Coworkers: Do you like them?

I guess my question is a little more than, "do you like them..."
I read this article about liking and socializing with your coworkers, and I became more curious.
Some of us spend more time with coworkers than with our loved ones and I guess it is important to get along,
or at least have a good working relationship.
But how many people really like their coworkers and want to spend time with them outside of work?

I don't like most of my coworkers.
I wouldn't be friends outside of the work connection.
That being said, I respect some of them and have a decent working relationship with a few.
They keep trying to set up social functions outside of work and one of the ones I like agrees with me:
neither of us want to spend any more time with them than we have to.
My time outside of work is my time (yes, bolded and italicized).
I want to spend it with people that I enjoy being around, and those people just aren't my coworkers.
I do maintain a good relationship with them on a work-level and I've found that, at the moment,
bowing out of baby showers, happy hours, and some ridiculous yoga retreat on a weekend (which just happens to be two days after my birthday) isn't affecting that too much.
One even said that "as long as you're not going because you don't like us" she was "okay" with
me not coming to the yoga event... it's 45 minutes from my house and I don't want to spend a weekend with these people. So sorry, Charlie.

So, how do you feel about your coworkers?
Do you socialize outside of work?
Is it encouraged by your managers?

 

Well, 2 of my 3 major coworkers are my managers, and I get along with them great. Hell, we even did my employee review last year at a brewery. My immediate manager is probably one of the people I trust most in any situation, be it professional or personal. Professionally, he has my back, and has offered advice in several situations that worked out in my favor, every single time.

As busy as we are, and despite the implications (financial, political, environmental) of our work, they encourage me to work reasonable hours, and are very flexible if something comes up, whether it be medical, family, running home to sign for a delivery, etc. Despite both of my managers being roughly 30 years my senior, I think I've spent more time with them than I have anyone roughly my own age. All of this had fostered a mutual sense of trust and respect that, so far, has worked very well in my favor from a professional standpoint.

As for that third coworker, he's my age, and we get along fine. However, he's more of a yuppie urbanite bachelor, and his idea of fun is living above a bar and going out drinking nightly, whereas my idea of fun is having a beer (or twelve) in the comfort of my own home, and either working in the yard, painting in the house, or planning my next renovation. I can't help but feel as though I sort of leap-frogged over a decade or so where I should have been out doing more, but I don't particularly have any interest in it anymore. Even if I did, with LBC and junior at home, I don't have the time.

 

There are a handful of people from my last job that I keep in touch with and will socialize with when schedules allow. Social media makes it a lot easier to keep up with former co-workers.
My current job I'm pretty much on my own. I only e-mail 2 people in the office and on those rare occasions when I'm in the office, I have no idea who 99% of those people are.

 

The military makes coworker relationships difficult. Most of the people I work with closely are my subordinates. Having outside of work relationships with people who are trained to call you Sergeant regardless of the situation can be difficult. I do organize the occasional get-together barbeque or something to encourage team-building, but I wouldn't really consider them to be friends. I'm currently working in a hospital, so the other people I work with regularly are military or civilian nurses. Half of my job is mediating conflicts between the enlisted Soldiers and nurses, so I tend to be on very business terms with them. So while I respect some of my coworkers, and I'm fond of quite a few of my Soldiers, I mostly try to keep my personal and professional lives separate.

 

Nope, I don't like my coworkers....

 

I'm pretty specific about who I socialize with outside of work.
I'd say that out of 20 or so people that I work closely with, there are 2 or 3 that I enjoy seeing outside work. And the key to that is we enjoy that company without bringing work into it.
The thing I really don't want is to be around people from work, who only talk about work. That's too much of a task and I don't want to be doing it during my free time. The annual Christmas Party is when that stuff usually happens.
Then, of the 20 there are a couple of A-Holes who I don't want anything to do with at all.

 

I don't think I've spent any social time outside of work with any of my coworkers, even at a variety of jobs.

I would have with my last coworker (also a PT aide), but she dropped the ball on contacting me most of the time. So we never made it out together. She also told me she'd stay in touch via email (we're both in PT school), but the few I've sent her have been unanswered, so I guess she didn't like me that much after all.

I like to keep work and socializing pretty separate, though sometimes I think it would be nice to have a work buddy to go have beers with after a long day at work.

 

I REALLY LIKE most others I meet. I've had to train myself to not rub up against them. I prefer "beside" to any other orientation.

 

I consider the people I work with friends, and have spent some time with them outside of work. I don't do so frequently since I live about an hour from work, in a different town from my co-workers. I have gone to non-work parties with people I worked with in the past and also gone hiking with a couple of them when they were in the area. For the most part the people I work with are pretty good people that I enjoy being around.

 

I also don't "friend" them on facebook or other social media sites... it's a dual relationship and I don't want them to have knowledge of how I spend my weekends.
I don't post stupid things up there, but I'd rather choose what personal information I share with them. Of course, my family's not on my FB either... hmmm.
I think I have privacy issues.
I do have my immediate supervisor and one of my IT chicks on FB, come to think of it, but I choose what to share with them.

 

My situation is a little different as I work closely with some family, and the other time from home. I am in contact with co-workers, but outside of email, I don't really have to socialize with them, which suits me just fine. I prefer to keep work and play separate and this makes it incredibly easy to do so. I guess I'm more of a lone wolf than I realize.

 

I'm one of those people who tend to keep my life compartmentalized. I have my good friends, my drinking buddies, my work acquaintances, my family, etc...and I'm not really fond of them overlapping (facebook, for the record, completely shot that to hell.)

I tried to socialize with my current coworkers (well, one of them...the other one works for the same company, but at a different site), and with one I had absolutely nothing to say; with the other, there was plenty to talk about, but the conversation kept getting interrupted for some reason or another.

Come to think of it, I haven't REALLY socialized with coworkers since I worked at the OG, and that was only a select few.

 

I like a few, don't mind most, actively dislike a few... just like in real life!

I have chosen to socialize with a few co-workers over the years, and consider a couple to be good friends. Outside of them, I would not go out of my way to spend time with my co-workers.

 

I like my co-workers.
I'm usually happy to see them and they usually seem happy to see me.
We get along and share the work-related banter...you know, bitching and moaning and pointing and laughing at work-related things.
But there is no one there I really "click" with.
But that's ok, there usually isn't.
I haven't had that since 2001.

 

I like my coworkers; but I spend more conscious time with them than with my wife. Unless they ski or ride a motorcycle, I have no interest in seeing them outside of work.

 

"Beside" - me too. "Shoulder to shoulder" is one of my oft-used phrases.

My friends have generally been derived from my interestes which developed into my obsessions and thence, my career. Most of my friends became friends precisely because they were my co-workers.

 

Many of my favorite people are old coworkers who were able to treat me as both a friend and a manager. We could go out together over the weekend then work happily alongside one another during the week. I found it made the professional relationship better, as I knew my staff well and could speak as openly as I would with a friend, even during criticism. That said, I do know that was a special case.

My new job is a little different. Apart from a select few, I can't see myself becoming friends with most of my coworkers. I like all but one of them, but there's no close connection in sight.