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Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

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Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#41

Post by jlawson »

40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

I wish people of my color, gender, or belief were allowed to make a club, or join yours. It sounds great. Maybe something like this is why whites commit suicide so much more than blacks in America (per CDC [1]). Blacks suffer in many ways but at least they're allowed to make a community just about themselves, and that's valuable.

[1] https://www.realclearscience.com/journal_club/2013/04/05/us_...!

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#42

Post by ams6110 »

LiterallyDoge wrote: post #22
aisengard wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mixing money and family/friends sounds like it will end horribly. What happens when you don't break even and you need to fire people?

I would say, just brief them at the start "I might fire you tomorrow, go in expecting that, we'll set you up something else if I do. Don't rely on this." Kind of like the way you lend money to friends. That said, you probably shouldn't lend money to friends.

You shouldn't really even do business with friends.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#43

Post by atom-morgan »

40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

> These sorts of groups get a lot of flak from folks who don't think these groups should exist or that companies should not focus on "diversity"

Including myself (mixed race). I find the "hang out with people who look like me" mentality to be really weird and when a company's idea of diversity is basically this, it's more offensive than racial slurs to be honest.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#45

Post by danbolt »

JimboOmega wrote: post #29
GauntletWizard wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your heart in the right place, but your solution is part of the problem - you don't have a community outside of work, because your community interactions are "tainted" by your ERG association.

The original article won't load but I disagree. While building your entire social life around work and work friends can be a bit dangerous, I think ERGs have an important role to play in combating loneliness at work. Work can be a bit isolating when you have a very different background from a lot of your coworkers. Having a group that shares some aspect of your background that you can talk to about that shared perspe…

My first full-time job out of school was exactly like that. At first I found it lonely as a lot of my peers were a decade or two older than me with kids, and mostly treated the job like a 9-5.

As investment into the company increased, more juniors were hired that had the similar life situations, liked to do similar activities, etc. My attachment to the company became much stronger after that.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#46

Post by thex10 »

jlawson wrote: post #41
40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

I wish people of my color, gender, or belief were allowed to make a club, or join yours. It sounds great. Maybe something like this is why whites commit suicide so much more than blacks in America (per CDC [1]). Blacks suffer in many ways but at least they're allowed to make a community just about themselves, and that's valuable. [1] https://www.realclearscience.com/journal_club/2013/04/05/us_... !

My (black) spouse has talked with me about their thorough support of this idea. They think there ought to be white student unions, white history month, white studies courses, etc. I wouldn't mind seeing this happen, if white folks could do it without hate or exclusion of others (which probably requires acknowledging and destroying white supremacy).

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#47

Post by 40acres »

jlawson wrote: post #41
40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

I wish people of my color, gender, or belief were allowed to make a club, or join yours. It sounds great. Maybe something like this is why whites commit suicide so much more than blacks in America (per CDC [1]). Blacks suffer in many ways but at least they're allowed to make a community just about themselves, and that's valuable. [1] https://www.realclearscience.com/journal_club/2013/04/05/us_... !

I've found that even if an ERG was created around a particular identity that does not mean that you have to have that identity to be welcome, for instance -- everyone looks forward to when the Indian ERG throws a party because the food is amazing, everyone is invited and the event schedule is public.

Also, ERGs are simply a more formal organization, in my company official ERGs some receive funding to support events. At a previous work campus we set up regular basketball and volleyball games after work using a simple mailing list and a share point like internal forum system.

I've seen groups where the focus is those who identify as "makers" and also a group for drone hobbyists. You can think of these groups as "special interest groups" to use a political term, but most of these groups are not exclusive.. for instance, you can join the NAACP regardless of race.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#48

Post by thex10 »

danbolt wrote: post #45
JimboOmega wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The original article won't load but I disagree. While building your entire social life around work and work friends can be a bit dangerous, I think ERGs have an important role to play in combating loneliness at work. Work can be a bit isolating when you have a very different background from a lot of your coworkers. Having a group that shares some aspect of your background that you can talk to about that shared perspe…

My first full-time job out of school was exactly like that. At first I found it lonely as a lot of my peers were a decade or two older than me with kids, and mostly treated the job like a 9-5. As investment into the company increased, more juniors were hired that had the similar life situations, liked to do similar activities, etc. My attachment to the company became much stronger after that.

My company has an early career professional group for exactly this. Provides a community of younger junior folks.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#49

Post by 40acres »

atom-morgan wrote: post #43
40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

> These sorts of groups get a lot of flak from folks who don't think these groups should exist or that companies should not focus on "diversity" Including myself (mixed race). I find the "hang out with people who look like me" mentality to be really weird and when a company's idea of diversity is basically this, it's more offensive than racial slurs to be honest.

I think of these groups as a shallow proxy for common interests, as mentioned I've seen ERG type groups at my company that don't have to deal with sexual, racial, gender, etc identity.

These groups are similar to an ice breaker in a conversation with someone new, usually I try to find something common with a person I've just met that we can share experiences over.

The ERGs at my org are not exclusive at all, the Latino, Women, and Black ERGs organize a yearly leadership conference that everyone is invited too and has a very diverse set of topics that can be discussed. The new grads at my company are automatically enrolled into the ERG mailing list and I've developed really tight bonds with folks I met there, there is a yearly ski trip with about 25 people that I'm apart of that started with folks who met through the new grad ERG.

Re: Fighting the “loneliness epidemic” at work

#50

Post by dragonwriter »

jlawson wrote: post #41
40acres wrote: post #11

The average American spends too much time at work to not have some sort of social, not 100% related to work, activities and groups that they can be apart of. As a black employee I'm very plugged in the employee resource group for black employees at my organization. I've been able to give back to the local community through volunteering, develop mentee and mentor relationships through this network and develop a sense…

I wish people of my color, gender, or belief were allowed to make a club, or join yours. It sounds great. Maybe something like this is why whites commit suicide so much more than blacks in America (per CDC [1]). Blacks suffer in many ways but at least they're allowed to make a community just about themselves, and that's valuable. [1] https://www.realclearscience.com/journal_club/2013/04/05/us_... !

> Maybe something like this is why whites commit suicide so much more than blacks in America

Whites officially commit suicide more than blacks because blacks who are even slightly inclined to self-destruction find it all to easy to get into situations that produce death by means that won't officially be viewed as suicide.

> Blacks suffer in many ways but at least they're allowed to make a community just about themselves

Whites can, and do, make communities just about themselves. Now, it's true that the ones that aren't purely and nakedly about virulent racism usually do it about some more specific subset of Whiteness (like a particular national/ethnic identity like Italian or Irish, etc.), probably because Whiteness as such (in America, at least) is not a particularly strong shared experience and identity (some other racial identities, particularly Black identity, are, but largely as a consequence of extended subjugation by the broader society which deliberately destroyed other identities in the group and produced a new common shared experience.)

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