BY DERRICK VIKIRU
Regardless of whether your employer has a workplace romance policy, you need to keep your relationship off workplace radar as much as possible.
Hook-ups at the office aren’t exactly HR-approved, so it’s a marvel how individuals manage to squeeze in a steamy session within the confines of a buttoned-up work environment. You will be surprised that there’s certainly no shortage of people portraying cavalier sexism, predatory behaviour towards secretaries and general sexual harassment. In August 2018, The New Yorker published a story about Leslie Moonves, chairman and CEO of CBS Corporation facing accusations from six women, of sexual harassment, intimidation and abuse of office. American comedian Bill Cosby has been accused (and sentenced) by numerous women of rape, drug-facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery, child sexual abuse, and sexual misconduct amounting to abuse of office.
Romance with a colleague
Business Insider conducted a survey which found that 54 per cent of respondents have had sex with a colleague, and that almost half of those encounters took place on work property. A 2013 workplace romance survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) found that 42 per cent of companies had developed a formal, written, workplace romance policy. Thirty-three per cent of organisations forbid romances between employees who report to the same supervisor, and 12 per cent do not even allow employees in different departments to date. The research also found that some companies forbid hookups between their employees and clients or customers.
Certainly, there’s need to toe the line between bad office etiquette – behaviour that requires disciplinary proceedings and criminal sexual harassment. However, thanks to a minefield of legislation, sexual harassment may no longer be as blatant today, but it still permeates many a modern-day office.
What hope is there for the average office dinosaur?
As much as your colleagues’ sex life and relationship choices is none of your business, many of us have encountered times they either engaged in or witnessed intense desk-side romps—behind closed doors and even in plain sight. For the sake of preserving your dignity, that of your colleagues and the entire organisation, if you stumbled on this information accidentally, try to wipe it from your mind and forget that you know anything.
Additionally, because no man shall lay asunder that which is meant to be together, Susan Heathfield of The Balance Careers advices how to maintain professionalism with office romance.
She notes that regardless of whether your employer has a workplace romance policy, you need to keep your relationship off workplace radar as much as possible. Keep the contact with your partner professional. It’s unprofessional behaviour that causes problems.
Avoid talking privately in corners or behind closed doors, regularly eating lunch together without other co-workers, and—above all—touching. Limit the number of co-workers with whom you share this confidential information.
Know whether you are required to report a dating relationship to HR. Don’t blindside your HR staff. They can help you with gossip control and with understanding what is expected and appropriate in your workplace.
Derrick Vikiru is the Sub-Editor Management Magazine: Email: dvikiru@kim.ac.ke
