior that was impossible for the respondent to accept, such as selfishness, disrespect, or flirtatiousness. Four referenced supervisor–subordinate relationships and six concerned peer coworker relationships. Interestingly, in some cases, the annoying personality characteristics initially drew the coworkers into friendships. One respondent, for example, found her coworker’s outgoing personality initially very attractive but eventually unacceptable. She explained, ‘Everybody absolutely loved her and adored her. She’s very likable. But then little things started happening. I just noticed that she’s very, very flirtatious and it didn’t matter who it was; as long as he had pants on, she’d be flirting with him.’ Another explained that her coworker’s involvement in an abusive romantic relationship encouraged the development of their friendship because her coworker came to the respondent for advice and support. After ending that romantic relationship, however, the coworker began another abusive relationship and again sought advice from her friend. This frustrated the respondent who explained, ‘It was hard for me to continue to help her when she didn’t want to help herself.’ Resolution After the complicating action led to a decision to end or alter the friendship, the narratives moved toward resolution. Relational transformation was accomplished primarily with indirect communication strategies such as avoidance of personal conversation topics or any topics unrelated to work, and nonverbal cues. The woman with a disrespectful coworker explained, ‘When I see this person, I don’t acknowledge them; they don’t acknowledge me and we know that we’re not friends. So that’s where we’re at now.’ The respondent with the coworker in an abusive relationship stated, ‘We’d talk about things at work, when you work together you almost have to . . . but there was a wall there because we could only go so far personally anymore.’ This respondent was the only one who explicitly discussed the friendship with her coworker. She told her friend that she would no longer provide personal advice, saying, ‘Well, you don’t want to listen to my advice, you’ve asked me this over and over again. You need to decide. I basically don’t want to be involved in that part anymore because you know it’s driving me crazy and I’m getting upset and I’ve done all I can do.’ In this conversation, the respondent explicitly constructed boundaries for their relationship, making discussion of her coworker’s personal life off limits. The other respondents did not speak directly with their coworkers about transforming the friendship for various reasons. As one respondent explained, ‘He was my boss and I’m extremely confident in my abilities to perform my job, but I maybe don’t have confidence to butt heads with the direct supervisor.’ Others felt that explicit discussion regarding terminating the friendship was unnecessary. As one participant explained, ‘We didn’t have to. We just didn’t have that much to do with each other. We didn’t chit-chat as much in the office,

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no small talk. I did my own thing and that person did their own thing and that’s how the relationship intensity lessened.’ Evaluation Evaluation appeared throughout the narratives. While describing the event itself (complicating action), respondents described emotions they experienced and their interpretations of the events. One respondent highlighted her emotional wounds early in the interview when she warned, ‘I might cry during this.’ The respondent with the disrespectful coworker explained ‘I went through the stage of being very, very angry, very mad.’ She interpreted her coworker’s behavior as rooted in egocentrism: ‘This person is so, in my opinion, egocentered . . . they only see themselves.’ According to her, this is why she decided to end the relationship rather than discuss the personality problems further with her coworker. Because of egocentrism, she explained, her coworker is ‘unable to see what someone is saying.’ Respondents described long-term consequences of the relational deterioration. In two cases, the respondents left their jobs because of the deterioration. As one explained, ‘I didn’t feel like I belonged there anymore . . . I wasn’t as happy working because I didn’t get to talk to people as much.’ The deterioration also affected the ways that the coworkers carried out their jobs. The woman with the disrespectful coworker noted that the deterioration influenced her work in a college student services position. She explained, ‘I think in order for me to do my job I would have to communicate with this person, but I choose not to do that . . . It has to be a direct order from my boss that I have to work with this person. If that doesn’t exist, communication doesn’t happen.’ As a result, she admits, ‘I think the students suffer.’ The deterioration experience also provided individuals with general lessons about relationships. One respondent, for example, learned to pay more attention to early clues and her instincts. She felt that had she paid more attention to early clues about her coworker’s flirtatious personality, the relationship would never have evolved into a friendship. The respondent in the abusive relationship narrative learned that talking to friends about their personal problems is ‘a waste of time.’ The distracting life event narratives Complicating action Three respondents reported that their friendships deteriorated when events in the friend’s personal life began to interfere with and harm the friend’s job performance. One narrative involved a supervisor–subordinate relationship and two concerned peer relationships. As one participant explained, his friend/supervisor ‘was having problems at home with his wife and family which he was not able to keep separate from his job so we had problems at work with his attitude and his behavior declined dramatically.’ Another described how her friendship with a recently widowed coworker/friend began to deteriorate ‘when she [the coworker] got involved with a really bad guy.’ This involvement began to seriously affect her friend’s work performance because, as the respondent explained, ‘She’d have to take time off. When she met him, he was on work release and he wanted her to run home for sex at lunch so she’d take extra time for that because he was on work release and he wouldn’t go to work.’ As the relationship continued, her coworker:

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. . . started drinking a lot with him and she’d come into work really hung over or still drunk in the morning just reeking. And she was pretty much high on cigarettes. Because of that, her blood pressure shot right up. She had to double her blood pressure medicine and so she was so jittery at work and so instead of being the calm person, she would just snap at people, snap off the handle at people. As a consequence, the respondent explained, ‘our staff wasn’t feeling that she was real dependable.’ These narratives are somewhat related to the ‘problem personality’ narratives in that both respondents perceived the inability to separate work and personal lives as rooted in a personality defect. The respondent in the first example, for instance, interpreted his supervisor’s problems as rooted in a poor ‘work ethic.’ The woman with the ‘bad boyfriend’ was perceived by her coworker as weak and low in self-esteem. These narratives are different, however, in that it was the effect on job performance, not the personality problem itself, that caused the deterioration. Resolution Although the respondent in the second example initially attempted to help her friend with her personal problems, her friend’s defensive reactions led the respondent to finally stop trying to help. Instead she decided to decrease the closeness of the relationship, relying primarily on limiting interaction with her coworker to work-related topics. According to the respondent, this choice of strategies was influenced mainly by the fact that the respondent was required to maintain a working relationship with her ex-friend. Interestingly, the respondent stated that she would have terminated the friendship more directly by explicitly stating that desire to her coworker if she did not have to work with her. As she explained, ‘At one point I had gone for job interviews and I decided if I relocated, I would sit down and talk with her because the work relationship wouldn’t be a problem then . . . I wouldn’t have to deal with her at work.’ The respondent did not relocate, however. Consequently, the deterioration was never explicitly discussed. Similarly, the other respondent reported that he began the relational deterioration by ‘backing away’ from his coworker. As he explained, ‘If there were conversations going on, I didn’t participate that much if he was around . . . I didn’t eat lunch with him anymore. I was just basically, kept my contact with him on a purely professional basis and as minimal as possible.’ Evaluation Evaluation appeared throughout these narratives. As discussed earlier, both respondents interpreted their coworkers’ inability to separate work and home as rooted in personality defects. These interpretations, in turn, led to emotional responses such as disappointment and frustration. In the first narrative described, the respondent explained, ‘I lost all respect for him and even when he got his personal life back together I could never look at him the same way again.’ The deterioration impacted the ability of both partners to carry out their work. This respondent reported that he began to complete tasks in different locations just to avoid contact with his former friend. Long-term consequences were also evident. Both respondents sought jobs in other organizations as a result of the deterioration. Although the second respondent remained at her job, the respondent who ended his friendship with

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his supervisor eventually found a different job and quit because, due to the deterioration of his friendship with his supervisor, ‘I didn’t feel like I could ever get much done as far as getting a raise or getting fired.’ The conflicting expectations narratives Complicating action The complicating action or ‘high point’ of five narratives revolved around friends having different expectations regarding how they should behave toward one another. Three stories involved supervisor–subordinate relationships and two centered on peer relationships. One respondent (a supervisor) recounted the story of how his friend took the respondent’s reprimand personally: What happened is he had an aircraft safety violation where he overlooked a couple of things that he was held responsible for and actually put down that he had checked them. Well, that’s when I found out that he was in a hurry and blew them off and I got a little upset with him and so I turned right to him and we had a talk. . . I wasn’t doubting him professionally but I was doubting his motives to keep his mind on his job and so on. And he took those, and it had to do with safety flight and, therefore, I got upset about it and he took that as being a personal attack against him and he said, ‘Well, what about all; you’re supposed to be my best friend.’ And I said, ‘This has nothing to do with friendship.’ Another described how her close friendship with her supervisor deteriorated when she was surprised by the annual evaluation he gave her. As she explained, ‘Everything was fine and then I got this annual review and from my perspective it was terrible and he had never mentioned anything being bad at all.’ Interestingly, she discussed the evaluation with her supervisor who offered to change the evaluation to meet her expectations. This was unacceptable to her. As she explained, I told him that I felt that he was unfair and why I felt that way and his answer was I could just go ahead and ‘rewrite it to how you want it to be.’ That was his – it was just bizarre . . . What he said to me was that he didn’t think it was that bad. He said, ‘I had no idea you would react to it this way and I didn’t think it was that bad.’ . . . It was never the same. After that I never felt the same way about him because he just totally blew me away. One respondent explained that his relationship with his friend/supervisor deteriorated when the respondent did not support his boss’s opinion in a meeting. As he told the story, We had a meeting with the employees there and we were talking about working schedules and his working schedule was different from everybody below him and he thought that I would take his side and say okay, everything was fair, yet I didn’t. Instead I sided with the guys that I was working with in saying, ‘Okay, we’re all working and it’s really unfair that your hours are better than ours.’ And I don’t think he liked it very much. He got very upset and ended up taking that into off work because we were also neighbors. Another explained that her friendship with a peer coworker deteriorated because the respondent, a waitress, would not work weekends because she

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lived in a different town and, as she explained, ‘I enjoyed going home.’ Accordingly, she explained, ‘my relationship with her [coworker] was more stressed because I wasn’t pulling my share of the weight.’ Resolution Only indirect messages were used to transform these relationships. The woman not ‘pulling her weight’ at work said her friend made it very clear that she wanted to end the friendship through communicative withdrawal: ‘She kind of initiated it by distancing herself by how much chit-chat she would have, clearly indicating how she felt.’ The participant who did not support his supervisor in a meeting said his supervisor effectively ended the friendship through nonverbal cues: ‘[It was] not so much what he was saying, but how he was saying it. . . . More than anything else, it was his tone.’ He added, ‘It also has a lot to do with the looks that you give. You can tell when someone’s looking at you and then just [gives a ‘knowing’ look] you know it’s that look. We used to give each other those looks all the time and that pretty much got the point across.’ After the fateful meeting, the ‘knowing’ looks stopped. Evaluation While describing the complicating action and the resolution of the event, respondents commented on their emotions and their interpretations of the events. These emotions included anger, stress, hurt feelings, sadness, and hostility. While describing his supervisor’s nonverbal cues, for example, the nonsupportive subordinate explained, I hate that. I feel like we’ve all grown up, we’re all adults, now let’s treat each other as adults and he would talk to me and he’d make me so angry that I couldn’t concentrate on what he was saying. He made it difficult for me to get my job done. Thus, these narratives also included some long-term consequences, such as impeding one’s ability to carry out tasks. Continuing, this respondent stated, ‘after one year, I couldn’t take any more,’ so he quit. The supervisor who reprimanded his friend found that the deterioration also affected his family – their wives ended their friendship, and his son was told by the coworker that he was no longer welcome in the coworker’s home, thus ending their sons’ friendship. The promotion narratives Complicating action The complicating action of five narratives centered on the promotion of one of the partners to a position of formal authority over the other. These narratives depicted the difficulty of negotiating that change in status. As one respondent explained, ‘He became my supervisor and I think that relationship, the fact that he was promoted, he didn’t feel like he probably could be as close because other people would think that there was favoritism involved or something.’ Resolution Again, friendships were transformed primarily through indirect messages such as avoidance of personal topics in conversation and nonverbal cues. One respondent, for instance, said that her newly promoted coworker effectively

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ended the friendship through ‘the tone of her voice . . . you know, snappy and demanding instead of asking me to do a job.’ One respondent reported that she used a direct communication strategy to end the relationship. As she told the story, We sat each other down and said ‘look, we’re not getting along’ and I decided to give my two weeks’ notice and she in return gave me a good reference on working there and we just decided it would best if we just ended the working relationship and so she gave me enough time to find another job. Evaluation Respondents experienced anger and frustration during the deterioration process. These emotions, however, were not as strong in the promotion narratives as they were in the other narratives. One respondent, in fact, said she was not surprised by the deterioration, suggesting that deterioration is inevitable when one coworker is promoted. In an earlier excerpt, the respondent interpreted his friend’s change in behavior after promotion as resulting from concerns over appearances of favoritism. This interpretation may have influenced his own behavior when he was later promoted: I think that’s just a natural progression. The camaraderie is different . . . You can’t be a friend. I guess you could still be a friend, but not the same level of friend once you take on a leadership position . . . You go from an equal to nonequal person . . . It affected me the same way when I was promoted. I couldn’t have the same relationship with some of the people in the shop that I used to. The betrayal narratives Complicating action Two narratives (one involving a supervisor–subordinate relationship and the other a peer relationship) centered on betrayal. One respondent told the following story: She befriended me and I thought that I could really trust her . . . But then she did something, she betrayed my trust . . . It was about money, my salary at that particular time. I had been in a position long enough to get a raise but I had some concerns as to what my job description was as opposed to what I was actually doing. And so, because I was doing things beyond my job description, I thought I should be getting more money. And I just, you know, I just said if she could not mention it that I would get to that in my own time. But she went back and she told my employer. In the other betrayal narrative, a gradual loss of trust eventually led to a major incident that led the respondent to end a friendship with her supervisor. The respondent explained, She kept information from me, so my job became more difficult . . . About the fourth month or so, in a staff meeting she started putting me down . . . It might not have been visible to other members of the staff, but to me it was. I confronted her right after the staff meeting. She told me that I didn’t know what I was talking about.

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At this point, the respondent began to ‘back off in the relationship’ by making excuses not to socialize with her coworker. The relationship’s fatal blow came later: ‘One day I came in on the weekend on Saturday and she was in my office. She was going through my files. She didn’t know I was coming in, it was a Saturday! I mean, right then in my office I started yelling at her “What are you doing here?!” ’ At this point, the respondent concluded, ‘basically, she was screwed up. That was what I was starting to think.’ Resolution Again, individuals used indirect communication to transform the relationship, including avoidance of personal topics in conversation and avoidance of socializing. The woman who caught her coworker going through her files explained, ‘There were no more additional overtures in terms of friendship. I think that’s how it started to go into nothing. We stopped calling each other. There were no more lunches, there was no more nothing. Everything was just on a professional basis.’ Another explained, ‘She pretty much got the picture by me being silent sort of . . . not answering the questions or really talking on like I previously did.’ She used these indirect messages for two reasons. As she explained, ‘I’m a very subtle person. My personality is to get along with anybody and everybody and not rock the boat.’ She added, ‘I chose that way because I had to work with her and she’s my immediate supervisor. So I couldn’t go wrong if I was just doing my job.’ Evaluation Respondents experienced various emotions during these deterioration events, including doubt, distrust, and anger. The deterioration also impacted the individuals’ work experiences long after the friendship ended. The woman whose coworker invaded her office reported that a year after the friendship ended, her coworker (also her supervisor) tried to have the respondent fired. On an annual evaluation form, the respondent explained, ‘there is a comments section and she starts putting in all of her personal opinions. And so I confronted her with that in the presence of the director of the department . . . She [the coworker] just stood up and started screaming “I want her terminated, she is so untrustworthy!” ’

Interpretation and discussion The narratives analyzed here indicate that workplace friendship deterioration is interpreted in a variety of ways by those who experience it and these interpretations have important consequences both for the individual employees and for the organizations in which they work. Along these lines, several common themes emerged from the data with respect to the perceived causes of deterioration (RQ1), the communicative accomplishment of the deterioration (RQ2), and the consequences of the deterioration (RQ3). Causes of deterioration The narratives revealed five primary causes of workplace friendship deterioration: problem personality, distracting life events, conflicting

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expectations, betrayal, and promotion. Two of these are the reverse of what Sias and Cahill (1998) identified as factors that impact peer coworker friendship development – personality and personal life events. The present findings indicate that personality and life events (when they distract employees from their work) can lead to the demise of workplace friendships and, in fact, the same personality traits and life events that bring friends together may eventually cause the friendship to fall apart. This is similar to the ‘fatal attraction’ that to date has been associated primarily with romantic relationships in which qualities that initially attract individuals to romantic partners eventually become perceived as so extreme, foolish, or pathological they repel the individual from that partner (Felmlee, 1998). Some respondents reported that they learned to trust their ‘instincts’ after the experience, suggesting that personality and life events may not be powerful developmental influences for these individuals in future workplace relationships. Instead the deterioration process may encourage them to maintain boundaries between their work and personal lives in the future. Future research should examine this somewhat paradoxical relationship dynamic in greater detail as it applies to nonromantic relationships. Betrayal also destroyed workplace friendships. Many researchers note the importance of trust in developing and maintaining healthy friendships (Fehr, 1996). It is not surprising, therefore, to find that betrayal harms workplace friendships. In these narratives, respondents were unable to regain trust in their partner, leading to the demise of the friendships. Future research should examine betrayal among workplace friends in greater depth, in particular focusing on friendships that survive betrayal and in which friends rebuild trust. Workplace friendships also ended because of the inability to manage dialectical tensions inherent in ‘blended’ relationships and identified by Bridge and Baxter (1992). The ‘promotion’ narratives, for example, depict the difficulty of negotiating the ‘impartiality–favoritism’ dialectic that accompanies relationships in which one partner has formal authority over the other. As respondents explained, their promoted friends most likely disengaged from their relationships because they were worried about appearances of favoritism. This dialectic tension also led to the demise of friendships in the ‘conflicting expectations’ narratives. The story of the unwelcome reprimand expresses this dialectic well. In that story, the subordinate expected the favoritism presumed of friends, but received the impartiality expected from coworkers. This narrative, along with others, also exemplifies the difficulties of managing the ‘judgment–acceptance’ dialectic in which friends expect unconditional support from each other, while coworkers are required to critically evaluate each other. Bridge and Baxter (1992) found that, when faced with dialectical tensions in workplace friendships, employees respond in one of three ways. They either ‘separate’ the roles, behaving as coworkers while at work and as friends outside the workplace, ‘select’ one relationship over the other (for example, choosing to ‘break’ organizational rules in favor of the

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friendship), or ‘integrate’ the relationships by being flexible about their expectations of both the workplace and friend roles. The narratives reported here depict the difficulties of enacting these strategies. For example, although the individual who reprimanded his friend attempted to keep the friend and workplace roles separate (‘This has nothing to do with friendship’), his partner instead selected the workplace relationship over the friendship. This indicates that consensus is important for the successful management of dialectical tensions – if both parties do not agree on how to manage the dialectical tensions, such strategies are doomed to fail, resulting in the termination of the friendship, the work relationship, or both. Future research would profit from examination of the ways that individuals successfully negotiate consensus regarding management of dialectical tensions. Communicative accomplishment of relationship deterioration Although the perceived reasons for friendship deterioration varied, the methods used to accomplish the deterioration did not. With only two exceptions, individuals used indirect communication strategies to disengage from their relationships. These strategies included avoidance of nonwork topics in conversation, nonverbal distancing, cost-rendering, and avoidance of socializing outside the workplace. Avoidance of nonwork topics is somewhat similar to the ‘self-presentation’ and ‘disinterest’ strategies identified by Baxter and Philpott (1982) in their study of college student friendships. Those strategies communicate individuals’ lack of interest in, and desire to distance themselves from, the other by decreasing the amount of personalized communication with their partner (Baxter, 1983). The strategy reported here, however, is more specific; the individuals in the narratives specifically avoided any discussion of topics unrelated to work. Such a strategy is particularly effective in disengaging from workplace friendships because one unique feature of such workplace relationships is their personalistic focus. Intentionally directing conversations away from personal or nonwork topics transforms the relationship from personalistic to role specific; in other words, the individual is no longer acknowledged as a ‘whole person’ but is addressed only with respect to his/her workplace role, transforming the relationship from ‘coworkers and friends’ to ‘just coworkers.’ The narratives, therefore, provide insights into the ‘essentializing’ function of talk in relationships – if talk is the relationship, individuals who only discuss work-related topics with one another have no relationship beyond the mandated workplace relationship. Sias and Cahill (1998) noted the important role of increased discussion of nonwork topics in the workplace friendship development process. The present study indicates that decreased discussion of such topics is essential to the workplace friendship deterioration, suggesting that workplace friendship deterioration can be accomplished by making nonwork topics ‘taboo’ (e.g., Baxter & Wilmot, 1985; Roloff, 2001). In contrast to studies of taboo topics in romantic and other nonwork relationships, however, workplace

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relationship partners did not explicitly discuss or ‘declare’ such topics to be taboo; they simply stopped talking about them, allowing the taboo status of the topics to evolve. Future work should examine this issue more thoroughly to determine the extent to which this implicit marking of taboo topics is unique to workplace relationships. These results also share similarities with the ‘chilling effect’ noted by Roloff and Cloven (1993), in which power discrepancies have a chilling effect on romantic relationships leading partners to avoid or withhold complaints from their partner. Our results indicate that employees’ concerns about their abilities to do their jobs after relational deterioration had a ‘chilling effect’ that prevented individuals from discussing personal topics with coworkers and from explicitly discussing the deterioration of the friendship – a chilling effect that may be unique to workplace relationships. Accordingly, this is another area for future research. Employees also disengaged from friendships through nonverbal distancing strategies that resemble Baxter and Philpott’s (1982) ‘other negation’ and ‘self-presentation’ tactics. The narratives, in particular, highlight the effectiveness of paralinguistic cues such as tone of voice. Respondents who were the targets of such cues reported that these tactics were very effective; through ‘snappy’ and ‘condescending’ vocal tones, the initiators of friendship deterioration made their feelings about their partner clear, effectively ending the friendship. One respondent also noted that the lack of certain nonverbal cues (in particular, ‘knowing looks’) signaled the end of the friendship. These results highlight the essentializing function of nonverbal communication for relationships; relationships are defined not only by what we say, but also how we say it (Watzlawick, Beavin, & Jackson, 1967). Finally, some respondents used ‘cost-rendering’ strategies to accomplish deterioration. The respondent who cut the crossword puzzle out of the newspaper before her former friend could complete it, for example, communicated her desire to decrease the closeness of the friendship by making the friendship too costly for her partner. This strategy, however, was not frequently reported in the narratives, likely due to respondents’ concerns with their ability to continue to work with their coworker after the deterioration. Not surprisingly, the ‘exclusion’ tactic (avoiding spending time with the relational partner) was rarely used to disengage from workplace friendships. Because spending time together is required in workplace relationships, complete avoidance is typically impossible. Accordingly, the individuals in these narratives used a particular type of avoidance to disengage from the friendships – avoidance of socializing outside the workplace. Socializing away from work helps workplace relationships develop the ‘personalistic focus’ characteristic of friendships and is an important influence in workplace friendship development (Sias & Cahill, 1998). The present study underscores the ways in which ceasing or avoiding extra organizational contact effectively accomplishes friendship deterioration – the relationship becomes workplace specific when the individuals no longer spend time with one another beyond that mandated by their formal

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organizational roles. We note that individuals in these narratives relied primarily on indirect strategies, regardless of whether the friendship was among peer or unequal status coworkers. Thus, hierarchical status did not appear to impact how these individuals ended their friendships. Consequences of friendship deterioration Analysis of narratives revealed a variety of consequences of friendship deterioration including: emotional stress, turnover, hindered job performance, and general lessons about relationships. All the narratives conveyed the emotional stress that individuals experienced during deterioration. These emotions were particularly difficult to manage because often the individuals’ ex-friends were a primary source of emotional support. Consequently, respondents reported feelings of isolation, frustration, and unhappiness. Again, these emotions did not vary with respect to the hierarchical relationship among the coworkers. The friendship deterioration process was as emotionally trying among peers as among supervisor–subordinate pairs. The ‘promotion’ narratives were unique with respect to emotion, however. In those narratives, the respondents’ perceptions of the inevitability of deterioration in such situations seemed to somewhat mitigate the emotional trauma of the experience. The narratives revealed a variety of long-term consequences of deterioration. Some individuals, for instance, eventually left their jobs because the deterioration made working with their coworker unbearable, indicating that turnover is a potential consequence of workplace friendship deterioration. The narratives also indicate that friendship deterioration can hinder employee job performance. Many narratives depicted the difficulties of accomplishing tasks when coworkers attempt to avoid one another as much as possible. Respondents also learned general lessons regarding relationships from their deterioration experiences. The interpretation of deterioration as inevitable in the ‘promotion’ narratives, for example, taught some respondents that promotion necessarily results in friendship deterioration. One individual retained this lesson when he was promoted after the deterioration reported in his narrative. He explained that he ended friendships with his coworkers after he was made their supervisor because he believes that friendships are impossible in different-status workplace relationships. Limitations and future directions The damaged nature of the relationships made it difficult to recruit both partners in each friendship. Because the partners in most of the relationships continue to work together, the researcher was concerned about damaging the relationships further by interviewing both partners (e.g., one partner might assume that the other said negative things in his/her interview). Thus, the narratives present only one version of the deterioration experience. Learning the stories of both partners would provide additional insights into friendship deterioration. For example, comparing

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partners’ interpretations of events may provide information regarding misunderstandings and misinterpretations of events and behaviors (e.g., an individual’s decrease in talkativeness may not necessarily be intended to end a friendship, but may be interpreted that way by his/her coworker). Although the small sample enabled in-depth analysis, it also limits the generalizability of the findings. Readers are reminded, however, that the goal of this study was not to develop an exhaustive inventory of deterioration causes, strategies, and consequences, but rather to examine in depth individuals’ interpretations and experiences with relationship deterioration. Such exploratory examination can provide a foundation for future research examining a variety of workplace relationship deterioration issues and scholars are encouraged to use the present study as a starting point for such research. For example, the narratives indicate some differences in deterioration experiences depending on the perceived cause of the deterioration. In particular, the promotion narratives indicate a somewhat less intense and more resigned reaction to the deterioration than other narratives. Future research examining in greater detail how the cause of deterioration impacts the process would be very useful. This study underscores the importance of continued research examining workplace friendship processes. Our results, along with extant research, demonstrate that friendships can enhance individuals’ work experiences and their work effectiveness. When those friendships dissolve, both individuals and organizations suffer.

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