Each year on 30 July the world celebrates the International Day of Friendship or as sometimes known, International Friendship Day.
This day was first formally recognised and celebrated in 2011 when the UN General Assembly supported the idea that friendship between peoples, countries, cultures and individuals can inspire peace efforts and build bridges between communities.
We wanted to recognise this day within Corporate Shipbuilding for a couple of reasons. First of all, did you know that average employee will spend roughly 3,515 days working in their lifetime? That’s a long time to spend without fun or friendship. And secondly, we know that the work we do often involves travel for many of us, for some only a few days at a time, but for others it can longer periods of time living and working away from family. Particularly in those longer stays away from home, we know that work colleagues often provide support through the friendships made and a sense of community, sometimes even feeling like family.
Celebrating this day also helps us to reflect on our Culture Essential, Respect and Protect, thinking about what our friendship might mean to others and what their friendship means to us.
Both Elena Majoli and Roberto Gonzalez are no strangers to travelling for work and so we asked them what friendship at work means to them, here’s what they had to say:
Elena Majoli, Senior Manager, Inspection Team – Hull Construction & Outfitting
“Working on construction sites for most people means being away from home for extended periods of time, but at the same time it puts you in contact with many people from different countries, backgrounds, education and cultures to yours.
The delivery of a ship, with its frenetic energy, is an experience that not only brings together everyone involved in the project, but makes us all cheer together at the end! This is just like at the World Cup final where all the players and fans from both sides rejoice at the winning goal, forgetting their differences and any tension that may have existed before.
The energy itself that revolves around the successful delivery makes us forget the hours we spend at work and at the same time makes us find strength we never thought we had.
Here in this particular environment there is chemistry between people and relationships are established. Whilst they may feel fleeting, they have a habit of resurfacing over the years. They really enrich one’s personal and professional lives; I would go as far as calling them “friendships”!
Yes, because even people who suddenly enter your life and share your long working days… they unquestionably leave their mark on you and contribute to making you a different, improved person, who better knows how to recognize the true value of people.
As a plus of our work environment “who works hard plays hard”… if I look back through my photo library on my phone, some of my best memories are those spent with my colleagues and acquaintances during my free time!”
Roberto Gonzalez, Senior Project Manager – Adora Cruise Projects, Shanghai
“Relocation itself is a challenge, having to start from scratch your relationship with others is always a difficult task, wherever you go. My family and myself have been moving in the last ten years all around the globe (South Korea, Scotland, Spain, Italy and recently to Shanghai). Making friend depends always on your own personal behaviour.
During these years, it’s been very difficult to find around a group of people where you can enjoy life outside of your work environment. Arrive new in a company well structured with a senior position doesn’t always help you to create close relationship with your colleagues. We have now to consider that site teams are quite far each other, and now with new way of monthly meeting, the opportunity to meet often face to face with your peers, make this even more difficult.
Although all of these difficulties, we have been fortunate to find ,in all locations, a group of people, which have made our life more enjoyable. Most of the time connected to school parents with similar hobbies and in a few cases, work has brought us friendship to escape from your day to day and relax a little bit together.”