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Comment by renewiltord | Hacker News Reader

The real wisdom of this graph is that for people who aren't friends with their coworkers, they are spending 4x as much time with not friends as friends. For people who are friends with their coworkers they're just cheating on that play, boosting their friend time.

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I think it depends on your role and the relations between the coworkers. Most people can't really be boss and friend at the same time. In some companies backstabbers are plenty and you need to be careful with whom you share your thoughts and weaknesses. So it's wise to clearly separate the "shallow&fake friends" from your real friends with whom you can let your guard down.

On the other hand we can use it as a criterion on selecting a good workplace. If you do not feel comfortable with your coworkers then maybe you should not work there.

I've never lasted long at any position I didn't rapidly make friends. It certainly doesn't apply to everyone's personality but if I can't enjoy the company of people I spend a massive part of my day with it's a no go.

I don't find fulfillment in my work. I hate the question "What do you do for a living?" I am there because I need to be until I have enough not to be, and so while I'm there I can't afford to be miserable too.

I presume that you are an American. In many cultures the idea of making frie. In many cultures the idea of making friends at work is frowned upon because

I never made friends anywhere :/

(in person, i did get friend requests in internet games)

I've always thought not being friends with your coworkers is a defense mechanism. Most of us have to work to survive, so getting emotionally involved and ending up with an uncomfortable or toxic environment (one with conflict and favoritism) is a big risk.

I've observed that the more highly paid and "professional" your work environment, the harder it is to make friends through work.

I used to work with a few coworkers in the same team and had a very 'defensive' approach as mentioned. Once we actually moved into completely separate departments we actually became pretty good friends. I think that removes the 'competitiveness' factor somewhat.

This is one of those points of controversy that foreigners in Japan bring up. But for me the idea of making friends at work seemed unusual and I felt that the Japanese way of doing things was correct, and it come to me that the Japanese expat community is highly US-centric.

In Japan it is however common for people from university to graduate together enter their workplace together at the same job, and then get promoted together and change department together etc..

Something I told the younger engineers in my last so-many years before I retired: "It's not the project you're working on, it's your co-workers. If you find a team where you're happy, where the manager is cool, stay there."

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