Dear Madeleine,
I was recently promoted and moved to a new team. I was very excited—first to make more money, and also to learn a new aspect of the business.
Six months later, I’m a bit disillusioned. Both of the things I was excited about are good, but I hadn’t anticipated the loss of my work friends. I found out that last week my former team all got together, and no one thought of inviting me.
I like a couple of the people on my new team, but they are all older and married with kids so the whole socializing thing is way different. I’m single with no kids, so I have very little in common with the people on my new team.
It has gotten very lonely. There is not much small talk; it’s all business. I’m thinking about asking if I can go back to my old team, but that seems like a step backwards.
Thoughts?
Lonely
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Dear Lonely,
This sounds hard, and I am sorry. I’ll share a principle that I hope will serve you in this instance and in the future. Your quality of life—and, research shows, the length of it—will be vastly increased if you have a strong community of people who love and care about you. Not “work friends,” but people who will remain close over the years, even as your job changes and your career grows.
Your job is to start building that community right now.
I don’t mean to imply that you shouldn’t have friends at work. You absolutely should—but they can’t be all you have. By all means stay connected to your old pals, tell them how much you miss them, and request directly that they include you in future get-togethers. To stay top of mind, message a couple of your favorites on a regular basis just to check in and say hello. In the meantime, start building relationships with people on your new team and outside of work.
You got lucky with your last team. It’s going to require a little more intention and effort to establish connections with the newer team members. The key to doing that is to find shared interests—hiking, Roblox, brewing beer, chess, dogs, plant propagation—anything you care about or would like to know more about. Just because people are married with kids and older than you doesn’t mean they don’t have lives. You just need to ask questions, pay attention, and find out what they care about. You might also think about joining volunteer committees at work to meet other people.
The same rules apply to finding connection outside of work: find a meet-up, start a club, go to community events that hold a little spark for you. It will take time, and you will strike out a bit, but keep at it and you will find your people. You might also reconnect with old friends. “Staying in touch on social media” means not staying in touch. Text. Call. Make plans for evenings and weekends.
Ask people questions about themselves. Remember what they tell you and follow up when they tell you they are going to a game or a concert. Learn their children’s names and ages, and ask about them. Even if you don’t care at first, the more you learn, the more you will. People tend to care about people who care about them.
Finally, if you have family members who love you, check in with them regularly. Make the time to FaceTime and catch up. Do Wordle every day with your favorite cousin. So far, it sounds as if you have naturally found people you like and have things in common with. But like almost everyone, you have reached a moment in life where you need to get purposeful and creative.
Going back to your former team is not a solution. Creating a network of relationships that will sustain you over the long haul is.
Good luck!
Love, Madeleine
About Madeleine
Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services as well as a key facilitator of Blanchard’s Leadership Coach Certification course. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.
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