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Staffers at Airbnb<\/a> might have found themselves in an unofficial work pairing courtesy of a practice adopted by the company\u2019s CEO, Brian Chesky<\/a>. <\/p>\n Chesky, who co-founded the short-term accommodation site<\/a> in 2008, recently said he has an \u201cinformal\u201d habit of pairing people on his team to provide them with another layer of support<\/a>.<\/p>\n Speaking on the \u2018ReThinking with Adam Grant\u2019<\/em> podcast<\/a> recently Chesky, who is worth $11.8 billion according to the Bloomberg Billionaire\u2019s Index<\/a>, said he will often mold duos out of his new hires.<\/p>\n \u201cFour years ago we hired two creative directors, they worked together as a duo. One\u2019s more of a creative director and one\u2019s more of a writer,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n \u201cThey wanted to join together: I remember him saying: \u2018Well, if he joins, I\u2019ll probably join.\u2019 And they came together and they came as a set.\u201d<\/p>\n While this working arrangement is common in creative advertising, the concept of a working duo made a mark on Chesky.<\/p>\n \u201cIt worked so well that I started thinking about this notion of duos in other areas \u2026 sometimes it\u2019s just hard for one person to be a unicorn, to be able to do everything, but if you could create duos they could cover each other\u2019s strengths.\u201d<\/p>\n Chesky, who is a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, was asked the question in relation to combatting workplace loneliness. <\/p>\n While Chesky\u2019s practice arose organically, he agreed the tactic could go a long way to helping solve the problem.<\/p>\n According to a November study<\/a> of more than 2,000 employees from analytics company Perceptyx, more than four in ten employees reported feeling lonely at work. <\/p>\n Men were twice as likely as women to say they felt very lonely, with senior leaders also reporting to feel more chronically isolated than managers lower down the hierarchy. <\/p>\n Perceptyx found that the impact ranged from disengagement to a fall in productivity\u2014lonely workers were 4.5 times more likely to struggle with their output and rely on unhealthy coping mechanisms to get through.<\/p>\n Loneliness isn\u2019t just hurting individuals, it\u2019s also damaging economies. <\/p>\n Cigna healthcare\u2019s Loneliness Index<\/a> estimates that employers lose $154 billion a year due to absenteeism, a figure that could be improved upon if everyone from trainees to the C-suite felt they had someone to lean on.<\/p>\n Chesky added he had \u201cnever really thought about\u201d how this organic habit could help combat the problem of isolation in the workplace, but added: \u201cI think there\u2019s something to that. <\/p>\n \u201cAnd also I think people are on the same journey as you because you\u2019re a new employee and you\u2019re [trying] to integrate [into] the team, but you\u2019re new and you\u2019re the odd person out. And so giving people a shared journey to be on together I think is really important.\u201d<\/p>\n While Chesky, who has grown the platform<\/a> to host more than 1.5 billion guests in its history, previously referred to his employees as \u201cfamily\u201d he has since walked back that sentiment. <\/p>\n Chesky laid off a quarter of Airbnb\u2019s headcount\u2014around 1,900 people\u2014in 2020 at the onset of the pandemic. <\/p>\n While announcing the layoffs, Chesky wrote he had a \u201cdeep feeling of love\u201d for all of his staff, which may have rung as something of an oxymoron for those losing their roles.<\/p>\n\nWork duo, not siblings<\/h2>\n