These days' people spend longer hours working alongside a colleague so it is inevitable that strong bonds and friendships will develop. In some instances, professionals know more about their work friends than they do their own partners, simply because they are in their company for 220 days per year.

When you work with someone for this length of time and share difficult experiences such as board meetings and successful collaborative projects, it is only natural that you will build a strong rapport. We all hate that Monday morning feeling but when we know that there is going to be a friendly face waiting to greet us when we stumble into the office at 9 am, there is no better feeling. And who else will stay awake when we talk shop in the pub on a Saturday evening but a work colleague who shares similar concerns and is familiar with the projects that we are talking about.

The workplace can be a hostile environment with pressures from management, difficult colleagues and a demanding workload, so knowing that your work buddy can provide a comfortable shoulder to cry on at lunch time can be a comforting thought. This makes it easier to get up every morning, knowing that you will share a day in the company of someone who is pleasant to be around. This makes the office a better place and employees become more engaged with the work that they are doing.

Some bosses are strongly against family and friends working together and assume that employees who forge work based friendships are extremely vulnerable individuals. However, many view friendships at work as a form of fostered closeness which makes for a happy team. When employees care about the people they work with every single day, they are going to work as a united front and bounce off each other's strengths and weaknesses.

Problems with work based friendships arise when they spill into personal friendships. Whilst a professional friendship requires the same amount of communication, honesty, trust and respect, a personal friendship runs much deeper as it involves sharing intimate and personal details. A professional friendship shares a bond which is associated with experiences at the office. But what happens when a professional friendship becomes a personal one too?

Friendships are fragile things, one minute everything is wonderful and then out of the blue something goes wrong and you wish that the girl who shared your chips with you last week, had actually choked on them! When friends fall out in a personal relationship, it will not spill into your professional life. When friends fall out in a professional friendship...everyday could feel like a commute to hell.

Turning a blind eye: Friendships in the office encourage bad behaviour and could result in unethical or illegal practises to go discreetly unnoticed and cause friction amongst the rest of the team.

Too much information: When employees spend a lot of time together both in the office and away from it, personal information is often shared. Therefore, it is better to avoid any subjects related to morality, religion, life history, deepest secrets and politics. Although it may feel fine to discuss these things at the time, such information could be regurgitated when it is a fight between you and your best friend for promotion.

When a position of status and money is at stake...can a friendship really be that strong? Likewise, one of you will make that promotion, so how will the other feel? This is where friendships can become sour and spoil morale within the rest of the office. It could be very difficult to report back to a friend you used to work alongside with but is now your boss!

A wolf in sheep's clothing: A work colleague could have a Jekyll and Hyde personality which is only uncovered when you meet outside of office hours. That guy with whom you shared friendly banter with at lunchtime could be a completely different person when the tie is replaced for a pearl necklace! Seriously, people put on a front at work and you could lose respect for a person when you meet outside of the work place. If this happens you could find it difficult to maintain the respect you had before meeting after hours.

Kiss up, kick down: Your best friend could even be your boss which makes it more difficult to balance the two extremities. She may be a great friend out of the office, someone with whom you can wind down with and feel comfortable around. However, back in the office it could be easy to forget that she is still your boss and you could expect her to treat you the same way as she does on the badminton court. If she swaps her sweatband for her professional hat, it can be easy to feel mistreated when she does not give you favouritism or offers those bonuses, opportunities and promotions to someone else.

Joined at the hip: If you treat your friend as a work-spouse, it can become increasingly difficult for you both to shine as individuals. When both bladders are in synch because you both share the same coffee breaks and hence, need to visit the bathroom at the same time, you become indistinguishable and both could stay in the same position for years whilst other team members rise to dizzy heights. Supervisors could also view employees who are close friends as gossipers.

Will it last: A friendship that exists both in the office and outside of it does not necessarily mean that it will last. Often when a colleague leaves a company, it becomes clear that you have very little in common when one of you works somewhere else.

Missing out on friends: Whilst it is nice to have one solid friend at work, this kind of relationship can cause isolation. When two people become close, others members of staff cannot see a way in. This could cause team members to become jealous and feel a sense of unjust at the office... It could even start malicious gossip. When rumours start flying, a work based friendship can become severely jeopardised and clicks could start to form.

Granted, outside friends may not know a single thing about your job but they will be more likely to offer you that much needed distraction away from work. They are also the ones who are likely to notice if you are taking on more than you can handle.

If you do have a work-spouse, the only way to truly balance the scales is to keep the lines of communication open whenever a doubt or worry crops up related to work or something more personal. By talking things through, you avoid disagreements which could severely damage both your personal and working relationship.

Your best friend may also be your work colleague but it is important to remember that this sort of friendship has different rules. It should be handled with extreme care and caution if you want it to last!