Episode 139 · 24 October 2024 · 52:56
Why we're still lonely at work, with Dr. Connie Hadley
Featuring Connie Hadley
Why we're still lonely at work, with Dr. Connie Hadley
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Intro and guest introduction
Meet Dr. Connie Hadley
interview#guest-bio#researcher#career-journey
How Connie's research on loneliness began
The financial impact of loneliness at work
The research: what we know about workplace loneliness
The hybrid work myth — why remote isn't the villain
Practical strategies for building connection
interview#connection-strategies#practical-tips#workplace-connection
Show notes
Why We're Still Lonely at Work — with Dr. Connie Hadley
Guest: Dr. Connie Hadley — organizational psychologist, researcher, and author of the HBR cover story "We're Still Lonely at Work."
Hybrid work gets blamed for workplace loneliness. But Dr. Connie Hadley's research says we've got it wrong.
Connie joins Al and Leanne to challenge the assumption that remote and hybrid setups are the root cause of isolation. Her data reveals the real drivers — culture, leadership, and the quiet erosion of connection that happens even when teams are sitting in the same room.
They dig into why loneliness costs businesses billions in lost productivity, how to spot the signs when colleagues are masking their isolation, and why teams — not just individuals — hold the key to building genuine connection. Plus, Connie shares her free self-assessment tool so you can measure loneliness in your own organization.
Top 3 Takeaways
- Hybrid work isn't the enemy. Loneliness persists regardless of where people work. The real drivers are culture, leadership engagement, and whether employees feel seen and valued — not the physical location of their desk.
- Loneliness is a team problem, not just an individual one. The most effective interventions happen at the team level — creating consistent rituals, unstructured social time, and spaces where people can be authentic without fear.
- Measure before you manage. You can't fix what you can't see. Use tools like Connie's self-assessment to identify where loneliness is hiding in your organization before it costs you your best people.
Connect With Us
Get in touch, book a call, or find Al and Leanne on LinkedIn — all in one place: truthliesandwork.com/connect
Mental health support: findahelpline.com — UK: Samaritans 116 123 · Mind 0300 123 3393 — US: 988 — Australia: Lifeline 13 11 14
Truth, Lies & Work is part of the HubSpot Podcast Network.
Full transcript
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Al ElliottThe dirty little secret is that most businesses think they know their customers. They have the data, the records, the history, but it's scattered across 3 teams and 4 systems. And in our case, it's about 216,000 spreadsheets, which means nobody can actually use it.
Leanne ElliottWhat you should be doing is using HubSpot, because why? HubSpot connects it all— every interaction, every support ticket, every conversation— into one platform every team can work from. So when sales talks to a customer, marketing already knows the full story. And when you know more, you grow more.
Connie HadleyNice.
Al ElliottCheck out hubspot.com, the agentic customer platform for growing businesses.
Leanne ElliottHello and welcome to Truth, Lies and Work, the award-winning psychology podcast brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals. My name is Leanne. I'm a chartered psychologist.
Al ElliottMy name is Al. I'm a business owner.
Leanne ElliottWe are here to help you simplify the science of work and create amazing workplace cultures.
Al ElliottWelcome to our Thursday edition. This is our regular Thursday interview series. If you like to keep up to date of the latest news and love a good Agony Aunt segment, then you're gonna love Tuesday episodes too. We bring you our weekly news roundup, our brand new segment called Hot Takes, and also our world-famous weekly workplace surgery where I put your questions to Leanne.
Leanne ElliottBut today we will be diving deep into one of the most overlooked workplace issues, loneliness, with the help of a very special guest, Connie Hadley. Connie is an organizational psychologist and part of the Thinkers50 Radar Class of 2024, recognized for her groundbreaking work on the future of work and management. Connie is the founder of the Institute for Life at Work, which is dedicated to exploring critical issues like hybrid work, team effectiveness, psychological safety, and burnout. She's also a research associate professor at Boston University's Questrom School of Business, where she focuses on applying research to resolve real-world challenges. Not only does Connie bring a wealth of experience from her time at McKinsey and Company and General Mills, but her latest research into workplace loneliness is currently gracing the COVID of Harvard Business Review.
Al ElliottThat's the COVID guys. That is the COVID story. So in today's episode, we'll be challenging some common assumptions about loneliness. Is remote working making us more lonely? Do teams make us feel more connected at work? And are some of us— are we just a bit more needier when it comes to being social? And what can we do to prevent this loneliness at work? We'll explore the highlights of Connie's research findings and share some practical strategies to bring back that sense of belonging, whether your team is remote, hybrid, or in office. So let's go and meet the amazing, the fabulous, the COVID of HBR, the world-famous expert on loneliness, Connie Hadley. Hi, Connie.
Connie HadleyMy name is Connie Noonan Hadley. I am by profession an organizational psychologist. That means I study people at work. And I have a couple titles. One is the founder and chief scientist at the Institute for Life at Work, which is a think tank I founded to try to get research into the hands of real people who can use it faster. And then I'm also a research associate professor at the Boston University Questrom School of Business. In terms of what I'm most famous for, I guess it's for studying loneliness, which is, I know, the focus of our conversation today. That wasn't what I originally started studying. And I do have other topics that I cover, including psychological safety, teamwork and team effectiveness, the future of work, employee well-being, mental health, burnout, and other topics like that. So, I don't know if it's going to be famous for a lot of all the sad and negative aspects of organizational life, but here I am. And hopefully, Hopefully we're going to bring some, some good news to these stories too.
Leanne ElliottI mean, the thing you're probably most famous for right now is being on the COVID of HBR, which is incredible to see, not only a psychologist but such a topic. Before we dive into that specific research and what is, is featured in, in the edition, do you mind just telling us a bit about why loneliness is an area of interest for psychologists, why you wanted to pursue it, why it's important that, that we do research this?
Connie HadleySure. Well, as I just alluded to, originally when I was back in grad school, I was really focused on people's emotional lives at work and their psychological attachments to people at work and their jobs themselves. And I was really focused on social support and on all these great things that come from having really strong workplace relationships. But over time, as I continued to research this topic, I found that a lot of people didn't have that. They don't feel like they have anybody they can go to at work. They don't feel like people have their back that are interested in them, that are supporting them. And it dawned on me that this, this is actually a real issue. And coincidentally, at the same time, other people are starting to study that, including my fabulous, fabulous co-author, Sarah Wright. She's at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. She was doing some work on it in the academic literature as well, looking at work loneliness, which is what we've now started to call it. And a little bit before the pandemic, I was doing some new research on that with Mark Mortensen from INSEAD. And we found that, like, in this one study, Mark and I found that people who were globally working around the world with different knowledge work teams had, like, 76% of them had trouble being connected to their teammates. So, that really was a wake-up call for me in my research, just how big the problem was. And then, Cigna was doing some research studying it in the US that showed how common it was. Then the pandemic happened, and that's when everybody really started to wake up to this issue. So I haven't done the quantification studies that others have, including the UK government has actually done a lot of really important work on work loneliness. And they've estimated the cost to employers of loneliness is in big price tags in the billions of dollars a year. And so now I feel like there's this social reason to fix it because it's going to make people's lives better at work, but also this financial reason to fix it.
Leanne ElliottAnd why is that? Why is Loneliness causing such a financial impact on our business. I'd imagine there's some people listening that would find that quite surprising that it is, and also that it's quantifiable.
Connie HadleyFirst of all, I have to step out of the work arena to fill people in on what we've learned from studying loneliness in the social realm. So there's been longstanding research among psychologists just about people's loneliness, but they've been studying in their personal domain, the people who don't have strong family and friend connections. And a lot of the people studying that are psychologists looking at sort of the, you know, the psychological experience, but there's also a lot of people looking at it from a medical standpoint and looking at the physical health impact. And so the number one reason it's expensive for employers is because people who are chronically lonely have huge healthcare problems associated with it. And there's this big meta-analysis that showed that it's as dangerous for your health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. It's worse than obesity. Loneliness is shown to predict things like dementia, cancer, heart attack, diabetes. And so if you're an employer and you're paying healthcare insurance for the people who work for you, you're likely to see those costs go up if your people are lonely. And then the other aspect of loneliness that can hit the bottom line is that people don't do their best work when they're lonely.
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Connie HadleyThey're not going to be as engaged, as motivated. They will have their minds sort of not at full capacity because they'll be distracted with these feelings of rejection and isolation. And so we've also estimated the productivity impact that people have. And in my research, again, some of these medical background things, those are things I have to borrow from my peers in other areas of science. But in my own research, I've certainly seen seen a big correlation between loneliness and low job satisfaction and intention to quit. And so the last thing that happens for employers is that people leave. So they then have turnover costs associated with it where they have to find— go through the recruiting process to find another employee and bring them on board. So when you think about the physical health costs, the lack of productivity, and then the departures of people who are lonely, it really does—
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Connie Hadleycreate quite a problem.
Al ElliottAll right, so let's now talk about the big news. Connie Hadley's latest research that she conducted in partnership with Sarah Wright has made the COVID of Harvard Business Review with her article, We're Still Lonely: What Leaders Can Do About It. This is a huge deal, not only because it's HBR, obviously one of the most respected business publications out there, but also because workplace loneliness is a topic that's finally getting the spotlight it deserves. This is also a huge moment for the organizational psychology community. Featuring my, my wife over there. Getting featured on the COVID of HBR is pretty rare for psychologists. The fact that Connie's work has made the COVID signals a shift in recognizing how crucial psychological well-being is to the future of work. It shows that issues like workplace loneliness aren't just soft topics. They're actually becoming central to how we understand leadership and organizational success. So let's get back to the interview where Connie shares how her latest research is moving the loneliness conversation forward.
Connie HadleySarah Wright and I have been studying loneliness for a while. And because we didn't know that much about work loneliness until the last 10, 15 years, we started with the basics, which is just trying to define it and try to identify what it looked like in the population. And Sarah's done some good work on modeling the process by which people might become lonely. But I spend most of my time talking to managers and people who work in jobs outside of academia. And they were like, OK, OK, we get the problem. What do we do about it? So that really was the impetus for this new study. And what we wanted to do was say, OK, we're going to continue to build on our knowledge base about who gets lonely and what that feels like. But now let's actually test some possible interventions that could reduce the loneliness. And we did a 2-part study. We surveyed 1,000 US knowledge workers ages 22 to 50. And we deliberately— we hired a panel firm to find people to complete our surveys. And we told them that you have to go out and find people who are low in loneliness, so the people who might say are not lonely, they're well-connected, people who are moderately lonely, and people who are high in loneliness. And we gave them this 5-question survey that Sarah and I have developed to measure work loneliness. And so we said, go out there and find us some people who are lonely in a lot of different ways so that we can compare them and try to understand how they're similar and different, and also give them these test scenarios and see who responds to what. And so that's the, that's the article that's now out in the Harvard Business Review. We also have a research report that's publicly available on my institute website. So people can look if they really want to geek out on lots of data and statistics, it's available for them as well. And we also have made available the self-assessment tool, the 5-question survey that I mentioned. So people If they're curious to know if they're feeling lonely, they can take that test for themselves.
Leanne ElliottHow would we recognize colleagues that are lonely? Or maybe how would we know the signs that we might be lonely?
Connie Hadley2 different questions, and I'll answer them each in turn. The first one, how do we know if someone else is lonely? I think the most important thing for people to know is it's really hard to tell from the outside. And this is again one of the reasons that we kept getting these questions from managers. They were in action mode like, all right, I'm gonna figure out who's lonely and then I'm gonna fix it. And, you know, we had to caution them to say, well, wait, so tell me what you think you're gonna look for. Like, what, what does, what does a lonely person look like to you? And they're thinking the person who sits at their desk alone or, you know, does no one talks about in a friendly way. Well, that's not the way to find out if someone's lonely because in, and this is a little bit different than when we think about loneliness as maybe you were thinking about your high school experience and that's how you would tell because everybody had to eat in the cafeteria and you could tell who sat alone or went to the library to eat.
Leanne ElliottYeah.
Connie HadleyBut in a work context, people are really sophisticated and they're really good at pretending to be what's acceptable in that environment because their livelihood and their career depend upon it. So most people who are lonely don't act the typical lonely way if you were looking at them. So they may be gregarious. They may sit and chat with people before a meeting. They may, you know, sit down at a table if you're in a cafeteria and eat with other people. It's such a stigmatized experience that it goes underground. So, the way you would know if someone is lonely is actually to have like more of a real honest conversation with them. And you'd want to build up psychological safety so that they feel that you're not going to stigmatize them or reject them if they reveal that they're feeling disconnected. Because again, it's a really vulnerable thing to feel, especially in a work environment. If you're not sure that that's going to work, if people aren't ready to speak up about it, then we do recommend you do anonymous surveys where people's confidentiality is guaranteed to get that better pulse on who is lonely in your organization. But a lot of it is going to take being able to have those open conversations over time where people feel comfortable talking about it. And then the second question you asked is, how do you know if we're lonely? And I'll tell you a story about that because I think it really exemplifies How easy it is to miss even in ourselves. When I was teaching during COVID we were— everybody, of course, this is in the fall of 2020. Everybody was working remotely or some people started to go back to the office, but it was pretty minimal. And that destabilized a lot of people's work experiences for sure. I had one student who had changed jobs that summer, the summer of 2020. It was already in the works and he moved jobs. And about 3 months into that job, he was in my class. He came to my office hours to meet with me one-on-one.
Leanne ElliottWow.
Connie HadleyAnd he said, you know, I thought I really wanted to switch to pharma. I was really excited about this job, but I guess it's just not for me. I think I should go back to my old industry and try something else. And I said, oh, that's such a shame. You know, you haven't been there that long, but tell me more about why you think this isn't a good career field for you anymore. And the more he explained it, the more I realized that it really didn't have anything to do with the job or the industry. It was about the relationship he had with other people.
Al ElliottHmm.
Connie HadleySo, for example, he'd had meetings all day long with his teammates. No one turned on their camera. And at first he did because he thought, oh, well, that's what we would do, right? And then he realized quickly the unspoken norm was when we were in meetings, we don't need to put our camera on. And he— I knew who he— I knew he was an extrovert because during that fall, we were only allowed to have like a tiny fraction of students come live to our classroom. So often I would stand up in the classroom with a mask on and 53 people would be on the screen and like 2 would be in the classroom.
Al ElliottRight.
Connie HadleyAnd you had to sign up to get one of those in-person spots. And this person was always trying to sign up to get one of those in-person spots. He craved that kind of connection that he could get from coming in person. And so, I said to him, do you think there's any chance that you're just maybe feeling like you just don't have that sense of camaraderie and connection to your coworkers, and maybe that's the thing that's really dragging you down? And over the course of that conversation, he realized it really was about the social aspects of the job that he didn't like. But he didn't interpret it. He didn't understand that to be the case. He went straight to, I don't like my job. It must be because of the job. It must be because of the work I'm doing in the field I'm in. So we can miss it because we're not looking the right way at the signals that our guts and our hearts and our emotions are giving us. And again, this is what hopefully the word will be starting to get out with this article and our other research to say that it's a very normal experience Anyone can experience loneliness from the first entry position to the CEO, people of all different walks of life. So before you think you're— it's your job, before you blame it on other factors, maybe just take a little look inside and see if you're getting that kind of social reinforcement and connection that you need. And if not, then there is a good chance loneliness is at the core.
Leanne ElliottSo let's talk about something a lot of CEOs have been pretty vocal about since the pandemic. Remote and hybrid work causing loneliness and disconnect among employees. Since the shift to working from home during COVID many leaders have argued that getting people back into the office is crucial for maintaining culture and avoiding isolation. Well, Connie's research has found this assumption to be incorrect. Hybrid or remote work does not cause loneliness. Your research shows that hybrid or remote work doesn't actually necessarily cause loneliness. That's interesting to me. Talk to me about that.
Connie HadleyA couple things on that point. One, remember I mentioned that study that we showed 76% of people were having trouble making connections before the pandemic? So yes, a lot of those people did have global colleagues that required some remote work. But for the most part, loneliness as a phenomenon has been rising well before the advent of so much remote work. And in the US, our Surgeon General Vivek Murthy wrote an article in the Harvard Business Review in 2017 that said it was a loneliness epidemic in workplaces. And so that was, again, when most people were working more in person. The other thing is about our own data. We really wanted to get down to some information that could be useful to help make those kinds of return to office remote work decisions. So, we asked about people's work modes in a couple different ways. First one we did is we asked them to self-select what is their dominant mode of work style is what we call it. So, fully in-person on one end, fully remote on the other end. So, those were 5 days in either mode. But then, we asked hybrid in 2 different splinters. So, we asked hybrid where they're mostly in the office, which meant that they were probably remote 1 or 2 days a week and the rest in the office. And then we asked hybrid, mostly remote, where they would be remote for 3 or 4 days a week and then only 1 or 2 days in the office. And when we looked at loneliness levels on that spectrum, we only found a real change when we got to the fully remote people. So the fully remote 5-day-of-the-week, in-the-week office people were lonelier on average than people in the other 3 categories. But among the fully in-person and the 2 different hybrid versions, There was no statistical difference in loneliness. And so, the first thing that implies is that maybe it's a risk factor to never meet your colleagues in person, and that's something to consider. But there is no evidence, at least from our study, to say that there's a certain magic number of days that you need to be in in order to get that level of connection. And when companies are claiming that they need 5 days to build a strong social network, I would I'd love to see their data that would support that. It's not supported in our data. But then the other question that we asked to get at this issue is we also said, take your last month's worth of interactions with your colleagues at work. And we're just going to bifurcate how they were done. Were they done virtually? So that could be by email, or it could be on a Zoom or a Teams video conference, or it could be through Slack or text or whatever other methods people use when they're not speaking face-to-face with someone, or face-to-face. So those, you know, give us your ratio of each one of those. And we saw that the people who were highly lonely— so remember, this is in the highest end of our bucket, these are the people really worried about— they reported that they spent 47% of their time face-to-face with colleagues, which is related to their work style. So it means that, you know, the people who are hybrid and the people who were fully in the office We're feeling lonely. And so, you know, I— if the data were clear to show that remote work is the evil factor, I'd be shouting from the rooftops, like, get back to the office. But it's just not true from what we see. And the reason it's not true is, again, I think people are more complicated than the technology they use to communicate. I think that we have the ability to make people feel really lonely. sitting around a table. And I think we have the ability to make people feel really connected communicating virtually over the internet. And we just have to be more specific and intentional about how we set up those conversations. We had 8 different possible sponsored activities that employers could do to bring people together in a social way. And this was a list, you know, I'll just run You know, through a few of them that's based on just talking to managers and studying what was happening in workplaces. There aren't that many ideas out there. There are about 8. So, for example, one is having— offering lunch, bringing— paying for lunch for people to come in and sit together in a room. And maybe there's a little bit of a program attached to it, like a lunch and learn where you listen to someone, or it's just straight-up social. That's one. Another one is carving out 5 to 10 minutes in a meeting to go around the room and have a personal chitchat. So, it could be, again, prompted, like, tell us Tell us what your favorite fall drink is, or it could be just open-ended. How are you doing? Tell us. Let's do a check-in. Other ones would be happy hours all the way up to doing a retreat where you bring everybody together and you have some socializing at the retreat. So, we had these 8 types of scenarios, and then we asked people to answer their likely response to those in their current job, in the current context in which they're working in one of 4 levels. Level 0 was, I'm not going to go to that, you know. So like, if there's a happy hour, I'm not going. Level 1 would be, just picking up on the happy hour example, all right, I will go, I'll make a quick lap, and then I'll leave. Level, um, so level— then level 2, that would be level 1 of actually engaging. Level 2 of engaging would be, I will go, probably stay half an hour or so, talk to a couple people that I know, and then leave. And then the highest level of engagement would be like, I'm, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna make the most of it. I'm gonna spend a bunch of time there. I'm gonna meet a bunch of people. And we wanted to have that grading, um, gradient because people have real preferences and comfort levels with different, you know, types of socializing. And we wanted to capture that. And so, um, we did that and that allowed us to discern like, what are the most popular activities that most people would want to engage more heartily in. And I will tell you what, we cut the data so many different ways. We really thought we were going to have differences based on gender and age and relationship status and whether they were remote or in the office. And pretty much none of that mattered. It came down to the top 3 choices were number 1, free lunches. Number 2, we're building out time in meetings to do chitchat. And number 3 was doing something like a happy hour. And that's not to say the other ideas— we included things like networking programs and peer-building programs— that's not to say those aren't good ideas. I don't want that also to be the message, like, only do these 3 things. But what we took away from it was that, you know, it's not that hard. It's not that complicated to get over loneliness and to build connection. So it's— we don't need to You know, invent these elaborate parties and customize every offering to each person's individual needs. Like, it's pretty universal. It's pretty basic. People love a free lunch. I mean, we all know that saying, and it's true. So I hope that gives employers like more impetus to offer these kinds of things, you know, not be sort of in this analysis paralysis of like, oh no, I don't know what to do. Like, just start with these things. But again, it's not just— offer them, put them on the calendar. It's like do them in a certain way. So a few key tips on how do you execute good activities based on our research would be one, you have to offer them consistently. So, you know, because of people's different busy lives, they may not be able to attend the one happy hour a year. So having them more often is good. The other reason you want to do consistency, so again thinking about a lunch, is if you have a monthly lunch, what you are signaling to your employees is this is important to us. We are committed to this. We really want you to build relationships. We're going to give you multiple opportunities to do that. We're going to pay for this. We're going to put some skin into this game to make sure this happens. So you want regularity, some kind of routine access. You also want to make it accessible to everybody if you can. Now, maybe not everybody at once. But if you have fully remote employees, for example, you want to try to find a way to get them to be able to attend some of these in-person events. I know lots of companies now are doing things like either quarterly or every six months. They're doing some kind of gathering for all their employees, no matter what work mode they operate in, to come together. And I think that's a great idea. You know, being really specific and intentional. How can we get everybody into this opportunity? And then the the other thing that I would say needs to happen is that the the people who are managing, you know, others in the office need to also endorse it. So they need to show up too. They need because that again is a signal the priority, and it will make people feel more okay about attending. And then the last thing we talk about, and we— and Sarah and I debated a lot how to phrase this in the article— we don't want to pressure people to attend in a way that repels them and makes them uncomfortable. So it's not like terrible, the kind of social pressure that we don't want. But I will say that we know that people who are lonely over time get more and more reluctant to engage. They get— their defense mechanisms start to lock in. So even when I— when we measured, for example, their level of engagement, each of those 8 things, the people in our highly lonely group were lower levels across every opportunity compared to people who weren't lonely. So it's, I think, a reaction to past bad experiences or their perception of what the environment is like. They're more likely to say like, okay, maybe I'd go and make a lap and leave. And so how do you get the lonely people to come to these events if they're the ones you're really trying to reach? Well, our evidence says that you have to make some really personalized outreach efforts to those people. Notice that they're not attending, gently encourage them, sincerely show that you welcome them to come. And then over time, if you do that, and again, like a really gentle and persistent but caring way, you'll start to see them attend. And there's an example in our article that I'd love to share about that because one of the benefits of our research is that we recorded people's stories so we can hear their voices. And you really get a better sense of someone's experience when you hear the way they tell their personal stories. And so this one woman talked about how when she first started her job, That she just felt very disconnected. She started as an administrative assistant, and she just didn't really connect with her coworkers. But in her mind, she was fine. She was okay. She was just gonna do her job and go home, and she didn't really need to be connected, which again is a kind of mentality that lonely people often develop over time. It's like, it's, it's fine, I don't care. So she had this one day about a month into working When some colleagues came up to her and said, hey, we're going to lunch. You should join. And she said, no, no, no, I'm fine. I don't need to go. I've had my lunch. I already brought it. I'm okay. You know, have fun. And the person— and I love the way she described it on the audio. She's like, oh no, that's not happening. We're not accepting your, your, uh, your no. You are coming. And so the woman sort of felt like, oh, okay, well, I guess they really, really want me to come. And so she attended. And then afterwards, she said it was amazing. She found that she did have a lot in common with these people. She said, we can, like, you know, I do feel like now we can all help each other when we need help. We can reach out to each other. And she said, I just absolutely love, like, working with these people now. And it was just like a one little example. But I think that's what can happen all over workplaces if we reach out and we make those really sincere and authentic connection points with others and show them that we really mean it. We really want them to come.
Leanne ElliottI'm wondering, is there something we can do in that moment to stop somebody being, uh, you know, just doing a lap to maybe staying an hour? Or is it really just about getting people to the event and then letting it evolve?
Connie HadleyI think you want a mix of unstructured social events because that is where sometimes the magic happens. You know, like fun conversations emerge because you can talk about whatever you want. And also for some people who are more social, they really love that kind of open-ended socializing. But for, again, for thinking about how to include everyone, including people who may be a little more reluctant, a little shyer because they're lonely, or maybe they're just introverted, or maybe they're new, for whatever reason, those kinds of people benefit from prompts and structure. So sometimes it is good to give people an assignment. And I say that with love. I think it's good to have a question, for example, that everybody fills out or to give them a funny little quiz and everybody shares their results with each other or to give them— sometimes when I'm trying to open up a conversation, I'll give people a very vague photo of something and ask people to interpret it. Just something that kind of warms up the conversation. So that everybody knows they have something specific that they can contribute and they know what's being asked of them. That can really help your, your quieter and more reluctant people. But again, sometimes that can also feel a little too artificial and constraining, and some people just want to talk about whatever they want to talk about. So I think just a mix of both is good.
Leanne ElliottAfter the break, we will be exploring if teams is a solution to loneliness. Back in a second. Did you know that the UK's number 1 management podcast, that's Us, by the way, and the UK's number one marketing podcast are both on the same podcast network.
Al ElliottWe actually have a lot in common. We both use behavioural science to help people do better at work.
Leanne ElliottAnd we both had to wrangle Rory Sutherland on an episode.
Al ElliottAnd 2 out of 3 of us are devilishly good looking. And you're not gonna say which. Fel, host of Nudge, UK's number one marketing podcast. It's brought to you— we need to do this in 3s—
Leanne Elliottthe HubSpot Podcast network, the audio destination for business professionals.
Connie HadleySeamless.
Al ElliottSeamless. Tell us about your latest episode, Phil. We've just done an episode on fake fandom and how New York indie bands are paying agencies to create fake TikTok videos about how much they like their work. And we talk about the behavioral science behind fandom and how that encourages people to enjoy the music and all of that good stuff and do some big things about how this affects the world of It is.
Leanne ElliottIt's such, it's such a good show. Of course, you'll hear all the stuff you want to hear about how to grow your business by using behavioural science in your marketing. But there's also just some really interesting episodes that'll be right up your street. Personally, I enjoyed Can Balsamic Vinegar Make Beer Taste Better?
Al ElliottIt can.
Leanne ElliottAnd Are We All Just Status-Seeking Monkeys?
Connie HadleyI am.
Al ElliottGo and listen to Lunch wherever you get your podcasts.
Leanne ElliottBut come back.
Al ElliottYeah, come back. Definitely come back because Nudge isn't as good as this. So come back. I'll cut that out. Keep that in.
Leanne ElliottWelcome back. Let's get down to it. Let's talk about loneliness in teams.
Al ElliottNow, here's another key point from Connie's research that really challenges a common workplace myth. The myth is that teams will solve loneliness. It's a natural assumption, I suppose, to think that putting people on teams will help them feel more connected. But actually, that's not always the case. Being part of a team doesn't necessarily protect people from feeling lonely. In fact, it can often make things worse when employees expect closeness from their teams but don't get it.
Connie HadleyTeams can be a fantastic opportunity for people to get connected in a close-knit way with others. And when I talk about what makes for an effective team, one of the criteria I use that's, that's based on one of my mentors from Harvard, Harvard, Richard Hackman. He had said that, you know, you really want this team to survive to the, for the next project. And the way they survive is by developing that sense of cohesion and interpersonal trust. That's just so wonderful that it does make you want to keep signing up again and again with the same team. So teams can provide the kind of connection level and camaraderie that people are seeking. But they don't always. And the Bummer is that if you're on a team where you don't feel connected, it's like a double hit because you feel like not only are you lonely, but you feel worse about it because you're like, how is that possible? I actually am on a team with these other people, but they don't seem to care about me. They don't seem to show any personal interest in me whatsoever. And it's almost like more hurtful in a way. And the expectations are higher when you're on a team. And then when they don't meet, they, it feels more painful. So, you know, in separate research, Mark Wardison and I wrote an article about how you should really evaluate the way your teams are structured. And from a productivity standpoint, certain features make sense, like having really fast agile teams that form and disband quickly, or staffing people on multiple teams so that you never have a single moment of wasted time in your day. But, you know, all those features have a downside, and they can reduce the amount of time people spend with each other getting to know each other.
Leanne ElliottIs there such a thing as, as pathological loneliness, or can loneliness creep into mental illness? What I'm wondering is, is there a point on the continuum where it's gone beyond what an organization can do to help somebody feel less lonely compared to it really being a challenge for the individual specifically?
Connie HadleyGreat question. And it's important, one of the things that I should caveat when I encourage organizations to measure loneliness using our tool or other tools, Don't ask a question if you're not prepared to deal with the answers that you find. And same thing, if I was advising a check on the mental health status of employees, I would say, you know, if you're asking people to tell you that they're lonely or tell you that they're struggling with their mental health and you provide zero response and help to them, that's irresponsible. So loneliness is not itself a clinical condition. It is not a mental health condition. And we're very clear on that. And that again goes back to anyone can feel lonely. And a lot of it's about the situation. So it's not something that someone carries with them from place to place. Yet it is also possible to become chronically lonely in all aspects of your life. And in that case, you are more likely to develop into another mental health condition such as depression. And conversely, in sort of thinking about the reverse causality, people who have Any kind of health condition, whether maybe it would be something like lupus or diabetes, as well as something like depression or anxiety or bipolar disorder, they often also can become lonely because they don't feel that they have that peer network and social support where people really understand them and can sympathize and empathize with what they're going through. So there's, there's definitely a lot of, you know, correlation, I would say, in loneliness, with loneliness to some other aspects of someone's life that might make them feel more disconnected, but it's not itself a mental health condition. That again, though, just to say, even though everybody can experience it, and it may be situational, like, take it seriously, like you would another mental health condition too. Don't hope that it just solves itself.
Al ElliottNow, there's another misconception that Connie's research tackles is the idea that loneliness is a personal problem, not something organizations need to address. Now, often employers view loneliness as a weakness or perhaps a personal issue, but it completely overlooks how the work environment can impact someone's social connections. Loneliness can affect anyone from entry-level employees to CEOs, and it's not just about working remotely or having certain personality traits. It's often about the work environment itself. So what can managers do to reduce loneliness and improve connection in the workplace?
Leanne ElliottIf in-person doesn't always fix the loneliness, what Could hybrid or remote teams do, or team leaders do, to build a stronger connection?
Connie HadleyEach company, you know, or organization should make their own decisions about their return-to-office policy. You know, the work that we do is cross-sectional in nature, means it's across a whole lot of different companies. So, we can't tell any one company what the right policy is. But I will say again, on balance, if you're thinking about going to the extreme end of 5 days in person, then I would just make sure you have your own data to support that decision as the right one for the well-being of your people. In terms of if you want to continue hybrid, though, or if you want to continue fully remote for some of your employees, I think there's lots you can do. I think our imaginations have been a bit untested in this regard. So, for example, one of the hot things that people really want is meeting chitchat time. Like, there's zero reason why they can't be done remotely. I mean, that, that's— and in fact, not only can it be done remotely, it might be able to be better done remotely. So think about, like, in a Zoom or a Teams call, all the little cool bells and whistles you can add into a conversation that'll enhance that kind of personal chitchat. So you can have a quick pop-up quiz. Microsoft has embedded, like, games, like collaborative games you can play for 5 minutes at the start of a meeting. You can use the chat function. You can, you can do, you know, Q&A as a separate function. There's so many ways to get people talking that are embedded in that kind of remote technology that it's a shame that so much of it doesn't get used for this purpose. And then other ways that people can get engaged remotely, say for example, you're fully remotely, I did recommend again, sometimes occasionally getting together with people in person would be really lovely. But if not, you know, a lot of it's thinking about how do you set up your, your norms of behavior as a group? What's okay to talk about? What's not okay to talk about? What's the forum? And I, I'm a big believer in getting work done. Like, I'm not trying to have people spend 5 hours a day just chit-chatting. Like, I'm a really impatient, like, driven person. So I get the mentality of a lot of managers of like, let's just get down to business. But I think if you open up the space, and we talk about in the article, like designing some slack in your work particularly for remote communications, you're going to allow more of that conversation to happen. And so, the worst is when we know we're going from meeting to meeting to meeting on video with zero time for even a bio break in between, and let alone any time to chitchat with people because you go straight into the agenda. That is, is, is not a good way to run remote communications. But alternatively, you could do things people do, 15-minute You know, video conference coffee chats one-on-one, and there are programs out there that can randomly match you with people. For example, that would be a nice way to start networking and getting to know others again with a prompt or just open, free-flowing conversation. And then there's other ways that you can do too. You can take advantage of like creating special channels for people to share their dog pictures or you know other things that can be you know doing like a one of those like mural boards online where people can post up things that inspirational. Quotes and things that mean something to them with a little explanation. There's just so many tools that could be used to create this sense of really exchanging personal and meaningful information about each other and building up that kind of affection and mutual respect and trust. So I say, you know, we have a lot more we can do, and I really look forward to all the possibilities that are out there. To do this well, you have to make it culturally normative to prioritize it and actually tactically feasible to accomplish it. And I think that's where oftentimes it falls apart. And I'll pick up a little bit more on the culture aspect as well, because we see that in our most recent report where you just see the description. We asked people to— we gave people a list of different cultural descriptors. And you see, for example, that the people who are most lonely are more highly likely compared to the people who aren't lonely to say things like, I have a very competitive culture. And, you know, again, where people just don't feel that they can open up to each other without sacrificing or displaying some weakness or potential vulnerability or sacrificing their productivity. You might see bias. You know, maybe people aren't speaking up because they don't feel like they're going to be welcomed for whatever they say, or they're not going to be treated with that kind of inclusive empathy that that we need to make people really bond, or they're even saying things like toxic, you know. And there were a lot of stories in our— and the audio recordings are just terrible sounding workplaces where there was one person who talked about, um, yeah, they offer coffee and donuts and nobody goes. So this would be your example. And she's like, because everybody's always backbiting and bickering and, you know, and just constantly like, you know, negativity. She's like, I'm not going to go. go sit and have a donut with those people. So, you have to do the whole thing from the beginning of your values to carving out the time to really fully engaging. And leaders need to engage too and show this is important. And that's when you're going to get the results. And then, even that being said, if you're coming from— you're trying to course-correct and you don't have the situation now and you're like really determined to make a change, you're going to have to give people time. Because they are not going to believe you for the first few rounds of these exercises. So you're going to also have to like get over their skepticism that is naturally developed when they see these things, you know, not being executed well. So again, I understand that not everybody enjoys chitchat, and I'm— I totally get that. And so, you know, there are certain people who may not want to do it all the time. But if you're doing it the right way, Everybody should end up at some point engaging in it.
Leanne ElliottAnd does that loop back to what you said right at the beginning about making sure you've got consistency? Did leaders just give up too soon?
Connie HadleyI think they do give up too soon. I don't know that they fully buy into it, you know, and that, that, you know, dissonance shows through in their execution. Um, so that's one of the reasons I'm so happy that Harvard Business Review put our work on the COVID Because to me, it's them saying to senior leaders, hey, you got to get involved. This is important. Please pay attention to this and start making changes. That is so helpful for all the people out there working. Because if the leaders don't buy in, there's just limited amounts of what you can do. And also, I want to expand that a little bit because I also don't think it's hopeless if your leaders don't buy in. I think you can create your own little pocket of camaraderie.
Al ElliottYeah.
Connie HadleyAnd, and go out there and do that and try the same tips, you know, but maybe that you have to approach it a little bit more creatively. No matter who you are, you can improve the connection even with just one other person in a way that'll make your work life better.
Leanne ElliottMany people may assume that loneliness at work affects only the more outgoing social types, and that us introverts who typically need less interaction are immune. However, Connie's research shows that introverts are actually more likely to feel lonely at work than extroverts, even though they might not seek out as much social connection. This finding really does flip the script on what we think loneliness looks like in the workplace and who it affects. It turns out loneliness can impact anyone, no matter how much they desire connection.
Connie HadleySo given that loneliness is a real issue for many, what can individuals There's some wonderful research by another psychologist named Nick Epley and his colleagues, where they studied kind of random social encounters. And I think it absolutely proves the point that anybody can approach anyone, even a relative stranger in your, in your organization. And what you will find is, you're— most people, when they do, they do this. For example, like one scenario is they'd make people go on like a subway train and have them talk to the person next to them. And so before they make this participant in their study like go talk to this random stranger, they'd measure how awkward they think the conversation is going to be, how connected they think they're going to feel to that person by the end of this 10-minute conversation, and how happy they think that they're going to feel. And usually people are pretty low, like their expectations are pretty low, as you can imagine. And then what they find at the end of it is The expectations were so wrong because people do end up feeling it wasn't as awkward as I thought it was going to be. I do feel actually quite a bit happier than I thought I would, and I feel more connected to this person. And the best part is when they survey the other random stranger who just happened to get foisted, be foisted, you know, this research participant, that other person also ended up feeling good about that conversation. And so I will say, yes, there are some, maybe some, some Real misanthropes out there, but for the most part, if you make the first step and you go out there and you invite someone to that 15-minute virtual coffee, or you stop by their desk to have a little chit-chat, you know you are going to find that they're responsive because again, our data would show and the data of other people like Gallup's most recent data says one in five people are feeling lonely right now in American workplaces. So just think of the odds. Like there are a lot of other people out there feeling just. as disconnected as you. So the moment you make that move, you may open up a whole new world for them too.
Leanne ElliottI remember feeling a bit disconnected, um, a couple of years ago. It was, it was towards the end of the pandemic. And I just, for January, I was like, right, everyone who connects with me on LinkedIn, or I connect with, I'm going to say, do you fancy a virtual coffee? Here's my 15-30 minute meeting link. I was one, surprised by how many people actually booked in. Two, really surprised by how much I enjoyed it. And I'm a fairly introverted person. And three, there's people— this was 2 and a half years ago— I'm still in touch now. I still have never met them, but we have virtual coffees. We talk about work. We talk about— I think you're right. It's amazing how just the capacity we have as humans to want to connect.
Connie HadleyI love that story. And bravo to you for opening yourself up to this whole world of people for a virtual coffee. But yeah, but I think your story is actually, it's not just because you're this famous podcaster that you've benefited from that experience. I think everybody can. And I know it doesn't seem like it, but I'm actually in between introversion and extroversion. I'm the ambivert on the scale. So I actually really dread going to happy hours myself because I do get social anxiety about it. So I'm not advocating for this because I don't know how hard it is to get over that hesitation, but I am advocating for it because I know in my own personal life and in my research that vast majority of time it is worth it and you are enhancing your experience and someone else's. So I just say, Just take that on faith, take a few chances, and soon you'll get that ball rolling. Again, there are few things in life I can advocate that have a higher likelihood of success than this.
Leanne ElliottTell us quickly about your self-assessment tool. For anyone listening, how can they use it either as an individual or a business?
Connie HadleyWell, so we published, as I mentioned, it's on the Institute for Life at Work's website, a research report that has all the— it has a user's guide for the scale. So, it has the 5 questions, the scoring key and how you know how to bucket the responses as low, medium, or high in loneliness based on our metrics. So that's for probably the best way for organizations to use it because then they can embed it in their own survey and then get collect their own internal data. But if you're just a person who's curious listening to this, you can also go to the website and get a link to do a little online test. And the benefit of that for you is that you get your scores automatically calculated and you get a little response. It tells you if you're high, low, or moderate in loneliness. And the benefit for us and for the greater world is that we're using this to also just be kind of an ongoing data collection method. So, people who sign up to take it are going to help us learn more about loneliness so we can continue to build out solutions for people that work.
Leanne ElliottI have no doubt there's going to be lots of conversations spinning off from your article in Harvard Business Review. With that potential noise coming, what's the one thing that you want people to take away from your work, from your article, from the research?
Connie HadleyThe one thing is hope. I think this is a problem that's been building, and it may seem at this point that that's just the way work is, but I want people to know it doesn't have to be this way. I mean, it really doesn't. I want people to know if you're feeling lonely, you're not alone in that. There are lots of people who are as well. They're just not talking about it. And when, if you're not lonely, but you're a manager who's worried about your people to know there's stuff you can do to help them if you do find out that people are lonely. And, you know, I would just love for everybody to just realize that this is, it's a, it really is. I know we overuse like win-win, but like it is a win-win. Like if you can help yourself and others feel less lonely at work, you're going to make people's lives better, but you're also going to make your organization more successful. Which is also good for us all in the long run. It keeps us all employed and making productive contributions to the world. So do it for yourself, do it for your colleague, and do it for your organization.
Al ElliottConnie's research has busted so many myths about loneliness and remote work. Let's just recap, shall we? The truth is: one, loneliness cannot be solved with in-person work. Number two, teams will not solve loneliness. Number three, lonely employees. are not needier socially than others at work. It's the quiet ones you need to be actually looking out for. And loneliness— number 4, loneliness is not a personal problem, it's an organizational problem.
Leanne ElliottUnderstandably, Connie's research has sparked widespread conversations across multiple platforms. Publications like Axios, NPR's Marketplace, and even the Daily Skimm have all picked up on the findings, emphasizing that feelings of loneliness at work persist no matter where employees are, whether remote, hybrid, or in office. If you want to keep up with Connie's work and follow all the commentary on her latest research, here's where to go.
Connie HadleyThe, the best place is to go to the Institute for Life at Work website. It's institutelifework.org. And, you know, we've got ways for you to communicate with us too, if you have questions about the research or want to learn more.
Al ElliottI strongly suggest that you go to institutelifework.org right now and also go and follow Connie on LinkedIn. She's brilliant.
Leanne ElliottThat is all for today. A quick reminder, if you'd like to hear stories of how organizations big and small have built amazing workplace cultures, then every Thursday we bring you an amazing guest with a great story just like today.
Al ElliottAnd if you'd like to keep up to date with the latest news and love a good Agony Aunt segment, then tune in next Tuesday where we'll bring you more of our weekly news roundup, our Hot Takes segment, which was— people are actually loving at the moment, and of course the world-famous Weekly Workplace Surgery where I put your questions to Leanne. Anything else to add before we go, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottSubscribe, hit that button, ring that bell, whatever it is you do on whatever platform it is that you're on. It really is the best way to support the show, to help us bring you even more awesome content and even more amazing guests like Connie Hadley from today. A huge thank you to Connie, an extraordinary psychologist, really breaking some new ground in terms of loneliness and mental health research more broadly. Just a joy to speak with her and so excited for all the success that, that she is quite rightly experiencing right now. Do go and follow her as well.
Al ElliottAbsolutely. Go follow Connie and follow us. We will see you next Tuesday.
Leanne ElliottBye-bye.
Al ElliottOut there, but also because workplace lonership is a topic that's finally getting the spotlight it deserves.
Leanne ElliottSorry, I think you said lonely ship. Okay, the shift to work— I'm gonna do all that again. That was shite, wasn't it?
Al ElliottYeah, no, it wasn't. It was just the end bit.
Leanne ElliottAfter the break, we'll be finding out if being lonely No. However, Connie's research— research— seek out as much social— social— everyone listening, everyone at the back.
Al ElliottOh, sorry.
Leanne ElliottYeah, I didn't get it wrong.
Al ElliottYou're doing a bit.
Leanne ElliottDoing a bit.
Al ElliottI didn't know you were doing a bit. Myth number 1, loneliness cannot be solved with—
Leanne ElliottWell, that's the truth. That's not the myth.