Today, being the celebration of Valentine’s Day, it seemed appropriate to discuss relationships in the workplace. Let’s face it; we spend more working hours with our co-workers than we often do with our families. So let’s look at a couple of scenarios of relationships in the workplace that can impact your business.
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Bob, a married Supervisor, seems to be giving more and more attention to Stephanie, a newly hired and fresh out of college Coordinator that works in another department. You notice at first Bob is spending an unusual amount of time at Stephanie’s desk; then they are sitting together, but separate from everyone else during lunch and ultimately notice that they start leaving for lunch together every day. This is one that you need to treat delicately! It is not your business that Bob is married and “appears” to be fooling around with Stephanie. Where it does need to be addresses is the time, Bob as a company Supervisor and role model, is spending away from productive work, the disruption to Stephanie’s work and the overall message being sent to the other employees. I would talk to Bob about this non-productive time and your expectations that it will cease
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Diane, Supervisor of 4 Warehouse workers, one of which is Joe. Recently Joe and Diane announced they were seriously dating. Diane has assured you this relationship will have no impact on her role as a Supervisor. Do you think this will work? The short answer is “no”. The biggest problem you will have here is that all other employees under Diane will always feel that their co-worker has a bigger say in disputes because he has “the ear of the supervisor”. Additionally, there will always be the perception of favoritism even if it is not opening shown. The best result for this situation is to move one of the employees. Hopefully this is part of your handbook policies as it may have to lead to one of the employees leaving your employment if you do not have another available position.
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