Office Romances – Dos and Don’ts

January 31, 2013, by HR à la carte | Work Environment and Policies

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner; what better time to talk about office romance!  We spend the majority of our waking hours at work, so it stands to reason that many of us will end up dating co-workers, subordinates or even managers.  I know a few people who met their spouse in the workplace and some who even continue to work together at the same company.   However, some workplaces place a direct ban on workplace relationships altogether (for instance, the military has a strict “no fraternization” policy), and others stay silent on the subject.  Neither extreme works or is realistic.  

Two-thirds of Canadians think that office romances are fine according to one survey by Randstad, however nearly one-third think the parties involved should work in different departments.  In a CareerBuilder survey nearly one-third of those who were in a workplace relationship ended up marrying their co-worker and nearly one-fifth dated their boss. 

We’ve provided a list of dos and don’ts to help you navigate the often murky waters of workplace romances:

Do:

• Have a policy on workplace relationships and provide guidelines to your employees on what to do in the event they find themselves in a relationship with someone at work.
• Have a clear Workplace Harassment Policy in place so your employees understand the difference between a consensual relationship and what is considered harassment.
• Ensure your employees understand that they need to let you know that they are in a relationship with another employee.  This isn’t meant to intrude on their personal lives, but is key to helping them manage the optics around that relationship, particularly if it’s between an employee and a manager.
• Transfer them into different teams or departments if possible; particularly if the relationship is between an employee and a manager.  This helps dispel any potential perceptions of favouritism.  If it’s not possible due to the size of your company, at least try and have both parties reporting into a different person from a management perspective.
• Be prepared to follow through on your workplace relationship and workplace harassment policies should your employees breach them, otherwise they are not worth the paper they are written on.

Don’t:

• Ban workplace relationships at your organization.  It doesn’t work and will only make your employees hide their relationships from you, creating an atmosphere of mistrust and deceipt – both a negative hit against your organization’s productivity.
• Ignore the fact that romances may blossom in your organization.  Be prepared to talk to your employees directly about it if they are not taking the initiative to let you know about their relationships with others at your company. 
• Ignore complaints from other employees about the lovebirds; overt public displays of affection  can make other employees feel uncomfortable.

Finally, if you do suspect an employee of having a relationship at work and s/he is not forthcoming about it or is flagrantly lying about it, know that it is your right as an employer to discipline that employee for the breach against your policies.  In one recent case in Ontario, Kuntz Electroplating Inc. fired one of their managers who repeatedly lied about a relationship with his subordinate.  “The main thrust of Kuntz’s argument is not about the affair.  It is that Reichard was in flagrant and continuous breach of the non-fraternization policy which required him to report his relationship to his superior. Instead of reporting it, Reichard on several occasions lied to at least three different senior executives about the affair while at the same time acknowledging that he knew and understood the policy.”

The judge upheld the termination, saying “Kuntz had every right to consider that Reichard’s wilful misconduct seriously called into question the trust, integrity and honesty required for him to perform his duties as a manager and that Kuntz’s lack of trust in Reichard was sufficient to terminate him for cause.”

Tell us what you think.  Have you come face-to-face with office romances in your organization?  How did you handle it?