Workplace relationships: why you click with some people and not with others

With some people at work, things just flow. With others, one meeting is enough to spend the rest of the day recovering. Usually there is no bad person behind it, and it isn't your fault either. Two people simply work differently, and nobody ever told them.

We spend more time at work than with most of the people close to us. That is why so many relationships begin there: alliances, rivalry, envy, and love too.

Does this sound familiar?

• Your boss notices every mistake but never sees your good work.
• A coworker takes credit, or quietly competes over whose opinion counts.
• The person you manage does the exact opposite of what you ask.
• A spark has jumped between you and a coworker, and you don't know what to do with it.

Why astrology

You don't have to believe in it or understand it. Synastry (comparing the birth charts of two people) lays their charts side by side, the positions of the planets at the moment each of you was born. It shows where your pace is similar and where it differs, who needs rules and who needs freedom, and where influence is quietly being negotiated between you. Often it is exactly what you feel at work, only without the words for it.

The At work reading in AstroJung compares your chart with that of a coworker, a boss, or someone you manage. It shows where you complement each other, where things rub, and what you can do about it. It ends with one step you can try this very week, for instance the next time you hand over a piece of work.

Three roles, three questions

• Coworker: ally or rival? Where you are a team, and where you quietly compete.
• Boss: what they see in you, and what they need to see before they notice your work.
• Someone you manage: how they see you as the one in charge. What brings out their best, and where your way of leading stifles them.

What the reading looks at

The planets that decide things at work. Saturn is rules and judgement: when it touches the other person's Sun, that person easily feels assessed. Mars is pace and rivalry: one wants to decide now, the other needs to think it through. Mercury shows how you give and understand tasks, the Sun who wants to be seen, and Pluto where power is quietly negotiated.

When you both know your exact birth time, the reading adds how your relationship touches daily work, career, and what happens out of sight.

Rivalry, envy and jealousy

A workplace isn't only about how well you work together. The reading neither hides these things nor exaggerates them. It says where they arise easily between you, and makes neither of you the guilty one.

When a spark jumps

Many love stories begin at work. When your charts show attraction as well, the reading says so calmly. It also says what that does to the attention of the people around you, and what it means when you aren't on the same level.

What the reading doesn't do

It doesn't predict a promotion, a dismissal, or how your relationship will turn out. It doesn't say what kind of person the other one is. It shows what is happening between the two of you.

How to begin

• Calculate your own chart, without signing up.
• Create an account and add your coworker or boss with their date, time and place of birth. If you don't know the time, the reading works without it.
• In Synastry, choose that person and open At work.

Who at work do you spend the most time with, and what about the two of you do you still not understand?