By Dana Wilkie
Jul 2, 2018 - SHRM
Now, perhaps more than ever, employees have ways to stay "connected" to one another while at work. They have e-mail. Texting. Facebook. Twitter. Instagram. LinkedIn. And more.
Yet despite these tools that allow constant interaction, many of the nation's workers feel isolated while on the job, according to studies and experts.
"Today—between e-mails, teleconferences and texting—it can be easy to go an entire day without meeting a colleague in person, which was not as much of a concern just a few decades ago," said Douglas Nemecek, chief medical officer for behavioral health at insurance carrier Cigna, which recently released a study on loneliness in America. "Additionally, in our busy world, it has become challenging to take a lunch break [with a co-worker] or to swing by the watercooler to catch up with colleagues. But those actions are important to keeping loneliness at bay."
No Substitute for Face-to-Face Interaction
Addressing employee loneliness has become a priority for Fortune 500 companies in the past decade, according to Cornell University's Center for Advanced Human Resource Studies. For instance, one of the 12 questions that polling company Gallup says measures the most important elements of employee engagement is "Do you have a best friend at work?"
One study conducted in August 2014 in the U.K. suggested that 42 percent of people do not.
A study published in 2011 by two professors—one from California State University in Sacramento and one from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business—found that "greater employee loneliness led to poorer task, team role, and relational performance." It concluded that an employee's loneliness triggers emotional withdrawal from the organization.
In interviews with SHRM Online, both study authors said face-to-face interactions are the best way to combat loneliness at work. But, they acknowledged, that's not always easy.
"Because modern technology can make so many demands on our time and energy, people become more selfish about the one-on-one time they give to others," said Hakan Ozcelik, one of the study authors and a professor at California State University's College of Business Administration. "In an era where people are increasingly immersed in and overstimulated with communications technology, employees are likely to get less generous when it comes to allocating the time needed to create closer work interactions, and they become less tolerant when it comes to spending the time on those work relationships that need some strengthening or repairing."
Face-to-face communication takes considerable emotional and physical effort because it requires interpreting and responding to verbal and nonverbal cues, he explained. In fact, he said, about 70 percent of face-to-face communication involves reading nonverbal cues, such as expressions and body language, that can help clarify what a person is actually saying.
Those cues aren't present in an e-mail or a text, he said.
"Sending an e-mail about a work-related topic might be more convenient c [but] when employees refrain from face-to-face communication, especially at times when they need to read and interpret each other's nonverbal cues, they put themselves in a communication process that is deprived of some crucial messages they need" to create strong relationships.
Sigal Barsade is the other study author. He is the Joseph Frank Bernstein Professor of Management at the Wharton School.
"We know from research that we get a fuller channel of emotional signaling when we can see and hear people, and that people are notoriously bad at reading emotions from e-mails, although they think they are good at it," Barsade said. "I would argue that, in general, we have a better chance of connecting if we take the time and energy to try to interact with others at work in the fullest way possible—meaning walking over and saying hello, or at least calling if you can't do that. There are no shortcuts for this."
Ways to Combat Loneliness
Having good relationships with one's co-workers reduces feelings of loneliness and is good for one's health, Nemecek said.
In a study released in May, Cigna found that nearly 9 in 10 respondents (89 percent) who said they had "good," "very good" or "excellent" relationships with co-workers were also in "good," "very good" or "excellent" health. Only 65 percent of those who reported having "fair" or "poor" relationships with co-workers were in similarly good health.
Some ways to strengthen relationships with co-workers and to combat loneliness, he suggested, include:
It's also important for workers and especially managers to watch for clues that someone may be lonely, a condition that can lead not only to lack of productivity and poor work quality but also depression, Nemecek said.
"It's important that all of us are alert to the signs of those around us who may be in distress, so we can offer our compassion and support," he said. "As a manager, it is important to get to know your team members as people, to share with them, and to create a relationship so that they feel safe sharing with you."
And creating those relationships means putting workplace distractions aside—even if just for a little while, Ozcelik said. He noted that lonely people can tend to perceive certain remarks or actions—no matter how innocently said or made—as rejection.
"Imagine a lonely employee who tries to reach out to her manager to create a closer relationship by revealing herself, and somewhere in the middle of this conversation the manager impulsively checks her e-mail because she's seen a message that needs a response," he said. "And to make things worse, the manager starts writing a response. While some employees might tolerate this, others—and especially those who feel lonely—might perceive these distractions as a sign of interpersonal rejection or disrespect."
Finally, HR representatives should regularly remind workers of the resources available to those who may be struggling with loneliness or other mental health issues, including the phone numbers for employee assistance programs, Nemecek said.