Reflection Paper #3 – Gender and Peer/Coworker Relationships

The readings in Sias (2009) Chapter 3 on peer-coworker relationships focused on work

relationships with people that coworkers arguably spend the most time with, more than with

family or friends. Peer/coworker relationships are between people within the same work

hierarchy and occur where there is no personal authority over peers. Peer relationships function

in four areas: mentoring, information exchange, social support, and power and control. These

relationships develop because of individual and contextual factors. Personality, similarity and

gender comprise the personal/individual factors, and organizational climate, culture, proximity,

shared tasks, work-related problems, the gender/sexual composition of the workplace, and out-

of-work gathering opportunities make up the contextual factors that contribute to the formation

of peer/coworker relationships. These relationships vary in strength and depth. The most

superficial is the Information Peer Relationship, work relationships begin this way when new to

a company or department, they deal with work related tasks and information exchanges on a

superficial level. The Collegial Peer Relationship offers a greater depth of relatedness, where a

moderate level of trust and intimacy exists; this deals with work and non-work related issues, and

contain feedback and emotional support for each other. The Special Peer Relationship is a “best

friends” type of relationship, one that exhibits high levels of trust and intimacy and deal with

both work and personal/family conflicts; these relationships typically come out of high stress

work environments and tend to be fairly rare.

I interviewed an IT Director at a major publishing company, regarding her peer

relationships with 4 other Directors. Her relationship with each of the other four male Directors

had been formed over a minimum of 15 years (exceptional in this day, age and industry). She

had built trusting relationships with 3 of the 4 that has grown into Collegial Peer Relationships.

Only one of the Directors did she not trust (she felt he had a “Napoleonic” complex) -- I would

label him an Information Peer -- she feels that he hoards information and works to position

himself above others in order to gain advantage. She feels a subtle, can’t-put-her-finger-on-it,

disrespect from him that she feels comes from the fact that she is a woman. She has to rely on

him, as well as the other Directors, in order to complete budgets and projects, so she puts up with

him and minimized contact to work-related issues as much as possible. This works well most of

the time, but invariably when something goes awry, it seems that it is because of this one guy

who has done something that negatively affects the project and the entire team.

In the interview, gender came up as an issue. My friend is single, has no children, and

has varied outside-of-work interests (birding, hiking, skiing, clogging and more). The other 4

Directors are all married with children, and the wives of all but one of the Directors stay home

with their children. Monday mornings, when the group gets together and chats before the

beginning of the work week, my friend just listens to the recounting of family stuff. She

interacts and engages with these peers, but in fact has nothing in common with their typical

worlds. Only one of the Directors, the one that she has the closest Collegial Peer Relationship

with, asks about her weekend, and her world. It is this person that my friend confides in, looks

to for guidance and shares the most information with. The relationship is reciprocal. It

developed because of proximity (he is the closest to her physically at work, on the same floor),

he has good listening skills (a trait deemed vital to my friend), and is not as traditional as the

other Directors because he is juggling a two-working parent household. She has met his

children. The trust that they have built up has never been broken, she feels that he would not use

(and never has) information against her within the work environment.

In spite of the upheaval in the newspaper industry and the stress/pressures that abound,

she has not created a Special Peer Relationship. I believe it is because there are not enough

individual factors that converge between her and these peers. Her personality, attitudes, interests,

and politics tend to be mildly different to dramatically different from the others, and the gender

issue is too great of an obstacle given the fact that she is single and the other peer potentials are

married. Contextual factors work against this as well, she does not do much out-of-work

gathering, she isn’t “one-of-the-boys” and never will be. In a crisis situation, her needs and

objectives would differ from her other peers, and would not converge to a point of breaking

through the intimacy barrier to bring the relationships to a Special Peer level.

Critical theory suggests that the gender and power issues are socially constructed between

these peers. She adapts her gender to the male-oriented world and is able to do this most of the

time successfully. She is treated with respect and valued by all but one of her peer Directors, and

has found ways to cope given the need all 5 of the Directors have to cooperate and work

together.

References

Jameson, D.A. (2001, October). Narrative discourse and management action. The Journal of

Business Communication, 38(4), 476-511.

Sias, P. M. (2009). Organizing relationships: Traditional and emerging perspectives on

workplace relationships. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.