Jodi Glickman, who will be giving the Annual Conference 2019 keynote on Searching for Work You Love? Why it’s the Wrong Advice for our Students (& Ourselves), weighs in on the debate between being liked—and being loved—at work, what’s the difference, and why being liked is not enough.

In a conversation with Jodi Glickman, our upcoming Annual Conference speaker, we asked about her recognized topic: Why you should stop searching for work you love, and the debate between being liked—and being loved—at work.

Jodi: I love this question—particularly because, for me, like and love are so far apart—the distance between them is so great that they’re really not even in the same ballpark. 

Here’s the truth—love has nothing to do with like.  Like is for Facebook.  It’s a thumbs-up, thumbs-down kind of thing.  Like is superficial.  It’s fleeting.  One day I like you, the next day I don’t.

Love, on the other hand—is deep and lasting.  It’s about trust, respect, admiration. Love is about making tough decisions, giving real and meaningful feedback, asking the right questions, doing the right thing, even when it’s not the popular or easy choice.

When we aim for “nice” at work, we don’t necessarily engender trust, respect, admiration.  Sometimes we get just the opposite—people sense inauthenticity. When we aim for love, we help build others up—we don’t evaluate our decisions based on “nice” or not, we evaluate our decisions on “is that the right thing to do?”

Being nice might mean not giving a student or colleague feedback because you don’t want to offend.  Being loved means giving someone feedback precisely because you care—you want to help them become better—it’s the generous thing to do.  Giving a young person feedback is an investment in their career development.

Being “nice” and holding our tongue, so as not to offend, is actually the opposite of nice—it can be extremely detrimental when we don’t give students or colleagues much-needed feedback because we’re afraid of the optics and not being “nice.”

Generosity is also a big component of love—it means sharing your time, your talents, your energy, your network, feedback, credit—sharing it all.   Generosity is about making other people’s lives (your students, teams, boss’ lives) better or easier. That’s a surefire way to make people love you.

Finally, consider this—like is limiting and prescriptive – it inhibits our behavior (I shouldn’t do this because it’s not nice, or I should do this because I want him to like me).  Love is empowering and challenging—it expands our thinking—how should I approach this situation to get to the best out of my team and to achieve the optimal outcome for myself, my students, or my client?

To learn more about this topic, join us at the Annual Conference, June 19-21 in Denver, Colorado!