Office Romance Gumbo (Served Cold Only):
Meetings,
Team Decisions,
Boss Watching,
The Mamas & The Papas

Office Romance Problems Effects & Etiquette (DOs & DON’Ts)

Office Romance Gumbo
(Served Cold Only):
Meetings,
Team Decisions,
Boss Watching,
The Mamas & The Papas
(whaaat???)

Falling in love with your coworker, and having a coworker office romance, screws up your chances for Promotion / Pay Raise. Full stop. Why and how to fix it? Follow this Sex and the Workplace Deck, and find out.

I’ve given you a family example (see here), but let’s go directly to the workplace, and let me give you 3 workplace examples, that I’m sure you can relate to, and that will further convince you that I’m not exaggerating: an office romance with a co-worker, does change everything within a team, and thus, jeopardizes both of your careers.

Example no.1 Lunchtime (see here, in the previous post)

Example no.2, straight out of your everyday workday is: Meetings (what else?)

You’re going into a meeting with the rest of the team, and one of you lovey-dovey couple gets there first. Now, anybody who tries to sit next to you, is getting shooed off – although very nicely, and with a smile – because you’re saving that seat for your Schmoopie.

So… what? Now we are calling ‘dibs’ on the seating arrangements, in meetings? Really? What’s next? A food fight? This is a place of work, guys, not kindergarten!

Not to mention this is an overt preferential treatment to one co-worker (your partner), over all the rest. You’re saying, to whomever is trying to sit next to you: ‘I don’t want you – I want her’ (or him) referring to your partner.

The first or second co-workers, may take it lightly, but then, the more people come into the meeting room – the more overt, obvious, and obnoxious it gets.

Thus, the meeting cannot start with the same casual, amicable atmosphere as it used to – there’s overt and covert resentment towards you, Schmoopie et Schmoopie.

And the third and last workplace example starts right where the second left off:
Example no.3: Voting on issues

So now, the meeting moves to voting on whatever it is you need to decide on, whether it’s a majority rules thing, or it is just a discussion in which a call must be made.

Whereas before you fell in love with your co-worker, and embarked on your office romance, everybody would weigh in, as individuals, now, you love-birds are automatically siding with one another – you won’t vote against the other one, even if it were called for matter-of-factly.

Thus, the game is, de facto, rigged: You prefer to side with your Schmoopie, rather than decide on the merits of each individual issue. How very professional of you! What promotion and pay raise material that makes you to be… Absolutely… For sure…

Indeed, your boss is a witness to all these happenings. He or she is there, when you’re twisting your schedule, and contorting everybody else’s on the way, just so that you can go out to lunch with your Schmoopie;

And your boss is right there, when you are shooing everybody off the seat next to you in the meeting;

And finally, when you’re voting on issues not by merit, as determined by your professional experience and expertise, but by your automatic siding with your coworker lover, who may not have any relevant say on the matter, and still you would side with him or her, just because this is what couples do (or there is a fight to be had).

So your boss is witnessing your overt choice to have your relationship override your professional judgement. How do you think that plays, when he or she has to make the call regarding your promotion and or pay raise??? (I’m talking to the both of you love birds!)

See how even the most benign everyday work circumstances, are affected, and negatively so, by your co-worker romance at the office?
See how it happens?

Nobody is trying to take your happiness away from you, but you do need to be very realistic about the fact that there is a price to pay.

No free lunches in life.
Nor love.
Nor work.

It’s just the way it is.
And I’m telling you the truth.

And a final note to this BossProblem no. 3 (out of 7) on how falling in love with your co-worker and having an office romance (some call it a co-worker romance) screws your chances of landing that promotion / pay raise. And the note is this:

The more functioning, thus the better equilibrium, the team has had prior to your blossoming office romance, the more disruptive and destructive it is, because you are messing with a well-established ecosystem, that now has to re-calibrate. Which is tough.

Both practically: Sometimes it will never reach the previous level or quality of equilibrium, as before,
and operationally: It will take time and resources. Especially managerial ones, which take away your boss’ focus from the business at hand. So, not a good thing, and yet another thing he, or she, would NOT appreciate about you.

It’s like being the Yoko Ono to The Beatles (if she were a part of the band to begin with – but you get what I mean).

Or better yet: It’s like The Mamas and the Papas. That’s great double-whammy example:

Michelle Phillips and John Phillips were married before the group was founded. So while everything we’ve talked about would still be absolutely relevant, it would not be as problematic, at least in the short run, because it is a built-in part of the dynamics of the group, right from the get-go. It is built-in into the situation. It is baked into the cake.

Whereas we’re talking about an office romance, a co-worker romance that starts after the team has already formed, and then you fall in love with a co-worker.

So in your case there is an element of a fundamental change, to the previous equilibrium and dynamics, as we’ve seen.

The second whammy of this example, gets even more poignant.

If it were “just” Mama Cass falling in love with her group-mate Denny Doherty, then there would be some overt or covert turmoil, but the group would be able to function, because he was not into her, thus a clique of two, a couple, was not formed.

But he was into said Michelle Phillips, whom was not only married, but married to the fourth band-mate, said John Phillips… Thus creating a complete mess with everybody involved (pun very much intended).

So when these two (Michelle & Denny) cheated on both husband, John Phillips, and unrequited would-be-partner, mama Cass, then, once it was found out, it wasn’t possible to put the genie back into the bottle.

They kept recording together for a while, because they were under contract, but their team disintegration had already started, and the writing of their breakup, was already on the wall.

Lesson the day: falling in love with your co-worker and having an office romance messes everything up.

And that’s when the affair is blossoming! What happens when it goes sour?

Join me next to find out!