As most readers know by now, Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd was ousted last week because of ethics violations stemming from a relationship with actress Jodie Fisher. H-P said its board determined that Mr. Hurd didn’t violate H-P’s sexual harassment policy and Ms. Fisher said that the two “never had an affair or intimate sexual relationship.”
Still, the fracas serves as a reminder that office relationships can be fraught with landmines. Even strong flirtations among co-workers that don’t culminate into full-blown affairs can have real and serious consequences — and can change the mood and equilibrium of the office. For one, it can be tough for other co-workers to concentrate when two colleagues are engaging in flirty banter or making googly eyes at each other. And if feelings change or aren’t fully reciprocated within the couple, then office tensions can run high.
Of course, many workers have taken office flirtations to the next level: A 2009 CareerBuilder.com survey of more than 8,000 U.S. employees found that 40% have dated a coworker.
With so much potentially at stake, why do so many people continue to pursue these relationships? The romantic in me likes to think that maybe true love is at stake and that the couple carefully weighed the consequences and decided to go for it. I do know of several couples who met at work, kept their romance out of sight at the office, and have ended up getting married, with no damage to their reputations or careers.
Read More via the WSJ
http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/2010/08/09/h-ps-mark-hurd-and-jodie-fisher-when-workplace-flirtations-go-bad/
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