Relationships at work

UrbanBob

Saw something about this in another post and thought it might lead to some interesting results.

My personal experience is never again there was too much drama and stress on top of an already stressful job and got looks from coworkers because they aren't blind and it took away from my work.

What is your experience and how did it go?

Anonymouse

Pretty fun when I was young and working stuff like retail. It was pretty much like an extension of highschool. Being able to meet tons of girls my age through work and "hang out" with different girls every few days. Joys of youth. There wasn't any sort of professional consequences for a bunch of shelf stockers or cashiers hooking up with eachother outside of work. If I were single at my age now I wouldn't feel comfortable getting into any relationships in a corporate office environment. Maybe I'm just old but it feels unprofessional and morally inappropriate.

DZA_

As the saying goes, "Dont sh*t where you sleep". That stuff gets ugly real quick. There are a few couples here (some that are not married and some that are) that work in the same technology unit but different teams on my floor.  I wouldn't mind dating someone in the same field but not at work.

Cheers,

Jon_Cisco

If you meet someone at work seriously consider changing jobs. I know several people that married after meeting on the job. Non of them did well working together but the relationships were fine.

EANx

A lot really depends on the environment. Some environments can be pretty insular, like a small military base located in a foreign country, so it's not like the people there have a whole lot of options.

I've seen a lot of people be in relationships at work. The best ones are those where people work in different sections and have almost no contact during the work day. I would only worry about people who worked together.

JoJoCal19

Similar to Anonymouse, it was great when I was young working in retail or even early on in my corporate jobs (non-IT). Probably around the time I was in my late 20's I had more of DZA's sentiment. I'd just prefer not do it at all, but like EANx said, if you didn't see each other during the work day it MIGHT be ok. Still, I'm the sort of person who likes to keep my personal and work lives sandboxed, so I'd err on the side of not having any relationships with anyone at the same company.

Domm362

Before making my career change into IT, I was involved with one of my co-workers at the school I was subbing at. Things didn't work out and it created a very tense environment for the next 6 months after (well, at least to me anyway).

So yeah, to me, work and relationships shouldn't be mixed. As DZA_ said, it can get ugly really quick - mainly if things don't work out (and most of them don't anyway).

MeanDrunkR2D2

Today if I were single it would really depend on a few things.  Someone that I'd see/work with on projects, no way.    If I worked in a huge corporation where I have no interaction with them in the office would be more acceptable especially if we have no influence over the other should things go south.   I work for a large company now and there are many husband/wife and singles dating internally, but they are usually in different departments so the interaction between them all is very limited.   

Anonymouse

Some of you guys bring up a good point about keeping work and personal life separate. For that reason I try not to hang out with people outside of work or add people on social media. Once one of us leaves a job then it's okay to be friends. The only exceptions would be maybe some after work happy hour and if people share any of my hobbies (cars, cycling, videogames). For my own sanity I like to try and keep my work and personal lives far away from each other.

DZA_

I heard a story from one of my ex-colleagues who was working on an infrastructure project late night in the law office and saw management and another person having a go in one of the side offices. My buddy ended up shaking his head, put on some headphones and grinding away at the project. What an awkward moment to be in. 

cyberguypr

Am I the only one who engaged in workplace foolery who doesn't have a horror story?

Domm362

cyberguypr said:

Am I the only one who engaged in workplace foolery who doesn't have a horror story?

You're probably one of the lucky ones. LOL

UnixGuy

I don't see a reason why to be honest. Meet people outside work, why does it have to be at the work place? too messy

jcundiff

cyberguypr said:

Am I the only one who engaged in workplace foolery who doesn't have a horror story?

No lol,  I was told at a former employer ( by the guy who ended up being my best man when I got married) to 'quit dipping my pen in the company ink"  my reply, "Why? It's a company pen"   This was a 24x7 contact center with multiple support projects ( I prided myself on having one in every project on every shift at the time :O )

I was divorced, in my mid 20s at the time.  Then I got serious with one specific chick there, today we have been married 19+ years 

EANx

cyberguypr said:

Am I the only one who engaged in workplace foolery who doesn't have a horror story?

Oh, definitely not.

Info_Sec_Wannabe

cyberguypr said:

Am I the only one who engaged in workplace foolery who doesn't have a horror story?

I met my wife in my first job. As the environment or set-up there is an advisory or consulting nature, we were assigned to different jobs and thereby able to avoid any drama in the workplace.

yoba222

The woman in charge of Office 2007's delightful ribbon UI design dated the guy in charge of Windows 8's UI design when they worked together. Look how well that turned out.

kaiju

If you are just "playing the field" it would be best to avoid "dating" coworkers. That situation could get nasty really quick. To quote a friend, "Sometimes dating a coworker is like playing hide & seek in a mine field. You may be able to escape the initial blast but only to get taken out or injured by the chain reaction of of other mines exploding". 

Scenario members:

Team lead

Team member-A

Team member-CB

It was known by many people within the organization that team-lead and team member-A had gone for drinks and clubbing after work on several occasions. They had spoken of this openly while casually passing convo with other team members. Team member-CB had a boyish crush on team member-A but was never able to get her attention. Feeling jilted, team member-CB made an anonymous report to HR that there was a sexual harassment-like fraternization between a team lead and one of his team members that needed to be investigated. The org had a strict sexual harassment policy so the team lead was temporarily stripped of his position and move to a different section at headquarters during the investigation. Team member A was temporarily to a remote site during this time. The conclusion of the investigation: there was no harassment involved. They were actually double dating because their perspective spouse/partner were always at the drinking/clubbing session. They assumed EVERYBODY knew about their relationship statuses. Perception is everything! Team lead was on the cusp of being fired because of this situation and team member-A was about to be assigned to the remote site that was a 3 hour round trip drive every day. Here's the kicker, team member-CB was the actual person who was sexually harassing team member-A. She avoided him because of the way he spoke to her. It was always OBVIOUS that he was making undesired sexual advances. That situation disturbed the harmony of that team for a while. In the end, team member-CB was forced out of the org.     

On the flip side: I have plenty of friends who met their spouses through or at work because everybody usually socializes together.