SMNTY Classics: Work Wives

Over our working lives, we encounter plenty of pals, acquaintances and even enemies, but the beloved work spouse is rarer -- and, it turns out, more productivity-enhancing. In this classic, we revisit just what makes the work wife relationship so special.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hey, this is Annie and you're listening to Stuff I've
Never told you. Hello, lovely listeners. I just wanted to
give a quick update on what's going on with the
podcasts and to thank you all for being patient and

(00:28):
sticking with us. Due to the chaos that was the
end of the year and a lot of shifting pieces
and lots of traveling on both of our ends, I
banked up a lot of episodes with guest hosts and
a lot of classic episodes before Bridget announced that she
was sadly going to be leaving the show. So when
you're hearing these episodes with guest host and classics over

(00:50):
the next coming weeks and you're like, but wait, what's
going on. It's the magic of podcasting and scheduling. It's
not like those TV shows where a character has just
gone on and everyone pretends they never existed. Bridget will
be greatly greatly, greatly greatly missed, and she's gonna you're
gonna hear from her. She's moving on to some cool
projects and I'm really excited for her and for you

(01:12):
to check them out, and you'll hear from her some
more on this show. Stuff I've Never Told You is
going to go on and we have some really cool
stuff in the work, so please stay tuned. I truly
am so thrilled to have y'all wonderful listeners and to
be a part of this community and to continue to
learn and grow with all of you. For today's classic,
I want to replay this episode all about that wonderful

(01:35):
relationship that is the work wife. I've been so lucky
to have amazing work wives in my life. Happy listening,
Welcome to stuff Mom Never told you from House stuff
Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen,

(01:58):
and I'm Caroline, and and I hope that this isn't
a too forward of a question to ask you in
a public forum. But I mean, do you think that
we're each other's work wives? Yeah? Yeah, I mean I
think so. We We work closely together. We see each
other outside of work. If anything weird is happening at work,

(02:22):
we're probably going to take a walk and talk about it.
We go pick up coffee together, We go downstairs and
shop at Jake Crew together. We have, thanks to you,
matching angry liberal feminists kill joy coffee mugs. I mean,
I don't know if we can get much work wife
eer than we are now no, we're the wife eist.

(02:46):
So basically this podcast should just be called work wives. Hey, everybody,
welcome back, and not sister wise No no, no, yeah,
we get a lot of confused listeners different something. So
was really interested to read about the whole work spouse
relationship because there are so many ways that you can

(03:07):
cut it, whether it is like a really close work
friend or the work wife who or work husband who
might make your actual wife or husband nervous like your
coworkers nervous. Um. I love workplace relationship chats. Yeah, yeah,
and I I do think that there are some things,

(03:28):
and we'll talk about this that can certainly complicate a
work spouse relationship. A lot of those things do have
to do with if your sexual orientations match each other's.
Caroline minds do not don't know? Um at my last job, well,
I mean, aside from dude roommate who's like my life
work spouse and he's your life wife, he is, Um,

(03:53):
I did have another work spouse who is a gay man,
and so that makes off any like potential conflict or
jealousy with a partner. Although when all we want to
do is spend time together. I guess that there's a
little bit of jealousy. But then you've also got to
worry too about you know, do other coworkers feel excluded?
Do they feel like they're being left out? Is your

(04:17):
work spouse possibly casting you in a negative light by association?
I know you're just going around spewing terrible things out
of your mouth. Part that's gonna badly on the person
you spent all your time with. Yeah, like when when
Matt and I ran around our old office putting googly
eyes on everything. I mean, well, we were doing that together,
so we reflected poorly on each other. Yeah, I'm just imagining,

(04:40):
like if Billy Eichner from Billy on the Street wererior
or your work wife, because he's just so so loud,
always yelling. I I was the one of my last
job who got in trouble for being loud. I did
have the the boss, like the boss boss come in
to the break room and tell me that my laugh
harried so well. I hope you responded, Actually, it doesn't

(05:04):
carry it, Carolines, don't call me carry I'll fire myself now,
thank you. So, before we get to our our work
spouse situation, in our millennial workplaces, why don't we talk
a little bit about how it used to be, because actually,

(05:28):
you know, the whole work spouse thing or at least
like work bestie is less common than it was. Yeah,
which to me almost feels counterintuitive because I feel like
we spend so much more time working. The forty hour
work week is something that I aspired to. Um. And
you know, when you when you work in those kind
of nebulous creative and digital fields, your work is never

(05:51):
done and also you can do it any time at
any place, and so there is that issue of seven
connectivity as well. Um. But yeah, we were looking at
one study that showed and this is something cited by
Adam Grant in the New York Times. But yeah, the
studies show that in nine about half of Americans said
they had a close friend at work, and by two
thousand four this was true for only thirty percent. And

(06:13):
that's crazy. With how much time we've been working, why
don't we have more work friends? And we even see
that stat reflected in younger people's expectations of their work
environment and what their work friendship situation is going to be.
So in that same study that Grant cited UH. In
two thousand and six, just fort of American high school

(06:36):
seniors thought that it was very important to find a
job where they could make friends. That had been fifty
four percent in nineteen seventy six. Because even though we're
spending more time at work, we're I don't know, we're
just like efficiency machines or something. Oh god, I think
it's the opposite. Um, I think us spending more time
at work is less efficient. But let's now refer people

(06:58):
to our bossed up episod with guest Emily Aries for
more on that. Um. But to me, it does make
sense that we have d prioritized work friendships because our
entire approach to work and the workplace in general has
changed so much for people in our generation and obviously

(07:20):
will continue changing for younger folks as well, because, for one,
long term employment is no longer the aspirational goal, where
you will work at ex company for forty years, they'll
give you your knockoff role X. I was about to say,
a rolodex. You can wear that on your wrist. Yeah,

(07:41):
I'd be like a neat little bracelet heavy look at
my charm bracelet of despair. But of course that's not
reality anymore. I mean, as soon as the recession hit,
I feel like we millennials do not expect to be
in jobs typically more than like five years. Yeah, well
you know, I mean you've got the positive and negative

(08:02):
side of that, Like we as a generation want to
do the thing that makes us happy. We want to
chase down happiness. We're not taught. We don't feel like
we need to be loyal to a company for fifty years.
It's not one of our top priorities. Instead of us
us the tapping into our passions Caroline right, passion jobs
and yeah, I mean we you know, I was at

(08:22):
my first job out of college for four years amid
the recession, and I couldn't really leave while that was
happening because I knew it wouldn't be able to get
a job. But once I did, catapulted right out of there. Yeah.
I've been at hell Stuff Works going on eight years.
So you're almost at that gold Rolodex. Yeah, I've almost
got a gold millennial. Yeah, a gold Rolodex. And yeah,

(08:45):
if my job were a child, it would be in
late elementary school. Yeah, and packing its own lunch. So
that's good. Yeah, I mean Mamma got time for that. Yeah,
at least it's a little little less hands on. Um,
but in ah into the fact that we don't necessarily
stick around in one place. We we job hop in

(09:05):
ways like never before. Teleworking also means less face to
face communication, although I do feel like, Wow, I don't
interface with people all that often in my job because
I do telework. You and I both tell a work
fairly often. But thanks to slack, g chat and text

(09:29):
in texting I think that's what they call it texting,
we are always still communicating. Yeah, exactly. And one study
did show that, and this was a huge study that
as long as you were in the office at least
two and a half days a week, and that applies
to us, it won't have a negative effect on your
work relationships. You know, you'll still have you can still

(09:49):
be buddy buddy with people at work, just maybe not
have a work spouse per se. Yeah, I don't think
that our work Boston marriage has suffered from our teleworking. No, No,
not by any means. Um. You've also got the issue
of social media allowing us to remain connected with old friends,
college friends, whatever. So perhaps there is less of a

(10:10):
drive especially if you're just at work, keeping your head down,
working for the weekend, because you know that you know,
when you get to that weekend, you'll probably be able
to visit with friends that you've been able to keep
up with on the internet. And I'm wondering with all
of this keeping our heads down and working for the weekend.
You know, I wouldn't ever accuse the millennial generation of
having a Protestant work ethic per se, but I mean

(10:33):
we do have lingering aspects of that in order to
make it to the vacation, to make it to the
long holiday weekend or whatever. And of course, you know,
if you're wondering what the Protestant work ethic is and
you've been under a rock for hundreds of years, uh,
it comes from Martin Luther preaching that hard work and

(10:54):
any occupation was a meaningful duty. It was a calling
from God. And then John Calvin of you know Calvin
as them, uh Calvin Klein, not Calvin Klein, Yeah, John
Calvin Klein. But you could argue that John Calvin's underwear
were the original Calvin's the original sin oh uh yeah.
So Calvin argued that people needed to avoid socializing while

(11:18):
working because you've got to put all of your attention
and effort into fulfilling God's will through your work. And so,
you know, let's gloss over a whole bunch of history
and condense a bunch of stuff into a really simplistic statement,
which is basically, like white Protestant guys, we're the ones
have been the ones in power forever in this country.

(11:40):
And they're the ones who are the CEOs of offices traditionally,
and so you have this ingrained culture of put your
head down and get your work done. But what more
recent research is finding, and I think what newer companies
are facilitating, is how jobs are more satisfying when they

(12:02):
provide social opportunities, you know. I mean just think about
the Google Plex and all of the amenities that it has,
you know, for whether it is like free sushi. My
mind is always goes to the sushi. I want that
Google Sushi so badly. Um, but they'll have you know,
like video game rooms where you and your you know,

(12:24):
pro grammars can go chill ax and play some duck hunt.
I've clearly I've never been in that space before. Christen's
actually never left the house before. We're community. This is
all via the magic of the Internet that we're communicating. Um. Yeah,
but I mean even that goes back to what you

(12:45):
were saying about more time spend at work isn't necessarily
more efficient. I mean, I think giving people those perks
at work to make them happier is important, and it
creates a happier workspace, which logically, so the logic goes,
should make them better workers. But if we are just
working for the weekend with like our twisted millennial so

(13:08):
to speak, Protestant work ethic, you know, if we're not
taking the time to form those friendships and to enjoy
duck hunt and sushi at work, then we won't be
as happy as we could be. That's what researchers argue. Also,
those are my new like that is my work life
balance skull. Some duck hunt and sushi yea at my

(13:30):
job just a regular Tuesday afternoon fall haf What is
not my work life balance skull nor anyone's. I don't
I don't know that anyone actually likes this is the
toxic work environment. Yeah. And so to further drive home,
which is what we're going to be doing throughout this podcast,
to further drive home the importance of having that positive,

(13:52):
healthy work environment. We need to look at a study
that came out in from recruiting firm Cornerstone on Demand
and Northwestern University that looked into what being part of
a toxic work environment does for us. Because as much
as a happy work environment can contribute to our productivity,

(14:13):
toxic work environments, as anyone who's ever had a job
out there can attest to, that really takes away from
our productivity. So the study found that three to five
of all employees are fired for toxic behavior related reasons,
or I guess that's three to five percent of all
plays who are fired, not just like Kristen today, it's
you because you had because you're toxic um And those

(14:37):
reasons could be things like misconduct even drug or alcohol
abuse on the job, sexual harassment, and to have a
toxic coworker. And I have worked with someone at an
old job who did abuse substances at the office and
trust me, it made things a little tense. Uh. That
toxic behavior does increase the likelihood that they're colleagues will

(15:01):
themselves then engage in toxic bus basically because maybe they
feel resentful or they just feel threatened or something, or
they'll just quit. So that the way that your environment
is shaped and feels at work absolutely affects everybody. And
having friends at work, even if they're not best friends,

(15:21):
but for sure, if you have a work spouse or two,
because again we're getting into sister work spouses, a little polygamy,
polygamy that can contribute to helping people want to stay yeah,
and maybe providing a buffer from that toxicity, because as
anyone who has worked in a toxic environment knows, it

(15:44):
spreads like a virus. It does so quickly, it doesn't
take much. I my first job out of college was
at the newspaper, and you know, I came on staff
with such you know, a glimmer in my eye, like
so excited, uh totally naive uh um. And one of
the first people I met was this woman who you know,
came off as very nice and funny and welcoming, and

(16:07):
then it just our relationship and I came to find
out that it was her relationship with everyone became one
of those toxic relationships because she loved to gossip, She
loved to uh pit people against each other. It was
just really unhealthy. But it I watched, and I can
especially see it now looking back watches. It just infected

(16:29):
everybody because it's hard to escape that negativity. Well, and
that brings us back to the positive role of a
work spouse or just a work bestie. If spouse feels
like too much of a commitment, you know, just say
um so. This research is coming from in the European
Business Review, because we are continental like that, like croissants. Yes, indeed,

(16:54):
we are the Croissans of podcasters. Um so. Researchers have
consistently found that employees who are friendlier work well together,
no big surprise, and a link has also been found
between relationship factors like cooperation and social support and team productivity.
So basically, like nice people work better together and more

(17:18):
productively together. Exactly. Not to say that there's anything wrong
with like the occasional like lunch break cavetching session, but
when people who work together genuinely like each other, I
think it definitely adds to the environment. And plus, people
who say they have friends at work, according to this research,

(17:38):
are happier on the job. They report higher satisfaction, more cohesion,
more commitment to the company, and less intention to leave.
Even though, as we were talking about earlier getting that
gold watch or for millennials, gold rolodex is totally antiquated,
but it does make it a little bit emotionally anyway,
a little bit harder to leave when you are b

(17:59):
a fefts or in a work spouse type relationship with someone,
because because you don't want to let them down. You know,
I remember when dude roommate was leaving his old job.
You know, he was he was going to be making
a better and more positive stuff for himself career wise,
but he did feel connected to so many of his
work friends and you don't want to leave them holding
the bag. But I mean, eventually, you know, you've got

(18:21):
to take the job. It's better for you, and hopefully
your work spouse is supportive. Well yeah, it's just so
much time spent together too, on the emotional ups and
downs of the workplace. I know, like who's bringing in lunch?
Are you gonna get food poisoning from the work pot luck?
And if you work at dunder Mifflin, for instance, it's
always you know who's dating who this week? You know,

(18:43):
did Dwight put Jim's sandwich in a funny place? Is
Pam still silently just staring at the back of Jim's
head because she can't tell him how she really feels. Pam, Yeah,
Pam Jam. And here's the thing. If you're Michael Scott, though,
at the Michael Scott of your office, your boss is

(19:03):
not into coworker friendships and relationships, is a little suspect
or even hostile toward them. That's probably not a good
sign about your boss. It's probably a sign that you
might have a Michael Scott yeah, because right. A lot
of the research we read pointed out that, Okay, on
the surface level work friendships, they might signal a lack

(19:26):
of productivity because if you're chatting, if you're grabbing maybe
a long lunch, if you're doing this or that, your
boss might look at that and say, well, why aren't
you working? But according to Gallop, back from when they
did a deep dive into factors that make workers more productive,
they found that employers who recognize the role that close

(19:47):
friendships play in terms of fostering productivity, they're gonna be
on the better end of things. They are gonna basically,
I don't know, be rewarded for helping people foster those
friendships because their workers will be happier and therefore more
productive versus your kind of stick in the mud boss
who you know, maybe walks into the brake room and

(20:08):
tells you you're too loud because you're laughing at your
work spouse because your laughter carolinees too far. But the
question then is whether there's a difference in having friendly,
casual acquaintances versus the work bestie or work spouse. Because

(20:28):
with casual work friends, I mean, they kind of require
less maintenance and are less likely to be a distraction,
and they can also be a sounding board, foster teamwork,
and help get stuff done without the sense of obligation
associated with off the clock best friends. But there's a

(20:48):
wrinkle in this. Yeah. So this study by management professors
at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Minnesota
found that when they had people complete a task, they
either had acquaintances or they had work friends work spouses. Basically,
friends outperformed acquaintances every time. And there's some critical factors

(21:11):
in this. Like we said, when it comes to leaving
a company, like quitting a company, your work spouse is
going to make it harder because you feel that sense
of loyalties. So those friends were more committed at the
start of the project. They showed better communication throughout the project.
They offered their teammates positive encouragement every step along the way.
But they also, based on the strong foundation of their friendship,

(21:36):
didn't feel like they could not offer criticism. If they
saw that one of their teammates was about to do
something bone headed, they could say, you know, I don't
know if that's the right way to do it. What
about this? They could give each other that honest, open feedback.
Whereas when they looked at how the acquaintances who were
paired up were working, they were across the board held
back by lack of communication. They appeared to prefer working alone,

(22:00):
They were less comfortable seeking help, and they resisted pointing
out when a coworker was about to make a mistake.
So it sounds like that friendship helps bolster the work
that's being done. Yeah, I mean, and this makes me
think of Myers Briggs tests, and I would be curious
to see how people who had those strong workplace friendships

(22:24):
might differ in personality traits versus acquaintance type people, because
there's like a little bit of an acquaintance in me,
like my my solo homeschooler self. Um, you know, as
a kid has definitely like come along with me as
I've aged. But I also know that I need like
the collaboration. Yeah, and you know matching feminist coffee mugs.

(22:50):
I know we do collaborate. You know, we stop, we
collaborate and we listen. Oh we do, we do. And
all of this is backed up again by that Gallop
study that found that workers who said they had a
best friend at work, We're way more likely to enjoy
some pretty cool perks. They were way more likely to

(23:12):
report having received praiser recognition for their work in the
past week. Uh, way more likely to say that someone
at work encourages their development. Uh. They were thirty more
likely to report coworker commitment to quality basically the positivity
and productivities off the charts for people who say, yes,
I have a work spouse slash BFF slash whatever, because

(23:33):
I don't think Gallup used the term work spouse well
and even to the point this jumped out the fact
that they were also seven percent more likely to report
that their company's mission makes them feel their job is important,
because that kind of commitment, you know, in that belief
in the company bottom line you know, is to me

(23:57):
would be a hallmark of an outstand like out standingly
positive company culture. Yeah. Well, because I mean, hopefully, with
all the factors we've talked about, hopefully this means that
you do have a boss who is open to letting
these work relationships flourish, and you do have opportunities for
that open and honest collaboration where you can bounce ideas

(24:19):
off of each other while you play duck hunt and
eat your sushi. Um, you know, because otherwise I feel
like a lot of creativity can be stifled if you
don't let people have those relationships. I had a job where, uh,
the boss. It was a very small company, and the
boss was super not okay with people talking with each other. Uh,

(24:41):
God help you if she found you out of your desk,
she was just convinced that anyone who was having a conversation,
even if it was to blow off steam or you
were just literally on your way back from the bathroom
or something, she just convinced you were like plotting against
the company and not working. Yeah, and so you can
imagine like creativity definitely hit a ceiling at that place.

(25:02):
But anyway, we're gonna move on. From just talking about
my work history and dive a little bit more into
work spouses when we come right back from a quick break.

(25:23):
So let's talk about the qualities of a work spouse
that differentiates them from just your average work pal, acquaintance,
desk occupier who doesn't talk much. Um. Sophie Cleman over
at Mike wrote about this in noting that according to

(25:44):
survey results from vault dot com, of the respondents from
a variety of industries reported having a so called office
husband or office wife, and a separate survey of only
white collar workers found that number was about double. Yeah,
that's interesting. So white collar workers. I wonder if that

(26:08):
is affected by the focus on more like creative work,
applied arts jobs maybe think office environments that are a
little more loosey goosey. Yeah, I would think that, um,
in more traditional workplaces where there is more of a
career ladder as opposed to service industry jobs UM or

(26:30):
obviously like freelance work, UM, that those might facilitate more
of those kinds of collaborative relationships because you need those
networks in order to get ahead. Yeah that's true. Um,
But yeah, your work spouse is you know, you can
be friends a lot of people at work, but your
work spouse is your person, the one you click with

(26:51):
without any romantic spark. And that's the key, because well,
as we'll talk about, that is definitely the key. I'm
gonna ask Pam and Jim that's right. Well, no, I mean,
you know, uh, dude, roommate is a straight guy. I'm
a straight girl. But because we had literally been friends
so long and we had met under circumstances where we
were both dating other people, like, we never had a

(27:15):
romantic spark between us. Um. A lot of people find
that hard to believe, but you know, we really are
truly BFFs, and so working together it was like the
perfect work spouse relationship, even though so many psychologists are like,
don't do it. So on a related note, then this

(27:35):
is interesting. So would you have you guys both gotten
pressure from people from time to time of like, why
are you all together? Don't you like him? Doesn't he
like you? Um? Not really because because most of the
people who know both of us know we would never
in a million years date because we are not each

(27:56):
other's type at all. Um, but at at at the
job where we worked together, Uh, there were a couple
of women who did not know us very well. They
just knew that we were roommates and that we literally
spent like so much time together, and they were like, oh,
you guys are in love with each other. We see

(28:18):
the way you react to each other, and it's like
now I first of all, stop it, stop it. Second
of all, I mean, how do you act with your
best friend? You know? Um? So really yeah, not not
very much there. There's never been any of that pressure
really because he and I are so similar but so different.
But that does become you know, a challenge sometimes if

(28:41):
you have like an opposite sex work spouse relationship where
because people even still do this day, have such a
hard time believing that men and women can be friends,
so that more specifically, like straight and can be legitimately

(29:02):
friends with women of really any sexual orientation without having
ulterior motives, which is just insulting on a Brazilian levels. Um,
and I would imagine that that might be even more
scrutinized in the workplace. Yeah, I mean, and you know,
we've seen studies before where and we'll talk about gender

(29:23):
a little bit more in a second, but you know,
we've seen studies that show that men in cross sex
straight friendships men do interpret some signs and symptoms a
little differently than women do. Um, and that can lead
to a little bit of of getting butt wrecked basically
over a situation to put it poetically, to put it

(29:45):
super poetically. UM, but I think that you you can't say.
It makes for nice headlines to say definitely one way
or the other, but you obviously can't say anything definitively
because people are all different people of people, people of people.
So we've established then that your work spouse is just

(30:08):
like your person. You know, you you do have chemistry
like Christina's and Meredith on Grat's Anatomy, although they were
also BFFs like I r L So, but that was
the first thing I thought of, was when Christina and
Meredith are like bonding and they established that they are people. Well,
this just brought to mind the work spouse relationships on

(30:28):
The Mindy Project, because Mindy, played by Mindy Kaling, has
like an actual romantic relationship with one of the doctors.
But Morgan, one of the nurses, is Mindy's work wife,
although he is not Mindy's like work husband, you know

(30:51):
what I mean. Like, she's not that too, she doesn't
serve him in any reciprocal kind of way, which adds
to the humor of it, because Morgan wants to do
anything he can to make Mindy's life easier, when in fact,
I would argue, and looking forward to hearing from Mindy
Project fans on this, I would argue that she she
has another work husband, Peter Prentiss, who's like the charming, funnier,

(31:17):
like another doctor, so it's not like the subordinate level
that is on Well. I can't confirm or deny because
I've never seen it, but I would argue that this
sounds a lot like Veep with Selena Meyer and Gary. Yes,
Gary without a doubt, and granted they had that moment
in the closet where they let each other have it.
Gary finally stood up for himself. I think that was

(31:40):
last season or two seasons ago, but yeah, absolutely. Gary
is devoted to Julia Louis Dreyfuss's Selena Meyer and she
just walks all over him. But they are both aware
that like she would not be able to succeed at
life without Gary whispering in her ear. Gary might be
my all time favorite work wise, He's just the best

(32:04):
um because one thing, one thing Gary Scott you know
that other work spouses have is understanding the big picture,
you know. I mean, like Gary is always anticipating what
Selina is going to need. And it also helps that
he has his bag well. Yeah, and and so one

(32:25):
of the key aspects to someone being a work spouse
versus a casual acquaintance is understanding that big picture. You
know a lot obviously about your work spouses professional situation,
their hopes, their dreams, their failures, their successes, um. But
you also know a lot about their personal life, and
so you know when he or she walks in and

(32:48):
seems upset or happy, you have an idea of what's
going on, because you do you see the whole picture.
There's also that because you know so much about that
person's life and their ups and downs and everything, there's
so much trust that has to happen there because you
can't just be shooting your mouth off about the boss
or another coworker that you don't like, or you know,

(33:10):
if you have a crush on someone at work, or
if something's going wrong at home. Can't just be shooting
your mouth off about all that stuff to just anybody.
And so you know When you combine all this stuff,
you get a pretty mega, supportive, amazing friend. And not surprisingly,
there are plenty of benefits associated to having a work spouse.

(33:32):
Ron Friedman over at The Cut wrote about some research
on this in December which found that having a work
spouse is correlated with getting sick less often, suffering fewer accidents,
changing jobs less often, and having more satisfied customers. Yeah,
and and again. You because you're committed to this person,

(33:54):
and your relationship with this person makes you happier, you
don't want to let the down, so there's more on
the line. Your laziness or your incompetence or your failure
doesn't mean you've only let yourself down or your boss down,
but it also means you're letting your work spouse down.
And you don't want to do that because you're so
committed and Freeman also cited research that should just how

(34:16):
important to work spouses during those really stressful times at work.
People who believe that their coworkers will help them during
times of stress and challenge are more likely to overcome
that stress and challenge to succeed no matter what's going
on at work. They're more able to quickly integrate and
adapt to things going on at work, and they report

(34:39):
better stress management. So just knowing that you have that
person who gets you your person at work, it reduces
your stress a little bit because you can just exchange
that look and be like, I know, girl, I hear
you loud and clear. And there have been so many
meetings you and I have been in together, large group
meetings where we might be sitting across the table from

(35:02):
each other and but just talking, talking loud and clear,
without saying a word, talking with those eyeball um, and
you all know Caroline has very expressive eyebrows. So um.
But this this next one though, is so crucial. I
feel like if you are managing both, you know, a
work spouse relationship and a romantic relationship on the side,

(35:25):
because one of the big benefits in terms of how
your work spouse can make your personal life better is
compartmentalizing your the minutia of your job angst and all
of the projects that you have to do and all
of that stress. If you can just compartmentalize it to

(35:48):
your work spouse, you don't take it all home. Yeah,
And I mean I I've always taken a lot home anyway. Yeah,
I mean, like, you know, your your significant other is
your significant other, so you're going to talk to that person,
but it doesn't It kind of saves your your ESSO
from having to sit across the table from you at

(36:08):
dinner as you're like, no, okay, well see Betty Sue
is a jerk because she does this thing, and then
you know Jim over here he does this thing, and
so but then they can't you know like that, don't
don't stress other people out with like the super intimate
details of how everyone is connected at work, like maybe
hit the high points well. And to that point, I

(36:29):
am real grateful that my husband did a very kind
hearted job. He was very gentle with me with this
of just alerting me that I talk I talk about
work a lot. I'll go through phases where yeah, it
work is life. I mean I shoot videos in my home.

(36:51):
It is literally there all the time. UM. And he's
been so helpful and patient and kind with helping me
kind of separate those two worlds as much as I can,
because I do want to be cognizant of what's going
on with his work life. Does he have space to
talk to me about stuff that's annoying him and he

(37:14):
even surprised me once when he surprised me so many times.
But one time I was talking uh about something at
work making me upset um and I was like, well,
I mean, what's going on? What are you mad about?
You know, don't you have any isn't something terrible? You know,
your job? And he was like yeah, but I just don't.

(37:37):
I just don't like to talk about that. He's like,
I just don't. He was like, I don't want to
even think about that when I'm home. You know. Boyfriend
Dog is the same, Like how do you do that?
You just leave it at the office. Well, see, the
complicating factor with boyfriend Dog is that he works at home. Um,
so I'm I kind of witness firsthand when something is
going south. But he tends to do the same thing

(37:58):
of like I just don't want to talk about it
because it just gets my blood pressure up. You know.
That's not to say he never like blows up, you know,
with work stress or whatever, but he tends to just
be like, you know, I'll just now I'm focused on
you know, making dinner, where now I'm focused on watching TV,
or now I'm focused on hanging out rather than work.
I can't even and he sees it all over my

(38:18):
face because I can't. I literally like getting ready to
come into work today. I was blowing through the house
like really fast and like trying to get ready because
I was doing a million different things, and he just
saw my face and he's like, this isn't You're just
in work land already, aren't you. Yeah, I'm sorry, I can't.
I'll be. I mean, I could, I need to, but

(38:39):
you know, yeah, I should have just come and put
it all on you, Kristen. That's what I'm here for, Caroline,
That's what a podcast is for. I'm not heavy. I'm
your sister, but so so you have that that personal
life benefit for sure. Um, although yeah you should also

(39:00):
you should be able to talk to your significant other
if something is going wrong at work. I shouldn't only
have to speak of positive things. Um. But then you
also have the benefits of future plans and future success because,
as Adam Grant noted, of startups emerged through founders friendships

(39:24):
and where do we meet people we know we like?
And no will work hard at the bar, Caroline just
kidding school and work at t J Max teaching Max. Um,
Hey girl, you look like you can find a deal.
Are you a max any staff? Let's start to start up.

(39:46):
But you know, we've painted a pretty rosy picture of
how important a work spouse is, but there are a
couple downsides if you're not being vigilant about your work
relationships in general. And one thing we pointed out earlier
in that if you are work spouses with someone who
is known for something, maybe for being super negative or

(40:10):
super hilarious or super amazing, like, all of these things
are going to reflect on you, whether it's positive or negative.
So watch out if your work spouse is known for
being like the office negative Nancy. Yeah, and I have
no research to back this up and don't know whether
there is any or not, but well, and I wonder, Caroline,

(40:33):
if that risk is greater for um, same sex work spouses,
because something that I have noticed and somewhat experienced in
workplaces is that especially if you have a male boss,

(40:53):
but female bosses do this too, and your work wife
is a fellow lady, you're like mutual workwives. You gotta
work workplace boss and marriage going on that it's almost
as if the boss sees you as just one person. Yeah,
you know, and it doesn't help sometimes that I don't know,

(41:14):
maybe you both have dark hair. You're kind of on
the pail and the spectrum. I'm talking a little bit
about us, yes, um, because it's uh, and it hasn't
been a negative for us, because I mean we're you know,
charming work wives. Hopefully we get spicy sometimes as does everyone. Um,

(41:37):
but there are there have been those moments where it's
like it's to become one, like we know we're we
are still individual, individual people. Yeah, um remember that. Yeah,
I and I don't know either. I did not come
across anything that indicates whether that's true across the board,

(41:59):
but I can definitely see I can definitely see what
you're talking about, you know, through personal research. Um. There's
also the idea of of missing out. You know, when
your work besties with someone, there's almost that feeling of like,
well why do I have to talk to anyone else?
You know. It was definitely like that at my old
job with my work spouses. Does that make me a

(42:20):
work big missed? Because they were both men anyway, you know,
it's like, well I don't I don't have to mess
with like the people who really bug you. There was
lesson SENTI for me to try to cross that bridge,
build a bridge, cross a bridge, send up a flare,
break out of my silo, because I had work spouses
and they were super funny and supportive and my kind

(42:41):
of people. Yeah. Well, and I would bet that one's
desire to branch out beyond their spouse silo directly correlates
to how long they see themselves in that job, true,
you know, and how much they respect and value the
um the company itself. Yeah. So if I decide I

(43:03):
need to launch a career and like infomercials, like I'm
gonna need to go like probably meet an infomercial like
wife work wife or something, and that makes me sad,
and make sure it's the makeup person A little chip
I learned from a little show. We also hinted earlier

(43:24):
at the complications that can come when your co workers
are jealous of your relationship, or just the complications that
can come out of your work spouse being on a
different level higher or lower, Because is it really an
egalitarian work spousitude ship thing if someone's a manager and
someone's a subordinate. Yeah, and speaking of co workers, will
they look at that and say, well, of course, Virginia

(43:48):
just got a raise because she's friends with Lindy. Lindy's
the boss by the way. Um, and you know the
the massive spouse woe it has to do with your
real spouse. Yeah. I feel like this is the work
spouse elephant in the room, which is the concern that

(44:11):
your work spouse overshadows your spouse spouse. Yeah. So there's
this guy, Willard F. Harley Jr. Who I swear to
God is quoted in like every work spouse article on
the internet. But he's a psychologist and marriage counselor, and
he is majorly concerned with the way that you are
interacting with your sexual orientation matching work spouse. So he

(44:35):
wouldn't be as worried about like Matt and me like
that school or you and me, but he'd be being Matt,
Matt being a gay dude, you being a straight lady. Uh.
He gets really worried though, especially when it comes to
like straight dudes and straight women hanging out, because he
has seen firsthand as a marriage counselor. The he says thousands.

(44:58):
I don't know, but he he said he's seen thousands
of people who've come to him after they've had those
close work relationships evolve into an affair because, as he
points out, like your work spouse. You call that person
a work spouse for a reason. It's a relationship that
meets a lot of needs. Like we've said, it's built
on trust. You probably share a lot of interests. They

(45:19):
get you there, your person you click, You share a
sense of humor, and you probably complain about the same things.
Like if you throw like work travel into the mix
or like work cocktail parties, watch out. Harley's guidelines are
all about like, do not spill your marriage problems to
your work, your opposite or your sexual orientation matching work spouse.

(45:42):
Don't be spilling marriage woes because that makes it sound
like the doors open. Don't get drunk together, don't travel
alone together, maintain those boundaries, talk about your spouse in
a positive way. Make sure that your spouse, your real
life spouse, is included in things so that he or
she does not feel excluded, because you don't want to

(46:02):
make it seem like you have some sort of secret,
clandestine relationship going on. Well, and in terms of not
spelling your marriage problems to someone you might potentially want
to have sex with, because that's basically what the whole
like UH sexual orientation matching is. UM. I think it's

(46:23):
is good advice all around, whether you're in a work
situation or not, because it's like, just be careful if
you are complaining about like if you hear yourself complaining
about the person that you are with to someone who could,
by contrast, start to look a little shinier in your eyes,

(46:44):
if that makes sense. Yeah, is anybody out there watching
uh Man Seeking Woman. It's on f x X. It's
on like one of the sub f X channels, and
there's literally a whole episode about that where there's this
like beautiful charming girl at work and she is close
friends with the lead guy and he's just waiting, he's

(47:04):
just waiting to slip in there, and she starts complaining
about her boyfriend, who turns out to literally be Jesus
Uh played by Fred Armison, which is ironic, um, And
she complains about him and he's like, I've got a
shot and he goes for it and falls on his face.
It's the same thing, like just don't don't leave the
goal unattended. Yeah, yeah, I mean, and that's that also

(47:27):
requires you as the complainer I think maybe checking yourself, yeah,
checking your motivations, what's going on, Maybe considering whether there
is someone who would be healthier to talk to. Yeah,
or even just like a friend who might not have
any vested interests at all. Um, I like that this
episode just became us giving like marriage advice. You're welcome,

(47:52):
so expect your bill in the mail anytime, thanks to
stamps dot Com. But alright, so we have to get
an agenda, right, I mean, we're sminty and we've kind
of danced around the whole gender topic. Uh, this is
coming from a couple different sources psychology today, the comparably
organization European Business Review. But work friendships tend to have

(48:13):
a couple different types of rewards. You've got the socio
emotional rewards, which is basically you're sharing pleasure in experiences,
and then instrumental rewards, which have to do with exchanging favors.
And again we're going to talk in like pretty stereotypical
broadbrush terms, but for the most part, women are more
likely to enjoy the socio emotional rewards of forming work friendships,

(48:37):
while men are more likely to participate in those instrumental
reward friendships. And uh to break this down, a little
bit of study done by comparably asked users in text
specifically whether they had a mentor and whether they had
a best friend at work, and women were way more
likely at all levels of the job to say, yes,

(48:58):
I have a mentor, I've formed a lationship with someone
in that regard, and yes I have a best friend
at work. And that has a lot to do with
the way that researchers say women form friendships with one another.
So Lisa Brateman, who's a psychotherapist, told Refinery twenty nine
that women are more likely to share personal details at work,

(49:22):
which equates to a whole load of lady intimacy basically,
and that is basically the foundation of friendship, right You're
sharing stuff about yourself, and that is definitely a quick
way to form a work friendship, especially a work best friendship.
And because women are more likely to do this than
men are, apparently that makes that steady result makes sense

(49:44):
that women are therefore more likely to have a bestie
at work or a mentor that they formed a close
relationship with. Well, and we're also likelier to seek that
kind of emotional support when we are stressed at work
and to both receive and provide more emotional social support
than men in times of work related unhappiness or distressed.

(50:06):
And along those same lines, women tend to invest more
in maintaining those friendships, calling friends regularly, meeting more frequently,
always b g. Chatting the gifts back and forth. Yeah,
and it's the thing that you said about supporting each
other being more likely to support each other in stressful

(50:28):
times at work. That ties back to the stuff we
mentioned earlier about how those work spouse ships are based
on a huge amount of trust you know, and how
your work satisfaction and therefore your work productivity is based
on knowing that you have someone behind you who's going
to support you. You know that you have someone to
talk to, someone who's gonna believe what you're saying and

(50:49):
support what you're doing. But when it comes to men
at work, again disclaimer, this is all very general, But
when it comes to men at work generally, their friendship
can be described as those instrumental or transactional friendships. They
tend to be organized around those shared interests and activities
or the exchange of tangible rewards and favors, and be

(51:12):
action oriented rather than person oriented. Hence everybody's going out
to play golf or whatever, or you go to the
box of the football game, yeah yeah, or whatever the
equivalent is. You guys are all playing duck Hunt together.
That's just gonna keep it's the duck Hunt is the
mascot of this episode. I'm fine with that. Or sushi,

(51:34):
just a slab of sushi. And one recent study that
I'm like, uh okay. One recent study said that it's
possible that mail co workers go out drinking together more
because it lowers all of their like pent up masculine emotions.
And I have to raise an eyebrow at that, because
that sounds very like I don't know. I went out
drinking with co workers quite a bit, and it was

(51:56):
always mixed gender groups, just to jobs blowoff team. I'm
curious what exact inhibitions they're referring to. I think they're
referring to those like scio emotional oh of getting beyond
the like getting beyond like the let's go out for
stats to being like you know what, I'm actually pretty

(52:18):
vulnerable and I enjoy art and enjoy art, and also
I'm scared about where my career is going. And I
was really interested too in this this socio economic note
about male work friendships. Uh. This one study cited was
saying that working class or blue collar guys at work

(52:39):
tend to express that transactional nature of friendship with material
goods and services, like hey, I'll exchange wrenches with you.
They're exchanging wrenches. That's actually symbol of marriage in some societies. Uh,
while middle class or white collar dudes were more like

(53:00):
to share those leisure activities like going golfing or going
to a baseball game. But I want to go back
to one thing before we, UM start to wrap up
in terms of the finding that work women's work friendships
tend to center around the socio emotional rewards, just having

(53:21):
the pleasure and the shared experiences, whereas men's work relationships,
um are more favor based. You kind of go out
to get ahead. And I think that I've brought this
exact same scenario up on a previous podcast, UM, but
clearly it's just stuck in my mind, UM because it
reminds me of a tweet that we received a while

(53:45):
back from a young woman who wants to get ahead
and socialize, but she can't go out for drinks because
it's all guys at her office and they never directly
invite her, and she feels it feels like she can't

(54:06):
go because she would, you know, like kill the all
guy vibe. Um. So I wonder if it is so
much of his and hers like oh we just have this,
you know, our sociomotion rewards, or is that the ceiling
is that like all we can really access. Yeah, I

(54:27):
mean I've definitely heard of women like taking golf lessons
so that they can participate in like the upper management
boys club, that is the golf outings where business is
discussed on on the green. But that's a really good point. Yeah,
I mean it could be like, yeah, it could be

(54:48):
that women genuinely are appreciating these types of relationships and
men are appreciating those types of relationships. But if you
can't even get an invite to one or the other, right,
because that kind of after hours networking is where a
lot of promotions come from. And if you can't even

(55:10):
get in the bar, or if you do get in
the bar, it's really awkward because you have to play
the whole like, oh my god, you guys are here,
Oh so weird. I'm here too, I alone not because
I'm sad. Um, I've just wanted, Oh can I join you?
You know, and your palms are sweating, so the glass
slips out of your hand and it's just a disaster
shatter and you cut your leg and you've got to

(55:30):
go to the hospital and then you miss work and
then they fire you. See see what networking brings you Exactly,
That's what networking felt like when I was unemployed. It's true.
But all that to say that I hope that workplaces
become more just cognizant of those unnecessary hang ups that

(55:52):
we have and really prejudices toward men and women or
people who match sexual orientations, is or Harvey put it,
um of those people forming relationships like going to one
on one lunch together, going out for drinks one on
one if they need to, because I think, yeah, like
in group settings, totally fine, not a big deal. But

(56:14):
as soon as you have after hours time with your
work husband and suddenly eyebrowser rays. Yeah. But hopefully if
you have formed if if you are a straight lady
and a straight guy, um, I mean hopefully you've you
followed the guidelines for work spouse ship and you guys

(56:37):
do have a very open honest relationship and your significant
others and your co workers are aware that like, no,
nothing's going on, and that it doesn't become a situation
where everything is blown out of proportion because people are
just gossiping about you, like look at look at them
spending all of that time together. And if you are
consistently hanging out outside of work hours with with that

(57:00):
work spouse, when you also have a spouse, it might
be a good idea to just make sure that spouses
so together, just just ease everyone's minds. Um, but how
do you even get to that point? You know? How
how do you do you get down on one like
to get to get a work spouse. Do I need

(57:20):
to go get a ring, get down on one knee,
save up two months salary and get a little twist
tie you put it on the pointer finger. Um, that's
that's the work spouse finger finger Yeah. Um. Well, researchers
basically across the board are like, you know, there are
certain ways that friendships, no matter what the setting, are formed.

(57:43):
Here's a quick guide. I love it, like become work
spouses in forty five minutes and less. And that's basically
to be vulnerable because if you want to form a
close bestie ship or friendship at work, You're not going
to get there by just talking about the weather. So
if you like somebody at work and you think you
guys could be good friends, allies could trust each other

(58:05):
and help each other. Um, it's swapping those personal stories.
It's work. Spouse ships are formed on the basis of
knowing so much about each other and still supporting each other.
It's kind of like. It all ties in back to
uh Ann Friedman's Shine theory about supporting your powerful besties
and not being intimidated by them. And Robert Epstein, who's

(58:26):
at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology, says, quote,
vulnerability is the key to emotional bonding, without which relationships
tend to feel superficial and meaningless. That doesn't mean you
need to be talking about all your issues like at work,
in front of everyone. But when you do have those
closer one on one relationships, don't be afraid to be vulnerable. Yeah, yeah,

(58:51):
be vulnerable without over sharing, right, you know, maybe hold
off on talking about your romantic relationships and also be
mindful of personal space. Maybe you're hopeful work spouse to
be you know, doesn't need to know about your menstrual
cycle yet yet. Yeah, we'll ease that in and then

(59:14):
of course avoid gossip at first when you start when
you're embarking on a new work marriage, because as we
discussed about my earlier about my super awful coworker at
my first job, that negativity just breeds more negativity. And
if people get the impression that they can't trust you too,

(59:35):
because all you're gonna do is talk smack about and
behind their backs. Like, what's the point of having a
work spouse if everybody else hates you? Yeah, yeah, you
need to just find another job, I think at that point. Yeah,
if all you can do is literally say horrible things
about eachach other or other people at work, that probably
just means you're unhappy in your job, going to do
something else. Yeah, Well, and that does get us to

(59:58):
one thing that we haven't directly addressed, which is the
work spouse divorce, you know, because yeah, you can just
like friendships can get toxic and you gotta let them go,
similar thing can happen, especially in the workplace, because I mean,
you have you've got a lot more on the line.

(01:00:19):
So I'm curious to hear from listeners who have work
spouses and if anyone is going to share with us
going through kind of the work spouse divorce, you know,
did you finally have to call it or was it
like a work spouse slow fade? And when if you
get a new job and the friendship didn't continue. All

(01:00:40):
these relationships are so like they seem so sterile, you know,
from the outside, but um, when you really start paying
attention to them, they're full of matching feminist mugs. They
are they are, and lots of games of duck hunt
and platters of sushi when they're at their best, you know. Um,

(01:01:01):
So please share all your work wife, work husband, work
spouse do you and also do you have a preferred
uh title for that? Do you do not call your
person your your work spouse? Um, let let us know
all the dates. Mom Stuff at how stuff works dot
com is our email address. You can also tweet us

(01:01:22):
at mom Stuff podcast or messages on Facebook. And we've
got a couple of messages to share with you right now. Well,
I've got a message here from a drill from our
episode where we talked to Anne Marie Slaughter about caregiving.

(01:01:44):
She says this is an extremely important topic and I'm
so glad that it's finally being brought to the forefront.
Up until recently, I never fully appreciated how important having quality,
free childcare has been to my own success. I got
pregnant my sophomore year of college. For the first year
of my son's life, it was a struggle trying to
figure out how to work, go to school, and pay

(01:02:05):
for daycare. I remember having to choose between staying home
with a sick one year old and going to work.
I also remember being fired because of choosing to stay
home with my sick one year old. But my story
does have a happy ending. When my son was too
I took a job working at a daycare. The pace sucked,
but he could go to daycare for free, and that

(01:02:25):
was a tremendous help. I was able to save my
money and spend it on important things like rent and food.
Having childcare also allowed me to finish my undergraduate degree,
and it also helped me to go on to complete
my masters as well. I owe a lot of my
success to having free childcare. If it were not for that,
I do not know where my son and I would be.

(01:02:46):
No one should ever have to choose between something basic
like feeding their family or affording their care. Yet sadly
this happens every day. Care is a basic human right
that everyone should have access to, and I agree here
here thanks for your letter. Well, I have a letter
here from Amelia who right. First, I love your work
and fierce feminism. I've learned quite a few new things

(01:03:08):
from your podcast, and listening is always a treat. Well,
thank you, Amelia. Secondly, the recent episode with Anne Marie
Slaughter really hit home for me. I'm thirty two and
stuck between having a baby and going to grad school.
I have so many questions and self doubts about any
avenue I pursue. Do I had to grad school knowing
I'll be thirty six when I have my first baby.

(01:03:29):
Do I put off grad school so I can utilize
my young ish eggs, or do I strap on my
cape and do both at the same time. All my
choices are daunting, and most professional women I've asked don't
have any answers either. I have asked several of my
professors who have small children what they suggest, and I've
heard everything from just have a baby now, you're not

(01:03:50):
getting any younger too, there's really no good time to
have kids. The worst and most memorable piece of advice
I got was well, at least your fiance has done
with a degree, What the heck is it girl supposed
to say to that? So, while your interview with miss
Slaughter did not necessarily assuage any of my worries, I
am relieved to know that there are strong women willing

(01:04:11):
to have these conversations and fight for a level of
equality which is long overdue. While things may not change
over night, I'm hopeful that our generation may be the
last to know this inequality. And Marie Slaughter is a badass,
and so are you? Please keep up the great work. Well,
you know what, Amelia, You're a badass as well. And
those are such daunting questions that I have a feeling,

(01:04:35):
uh so many listeners can relate to As a woman
in my thirties, I think I think similar things as well. Um, honestly,
it's just it's just weird having ovaries sometimes just know
when they're sitting in there. Yeah, yeah, that's true. Um,
But yeah, I also am am really excited that Amory Slaughter, Hi,

(01:04:58):
Gen Poo and other amazing people are working for that
equality that we all need. So with that, keep sending
your letters mom. Stuff at how stuff works dot com
is our email address and for links to all of
our social media as well as all of our blogs, videos,
and podcasts with our sources so you can learn more
about work wives. Head on over to stuff mom Never

(01:05:21):
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