How to greet people at work



Business Bartleby

To hug or not to hug?



Max Flannel, our office agony uncle, answers a bulging postbag on greeting etiquette.



DEAR MAX, At the start of virtual meetings, should I say hello to everyone? It seems to absorb a lot of time, but I don't want to be unfriendly.



Virtual calls put the hell in hello. Every greeting prompts other participants to spend ages unmuting before saying "hello" back. Some people then ask "how is everyone?", forcing everyone to unmute again and say something wildly insightful like "fine". By the time that's over, someone else has joined the call and the whole cycle starts again. Use the rule of three. If there are three or more other people already on the line, just wave.



I am a germophobe and hate shaking hands with people. I pine for the days of the pandemic, when no one touched each other at all. What do you advise?



Your best bet is to wear a mask: there's no more cost-effective way to get people to keep their hands to themselves. You could also ask your employer if you could work from home, or from an iron lung.



If that is a step too far, you could do that pandemic-era thing of extending the point of your elbow towards people, and hope they will reciprocate. But what made some sense then looks weird now: like you don't know what those things at the end of your arms are for, or have been in a coma for five years.



I suffer from anxiety over how to greet people, particularly those I know a bit but not well. I spent some time in Japan in my youth, and to avoid deciding whether to hug someone or not, I stop before I get within touching distance and bow. It's amazing how often people will bow back. Is this a sensible strategy?



It depends a bit on whether you are still in Japan. But the pre-emptive greeting is a good tactic wherever you are. Another variant of this approach is to do a lot of performative stuff as you get close to someone: saying hello loudly, waving madly and smiling like an idiot.



Stop about two metres short of the other person, well out of range, and if necessary keep waving and saying hello for a bit. If you are in a meeting room, move quickly to the other side of the table as you wave. If you appear to be unhinged but extremely friendly, you will have hit the right mark. No other greeting will be needed.



I don't know how to greet female colleagues I have worked with for years. I could shake hands with them, as I do with other men, but it seems a little formal. Do you have any advice?



This question is one of the ones I get most often, at least from people in America and western Europe. The classic advice is to shake hands with everyone, regardless of how well you know them. It works as a greeting between men, so should work as a greeting between sexes, too. If you want to add a bit of familiarity, use both hands to project extra warmth. Imagine you are a political leader after signing a peace treaty.



But there are times when handshaking feels genuinely awkward: when you see a close colleague socially, for example. My advice in these circumstances is never to be the first mover: wait and see what the other person does and match them. The risk is that you sacrifice some agency, and end up in an unwanted clinch. But at least you didn't start it.



I was recently involved in an unfortunate hugging incident at work. I got my timing and targeting all wrong, and ended up with the other person's ear lobe in my mouth. Where did I go wrong, and what should I have done?



If you do end up at close quarters, remember that an embrace at work is not meant to be an actual embrace, just a faint echo of one. If you are hugging someone, behave as though you are playing that children's game called "Operation". Put your arm around the other person without actually touching any part of their body. Keep your face well away from theirs: unless they have unusually big ear lobes, you should never find yourself in that kind of horrendous situation again.



In a recent cheek-kissing greeting, we did not agree on the number of head movements and I ended up with the other person's nose in my mouth. What should I have done?



You could count down out loud. But I notice that this comes from the same address as the lobe-eater. Since you seem unusually prone to nibbling your colleagues, please just approach everyone with your hand already fully extended for a handshake. You should look like a Dalek.



Write in and let me know how you get on. I'll be back with another postbag later in the year.





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