Sam sits to your left, but you know him as “the doomsayer.” With each new project, he prophesies epic failure and marks every email urgent—including the one about not microwaving strong-smelling food in the break room.
Mary, in the cube next door, loves to turn on the live feed of a falcon nest, sans headphones. The chirpings are intermittent, as are the judging looks she casts toward every soda can that gets trashed. You don’t like either of them.
This leaves you in the middle. With your aromatic lamb curry and an empty recycling bin, where do your quirks fall on the office likability scale: above grim guy or below bird lady?
We’re all contestants in the popularity game, and getting the thumbs-up from coworkers can make you genuinely happier. “Likable people are more apt to be hired, get help at work, get useful information from others, and have mistakes forgiven,” writes Sue Shellenbarger of the Wall Street Journal.
So how do you get those good vibes flowing? It takes more than basic job competency. Take our twelve-step challenge and up your likability score.
Step 1: Ask Around
“Whether you believe you have a reputation or not, you’ve got one,” says Eric Hansen, an organizational-development consultant and 1992 MOB alum. “People are talking about you over the water cooler all the time.” Tapping into popular opinion can help you accomplish the first step of improving likability: developing self-awareness. No need to wiretap the office watering hole though. Start with a self-assessment, like the one offered by Tim Sanders, author of The Likeability Factor.1 Then reach out. Katie Cherrington, an HR business partner with Hewlett-Packard, recommends asking a few people you trust to identify your unlikable quirks. Pool several opinions to find out what behaviors people are picking up on as irritating.
This step takes boldness, but it certainly pays off. “The people you see rise to the top in organizations are those who are constantly wanting to improve and asking for feedback,” says Cherrington, a 2009 MPA alum.
Action item: Choose two coworkers you know well and get their honest assessments.
Step 2: Face the Feedback
Ignoring criticism will damage your office appeal—even if you’re the cream of the crop. For example, Cherrington coached a vice president who came with all the right credentials—except a willingness to listen to feedback. “We’ve let go of really smart, talented, high-performing individuals because no one wanted to work with them. For those who are arrogant, their career prospects are very limited,” she says.
Resist the temptation to shrug off unfavorable news. “Be honest about where you are and who you are,” Hansen counsels. “Be able to talk about the shortcomings you have and invite others to help you with those.”
Action item: Consider what others might experience when they’re around you in the office.
Step 3: Put Some Heart in It
All you need is love: likable people take a genuine interest in others.
Sunnie Giles, an executive-communication coach, recommends meeting others’ needs proactively, with no strings attached. Notice a colleague working through lunch? Offer to grab an extra sandwich on your way. Does your cube neighbor need a second set of eyes on an upcoming report? Make yourself available.
Keep examining your motivations though. If you’re only in it for popularity or praise, no number of steps will help. A study of CEOs by Northumbria University found that successful leaders are authentic people, which allows them to win coworkers over and create change.
“The people who are liked a lot at work are not the people who develop relations with an agenda,” says Giles, a 1992 accounting grad. “They are willing to do favors just because.”
Action item: Help someone with a task and get to know him or her better while you do.
Step 4: Take Time for Talk
Do you avoid the break room or shun office activities? Everyone needs alone time, but the corporate world already has plenty. Trade confinement for colloquy.
“At the heart of likability is conversation,” says David Sturt, executive vice president of O.C. Tanner and 1992 MBA alum. “It’s in how you talk to people, how you interact, and what you talk about.”
Create—and attend—opportunities for talk both in and out of the office. Weekly informal gatherings with something to munch on set the stage for interaction. The occasional larger activity also yields likability. Sturt took his team go-karting: “I saw things come out of people that I’d never imagined. Often we only see a single dimension in a work setting. If you can get to know people outside of that you see other dimensions. Friendships begin to emerge in ways that you can’t do living entirely within the formalities of business transactions.”
Action item: Spend ten minutes of your workday talking with someone.
Step 5: Clock Face Time
Once you start talking more, you might notice a decrease in email. Don’t panic; you’re on your way to higher likability.
To be liked, be embodied, says Curtis LeBaron, a Marriott School professor who researches nonverbal behaviors. “Face-to-face encounters deepen people’s commitment and involvement and increase their energy and their discretionary effort,” he says. “When a leader reaches out and connects with someone in a likable and a meaningful way, people give more of themselves to their work and are happier at the same time.”
This means skipping the send button to handle concerns in person. If you must address a problem via email, previously banked face time can prevent misunderstanding. Telecommuters must take care to establish some in-person encounters. “From time to time it’s wise—maybe even necessary—to make a deeper connection with people,” LeBaron says.
Action item: Next time someone turns in top-grade work, visit his or her cube to give in-person praise.
Step 6: Make a Match
Flattery might actually get you somewhere: casually imitating the posture and gestures of whomever you’re talking with can signal likability. According to LeBaron, “People who are very good at connecting with others tend to match the behaviors of the people they’re with. Matching is one of the ways we subtly and unconsciously say, ‘We’re not just together; we’re like each other, and we like each other.’”
Though mirroring behavior usually happens unconsciously, you can do it intentionally in small doses, particularly during job interviews. But beware of overdoing it; mimicking a few subtle gestures is enough. Parroting is just as annoying as it was in elementary school—and a tad creepier as an adult.
Action item: Give matching a try in your next hallway conversation.
Step 7: Avoid Hovering
You’ve got enough on your plate, and no one likes a micromanager. In a 2002 survey by FranklinCovey, workers listed micromanaging as one of the most significant barriers to completing their most important tasks.
Keith Murnighan, author of Do Nothing! How to Stop Overmanaging and Become a Great Leader, warned against creating this barrier. “It’s obvious that you should hire trustworthy people who have skills,” he writes. “Then it pays to let them do what they can do and trust them to do it well. Leaders have two choices: to trust people or to micromanage them. The first one beats the second by a mile.”
People who are very good at connecting with others tend to match the behaviors of the people they’re with. Matching is one of the ways we subtly and unconsciously say, “We’re not just together; we’re like each other, and we like each other.” —Curtis LeBaron
If you find yourself checking in on employees multiple times a day, evaluate whether you’ve slipped into the hover habit or if more training is needed.
Action item: Identify individuals who feel oversupervised and work with them to create a new management strategy.
Step 8: Find Friends
Love web comics or obscure indie rock? Your office could be full of fellow fans.
To discover similar souls, Sanders suggests the FiveByFive exercise: Write down five of your passions and hobbies and five of your frequent work contacts. Then try to fill in hobbies and passions for those people. Though you see these people often, you may have no idea what to put down, so ask around. In Sanders’s test group, almost three out of four people found a connection between their hobbies and those of their frequent contacts.
“If you start to match passions, you will build an important layer of shock and stress absorption into your business relationships,” Sanders says. “When people are connected at the passion level, they are connected at the emotional level too.”
Action item: Connect outside the cube through the FiveByFive challenge.2
Step 9: Nix Negativity
A good complaining session is a great way to bond, but no one wants to hear about how bad things are all the time. If you find yourself feeling grumpy, try identifying what’s going right. Another approach is to couple your problem-identifying skills with good problem solving.
Cherrington used this technique in coaching a coworker whose teammates saw him as too negative. “He was constantly bringing up where the problems were, which was great because we needed to identify those,” she says. “But the second step is developing solutions.” Once he was given this feedback, he became a problem solver. His teammates’ perception of him changed, and his happiness on the job increased.
Action item: When you comment on a problem, also offer a solution.
On the likability scale there’s room for all kinds. The Sheldons and Gonzos of the world often prove to be the most lovable. No one needs to crush their love of falcons to be liked (just temper the volume, please).
Step 10: About-Face
Tuning into others might mean realigning your spine—just a bit. By orienting your body toward people, you not only make yourself open to interaction but also make them the focus of your attention.
A study LeBaron helped conduct found that when doctors put down their paperwork and turn toward patients, likability goes up. “They seemed focused on patients rather than artifacts,” he says. “We orient toward the things that matter to us, and that includes people.”
When a coworker comes to pass along a document, turning away from your keyboard can transform a brief encounter into a likability session. Once you’ve opened up and detached from the screen, real conversation can happen.
Action item: Practice the drop-and-turn in conversations at home.
Step 11: Don’t Be in It to Win It
You can’t please everyone, nor should you try. In fact, attempting to get everyone on your fan list might decrease your likability. Instead start from a grounded place and work on what matters most to you. Remember your initial feedback and go with what seems most broadly applicable.
“The standards of likability change depending on who you talk to,” Giles counsels. “When you’re adapting to every situation, it’s a never-ending battle. You’re going to be completely exhausted if you keep dancing to different tunes.”
To strike a balance, Hansen suggests being forthcoming when you can’t make everyone happy. “You’re always going to disappoint some people. But if you can manage expectations up-front by giving people a heads-up, business relationships can survive and thrive long-term.”
Action item: Accept that not everyone will like you.
Step 12: Be Yourself
On the likability scale there’s room for all kinds. The Sheldons and Gonzos of the world often prove to be the most lovable. No one needs to crush their love of falcons to be liked (just temper the volume, please).
“Everybody has a unique combination of traits and values that if they just play at who they are and be thoughtful around the beneficiaries of their work, they will be liked,” Sturt says.
Even shy people can stay true to themselves by simply being friends with the coworkers they feel the most comfortable around. “Likable people say hello at the office,” says Cherrington. “They are willing to share their resources and networks to help people be successful. They are good team players. And it doesn’t mean they have to be extroverts.”
No matter what degree of eccentricity you possess, likability includes liking yourself. “Most of the time, when you’re confident in yourself that becomes an influence to improving your likability,” Giles says.
Action item: Choose the quirks you’d like to keep and embrace your inner oddball—lamb curry and all.
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Article written by Katie Pitts Olson
Illustrated by Jonathan Bartlett
