This is the Business English podcast episode 73.
Do you have a work spouse? American office culture explained.
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I'm doing great, Michelle. How are you? How's everything?
I'm good. I'm good. Have you ever had a work family?
Oh, my gosh. Or do you think you have one now?
No, not really now as much. I don't think I've ever really had this other than I do remember teaching tennis at a tennis camp in high school, in college, and we all kind of lived in the dorms.
So it kind of felt like a family at times with the other coaches.
Yeah. You know, so that might be the closest thing I've come to work family, but I've really never had a full time job.
You know what I mean? And I think sometimes sometimes it requires like being in the office full time going through all the the stresses.
You know what I mean? Those moments. So what about you, Michelle?
Have you had it before? Do you have it now?
Well, I think it's like for us. I mean, it all is English.
It's yeah, it's hard. I think, you know, I would say in some ways we're in a work family.
We work together. But I think part of the work family is like the being in person.
Like, I don't know. What do you think? Yeah, I would agree with that.
That's what I'm saying. It's like, I think that close bonds are, I mean, we're close as a team for sure.
But if you're going to call someone like your work sister or your work mother, I feel like those bonds like that are formed in person.
And when you're under stress, you know what I mean?
Like I have a friend who does have a work mom or had a work mom in Boston and she really went through a lot of stress at our company in Boston. like moments where she was crying and that and that work mom is the shoulder she cried on oh you know what i mean that's good to have that yeah um i did have a work family i think when i worked in radio because well you know i've talked about this before it was all open concept yeah like we were all and like we all just had like a million inside jokes and there was it was cool It was fun.
Like, and I would say I had kind of a work brother.
Like we would always, we were always talking and just like, it's true.
Like under stress, like when we would talk about things or whatever.
That's amazing. Yeah. So, so it is nice.
So, so guys, you know, this is about, you know, people you work with often can become like a second family.
And Lindsay, like we were, we've already been talking about this, but the change with remote work.
I know. I wonder if there are still, you know, still work families quite as much.
I don't know. It's a really good question.
And yeah. And then I also think about our European listeners as they're listening.
Are they thinking, oh, my gosh, Americans are workaholics.
How can they have work families? How can it be that we identify so much and spend so much time at work that we would have a work family?
I wonder about this from a cultural perspective, right?
From all our listeners, all their ideas about work.
Does it mean that we work too much? Like work is too important in our lives.
Yeah. Oh, that's an interesting thing. Yeah, that is interesting.
Yeah. So we're going to talk more about this idea of the work family today.
So but guys, we want to direct you to another episode we recently did.
Another good business episode. Episode 58 is Can You Hear My Music?
How to Avoid Being Rude at the Office. Yeah, that was a great one.
Great skills. Such good skills for relationships at work.
Yeah. So Lindsay, you, you already kind of talked about this, but like, I mean, being close with coworkers, like what about, what about when you taught at a school?
Were there any people you were close with?
Yeah. I mean, when I taught in Japan, for example, I w I guess, yeah, that would probably be a closer thing to work family.
Cause I was living in Tokyo and I had a couple of, I had my manager who was Japanese, my system manager who was Japanese.
And then two or three other teachers at the school who were Japanese and they kind of took me under their wing and really helped me.
Like they helped me with paying my bills, understanding the bill in Japanese, my internet when it went out or just like living in Japan.
So it definitely extended outside of work for me.
So yeah. And I felt very close to them. So I would say, yeah, that was kind of a family.
Yeah. Yeah, it's a special kind of relationship.
I mean, like, why do you why is it important to have these relationships?
Is it important? I mean, we spend so much of our time at work, I guess, especially if you're working in person.
I think it would be really important because you want to walk into a place and feel at home, feel like you're walking into your home and these people matter to you.
Right. You have those connections. Right.
And, you know, sometimes I think a work family, it happens when you don't even realize it's happening.
Like all of a sudden you realize you feel a certain bond with these people.
I mean, so like how can a work family be developed?
I think it's just time in the office. Yeah.
You know, there's no it's the same thing in like dating.
You can't substitute getting to know someone.
It's just time, time, time, time. And I think, as I said before, exposure to it, more intense exposure. experiences you're under pressure on a deadline there's a project there's a difficult client and you come together you figure it out I think it's those two things it's just interesting just I just want to call out just the concept of work family or work mom is an actual these are phrases in American English right I don't know if they exist in our listening languages that's really interesting in itself you know what I mean right Right, right, right.
Exactly. Well, I mean, I'll just skip to that part and I'll come back.
But yeah, work wife, work husband, work spouse.
These are things are real. Yeah. People you say that you might even introduce somebody as like, oh, this is my work mom or this is my work brother or, you know, and that's so.
So actually, these are real expressions you might hear.
They really are, which is really interesting.
And so how do we do it? How do we get there?
How do I find my work sister if I ever work in an office again?
Yeah. So, okay. Well, how do we develop these relationships?
I mean, number one thing is attend events, right?
Like maybe you have to attend meetings. I mean, that can be certainly a thing that people end up bonding over.
But, you know, or attend real events outside of the office.
Don't feel too much pressure. Attend only genuinely or... you know, from, you know, like don't, you don't have to be at every single event.
Right. Don't try too hard. Cause that also is very obvious.
Right. When people are trying too hard. Yeah.
Yeah. Right. Exactly. Or have lunch, have lunch with your coworkers.
Yeah. And that's one. And then I think just be genuine and open up.
Like just, it just, happens it's like slowly over time you just realize oh I actually feel pretty like close to these people and I think it happens mostly you have this realization when you're introducing them to someone from another circle of your life right like to your actual family or you know if they meet a friend of yours you know if you go to an event or something like that and then you kind of introduce them and then you kind of realize like oh I kind of like I didn't realize that I feel so close to this person Interesting.
Yeah, that's really interesting. Did you used to go out for lunch with your coworkers every day?
Was that a regular thing that you would do?
Or is it just once in a while? At one of my jobs I did.
But there was a lot of eating at the desk.
But my my work brother, who I still keep in touch with to this day.
I mean, even though that was like 10 years ago.
Yeah. Yeah. I still. Yeah. Like I still have a fondness for these people.
That's very cool. And and, you know, like I told him when I was pregnant and all this stuff.
Yeah. So like but I remember we used to go to the salad place all the time, like downstairs.
And then, you know, like but there was a lot of there was still like a lot of eating at the desk, which is another topic.
Well, it helps that you are in radio. Radio people are fun.
I think they're really fun. It was fun.
It was fun. There were a lot of like jokes.
That's the last thing I was going to mention is let the jokes develop naturally.
I mean. You know, there were just certain things that build up in time.
I mean, it's just like a relationship with anybody, really.
I mean, I think our listeners probably, you know, I don't want to assume, but you think like, how am I going to create this kind of bond with somebody?
And just wait, just like put yourself out there and, you know, join in on the fun.
There's like a lot of, I mean, think of the show The Office, right?
Like there's like a lot of... silly kind of funny things that happen and, you know, just kind of enjoy it or kind of take humor in what you can.
Yeah. I mean, the key here, guys, is, as Michelle is saying, show up for these events.
Don't be afraid. And that's part of what we're helping you guys with on this podcast in particular is, you know, how can we have the confidence to go to these events and socialize in a business context in English, right?
There's so many social moments at the workplace, right?
Right. And, you know, hit follow on the show to keep listening right here.
But the key is showing up when you're invited.
Just show up. You're invited to the holiday cocktail party.
Bring your spouse. Right. Come introduce your spouse to people.
Have that conversation. Have a meal. Have a glass of wine with your coworkers.
Right. And just to just to touch on, you know, work husband, work spouse.
Yeah. A little bit more. I just have this article from it's from Women's Health Mag dot com.
It's called Why a Work Husband is the One Relationship You Need in Life.
For starters, they just get it. So this is by Elizabeth Bacharach.
And that was it's from 2019, June 21st. But I think it has some good stuff that we can dive into.
Nice. Okay, guys. So go and check out that article.
It's always good to kind of listen to an episode here and then add reading, right?
Reading is really important for our skills here in English.
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Exclusions apply. See details online. OK, Michelle, do we have some quotes then that we could give our listeners to give them a little context?
What do we have? So, yeah. So from the article, they say a couple of things is like a real spouse, a work spouse supports you and helps you with work.
But they also challenge you when you need to be challenged and call you out when you need to be.
So that's somebody talking in the article named McBride.
And then they say, I'm just going to summarize, but they say that the research actually shows that having a work husband can be a good thing.
So it says that there is a study from this person, McBride's own study and simply hired surveys that says that it's important to have a work, you know, to have this person who it says, quote, whom you trust enough to blow off steam.
Yeah. Yeah. That's part of it. Yeah. You really need this.
I could compare it to being in school. Like even in high school, you needed your friends to kind of talk about the teachers, talk about the test, talk about the assignments.
It's a way of like talking through stress.
Right. Right. It's so true. It's so true.
But, you know, you've got to be careful sometimes.
Right. You know, the article also mentioned some cons like, you know, it might interrupt your work.
Right. You might. I mean, I would be lying if I said that the person who was my work brother and I didn't have some conversations in the middle of meetings that shouldn't have been happening.
Like, cause we always had this conference call every day and we weren't really, I mean, to be honest, like we weren't like, eventually we didn't need to be on that call, but everybody else was.
And so we were just, I would literally just like take, I mean, this is like what can go on in an office, right?
Like, you know, take my chair, roll over to his desk and we would just talk while everybody... you know and that but that stuff happens in an office like there's yeah like that that's like not being used i mean maybe it's not great that i admitted that that was 10 years ago maybe i wouldn't have done that now it's human it's human then you're connecting and connecting you know so um but yeah and then also it talked a little bit about if a real spouse become jealous so right right about Could happen.
Yeah, I love it. That is so interesting.
And so just to clarify, usually a work, would you agree that usually a work husband or a work wife or a work spouse is typically, is it usually a colleague is not like a, wouldn't really be a boss or a manager as much as usually someone at your level?
Yeah, I would say I wouldn't. I don't think it doesn't make sense.
It doesn't make sense because that gets into like weird power stuff.
Right. Yeah. So what about someone who's more senior in the company?
Maybe they're not like you're not their direct report.
They're not like the boss boss, but maybe they're above you, but they're not.
You're not their direct report. Could they be a work spouse or does it really have to be generally someone at your level in the company?
Huh. That's a good question. I mean, then you get into a little bit some sticky stuff.
And like also, I'm sure there are some things where people are like work spouses, but really, you know, they have some feelings.
Right. Some romance going on. Yeah. So like I I don't I you know, I I don't think that I would be happy if Dan had a work wife.
OK, now we're being honest here. I mean, I'm just saying like, you know, like a work mom would be OK.
That's so funny. I love this episode. It's fantastic.
Guys, this is a glimpse into real American office culture.
Right. This is real. And I would be so interested to see for our listeners to compare how it's different in their countries.
But if you're working in the U.S., you're going to encounter this kind of thing, especially if you're working in person.
Right, right, right. Exactly. But, you know, always with the work spouses, you know, you know, sometimes you have to think about like the the dynamic and the power thing, you know, like we have to be sensitive to those things, too.
Right. I watch that show New Amsterdam all the time and we always rip on Max because he's always dating women from the office, from the hospital.
I'm like, can't you date outside of the hospital?
What is going on? It's like he's had three relationships with women in the hospital.
It's so funny. It's like, oh my gosh. That's pretty funny.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, so, uh, well, should we do a little role play with some of these questions?
Here we go. Here we go. All right. So here we are friends.
Are we work friends or just friends outside of work?
Like what's the context outside of work?
Okay, here we go. Oh, that's you. Oh, so Scott and I were talking after the meeting.
Oh yeah. Your work husband. Yeah. Well, we were complaining about some of the changes in the company.
It's good you can bounce ideas off one another, but stay on track.
I know. So I'm giving you a little unsolicited advice there as your friend.
Yes, yes, exactly, exactly. So yeah, there we just used work husband.
That's just wanted to show you how it might look in a conversation.
Yeah, very interesting. Very interesting that these words are real and common in American English.
I love it. What's the takeaway for our listeners today?
All right. Well, guys, work family can be great.
Work spouses can be great or they can create some uncomfortable situations as well.
But this was all about office dynamics. And think about it like, you know, I wrote try and have a work family, but it's not necessarily something that you completely try for.
It does happen over time. But my suggestion is just put yourself out there and things before you know it, all of a sudden you'll realize you have a little work family.
Interesting. I love it. Guys, go for that connection at work.
You know, this is a huge part. We're spending 40 plus hours a week at work, so we should have connections.
So good. Really interesting, Michelle. Thanks for bringing this topic in.
Thanks for sharing your stories about your work brother.
I'll have to send him this episode. Yeah, good stuff.
All right. I'll talk to you soon. Have a good one.
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