Interpersonal Communication- A Mindful Approach to Relationships, 2020a

Ability to Focus
Have you ever found your mind wandering while you are trying to work? One of the most important
things when it comes to getting our work done is having the ability to focus. Within an organizational context,
Methot defines “ability to focus” as “the ability to pay attention to value-producing activities without
being concerned with extraneous issues such as off-task thoughts or distractions.” 36 When individuals
have healthy relationships with their coworkers, they are more easily able to focus their attention on the
work at hand. On the other hand, if your coworkers always play politics, stab each other in the back, gossip,
and engage in numerous other counterproductive workplace (or deviant workplace) behaviors, then
it’s going to be a lot harder for you to focus on your job.
Types of Coworker Relationships
Information Peer
* Information Sharing
* Workplace Socialization/Onboarding
* Networking
* Knowledge Management/Maintenance
Collegial Peer
* Career Strategizing
* Job-Related Feedback
* Recognizing Competence/Performance
* Friendship
Special Peer
* Confirmation
* Emotional Support
* Personal Feedback
* Friendship
Figure 13.5 Types of Coworker Relationships
Now that we’ve looked at some of the
characteristics of coworker relationships,
let’s talk about the three different types
of coworkers that research has categorized.
Kathy Kram and Lynn Isabella
found that there are essentially three
different types of coworker relationships
in the workplace: information peer,
collegial peer, and special peer. 37 Figure
13.5 illustrates the basic things we get
from each of these different types of
peer relationships.
are so-called because
we rely on these individuals for
information about job tasks and the
organization itself. As you can see from
Figure 13.5, we engage information
peers in four basic types of activities we
engage information peers for information
sharing, workplace socialization and
onboarding, networking, and knowledge
management and maintenance.
Information Sharing
First, we share information with our information peers. Of course, this information is task-focused, so the
information is designed to help us complete our job better.
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Interpersonal Communication