After a workplace promotion, the unwritten rules of your relationship will change, but it doesn't have to be for the worse Dear Bob …A friend of mine (in the sense that coworkers are friends) was just promoted. He deserved it. He was the right person for the job. The problem? He’s now my boss.[ Want to cash in on your IT experiences? InfoWorld is looking for stories of an amazing or amusing IT adventure, lesson learned, or tales from the trenches. Send your story to offtherecord@infoworld.com. If we publish it, we’ll keep you anonymous and send you a $50 American Express gift cheque. ] I don’t know why it’s a problem. He isn’t making it a problem. I don’t think I’m making it a problem either. But we aren’t friends anymore the way we used to be. Our working relationship is more formal and less relaxed; we’re both more tentative and guarded in our conversations.I don’t know what to do about it, and I’m pretty sure my old friend/new boss doesn’t either. Any suggestions?– Strained Dear Strained …I have one: Wait.It’s a fact — when you report to someone, the relationship is different than the relationship between peers, for a number of reasons that are obvious once you take the time to list them. For example: Peers aren’t paid to evaluate each others’ performance. Your manager is paid to evaluate yours. Also, peers don’t generally give each other assignments. Managers routinely assign work to those who report to them, set deadlines for completion, and establish the expectation that those they delegate to will deliver before the deadline.One more: As I explain in depth in “Leading IT: The Toughest Job in the World,” managers aren’t (or shouldn’t be) part of the teams they lead. They have to maintain some level of separation, relying on the team to develop internal management to complement the leadership they provide.All of this means that the day before the promotion, you both knew the unwritten rules governing your relationship. The promotion invalidated them, and so far, they haven’t been replaced by a new set of unwritten rules. If the two of you were in a movie, you’d solve this through an earnest conversation, a fishing weekend, or beer. Since this is life as it actually happens, it’s more likely you’ll solve this through trial and error. Be patient. Both the problem and its solution will happen naturally over the course of time. Trying to rush it will probably just slow it down.– BobThis story, “Your new boss used to be a peer — now what?,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Read more of Bob Lewis’s Advice Line blog on InfoWorld.com. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter. CareersIT Jobs