Today’s post/video is a BONUS installment I’m inserting here,
just before getting to all the fixes, to all of the 7 office romance BossProblems, we have enumerated thus far, which we will get to, next time.

This BONUS is designed to complete the gear shift, we’ve made last time: From focusing exclusively on how your office romance screws up your chances for a promotion, and/or a pay raise, to now also drilling down into the relationship, itself.

Now, mind you, this is not a Dear Abby kind of Deck. But, we would be remiss, if we do not to address the totality of the effects your office romance has on you. And that necessitates this gear shift, from your purely professional and monetary drives, for a promotion and pay raise, to the strictly personal ramifications, your office romance will have on you, should it come to an end…

To have this complete 360 degree view, this BONUS came to be. Thus, today is about your heart and soul, rather than your job title and wallet.
Not to belittle the latter. Just to define the focus for this post/video, which is difference to all the rest on this Deck.

So, the no. 8, BONUS, office romance BossProblem is:
What happens when it ends?

Please note, I did not say “if” it ends. I said “when” it ends. I’m truly sorry to have to rain on your parade, but we’re all adults here, so we might as well face reality: Most good things come to an end. It’s the natural cycle of life: The freshness, and exuberance, and beauty, of the blossom, the sweetness the ripe fruit [I’m getting very poetic here], then, the rot – pun very much intended – and, finally, the falling off the proverbial tree.

Now, to add insult to injury, this whole sequence is unfolding before your very coworkers, and boss. They are the tabloid paparazzi, to your “Brangelina” love affair. And, just like with “Brangelina”, no Hollywood happily-ever-after ending, is guaranteed. Statistically speaking, the opposite is.

And that is not to say, that you two schmoopie-s may not beat the odds. Of course you could, and I truly hope you would! After all, it does happen.

Many a happy couple has found their Westley-Buttercup true love, at the office. [See, I was a poet there for a moment… now I’m back to my normal Remington Steele…]

It makes complete sense: This is where you spend most of your time, so this is where you get to profoundly know people ; And of this prolonged and profound acquaintance, sparks may fly ; And of those sparks, true love may evolve.

Nevertheless, as the saying goes: While you hope for the best, you should prepare for the worst.

Now, “hoping” is no big deal – you can do it on your own. No skill or experience needed. It comes naturally to all of us, simply being a human. Preparing for the worst, on the other hand, is all about skill and  experience, which is where this Deck kicks in, which is why this BONUS is crucial.

In the context of getting a pay raise, which is all we do here, on this channel, it is probably not the kind of “bonus” you want. I totally get it. It’s a bummer: Who wants to drill down, into the very probable, or let’s make it more optimistic the very possible, odds, of your office romance fizzling out, dissolving into a very awkward day-to-day at the office, at best, and an unbearable emotional grind, at worse – who wants that?

But, this is not some fluff, feel-good, Kumbaya, bullshit channel, but a realistic, pragmatic, tough love channel, so we do not pander to you, for your subscriptions and likes – though we obviously want and need them, to ride the algorithm. Instead, we go by what you actually need, based on our decades’ professional skill and experience, to help you save both your career and your relationship. Which is why this BONUS is what it is.

So, if you acknowledge this – even begrudgingly so – and want to make sure you have all your bases covered, not leaving any stone unturned, stick around. It will worth your time. If not, skip this, and go directly to the fixes, here.

So, what does happens when it ends?

5 things:

1. You’re back to square one

You come full circle to where you started off of – but not in a good way: Remember the first two office romance BossProblems we’ve covered? Those were:
(1) You are not focused on the job and
and
(2) You become a distraction for others.

Well, what happens with those two now, that your office romance is no more, depends on how you’ve dealt with them since they first started:

If you’ve managed to control them by now, thus, they have subsided
then, now there’s a relapse, and they kick in once again. If you have not managed to control them, thus, they have been present all along your office romance, now that it ends, they are exacerbated even further.

Obviously, this does not bode well to your chances for that promotion and/or pay raise you so want, but this is not our focus today. But even from a pure personal perspective, your personal prospective, this puts an added burden on you, emotionally, and mentally, on top of that of your breakup.

So, there’s the heartache of the break-up itself, which is then compounded by your presumably deteriorating performance, and then topped off by your diminishing chance to get ahead, that stems from the other two – a Perfect Storm, of both career and personal life, that can easily throw you off the track, and for some time to come.  

This is bad for any employee, but all the more so, for a highly driven one, such as yourself. Which is why, this crippling outcome, is something you should take into account, when you embark on an office romance.

Actually it’s not so much “taking into account” per se, because falling in love is not a logical, calculated, behavior. (I’ll address this point in a separate video here). It’s more about being “aware”. So just be aware of this possible outcome, as part of the bigger picture of being aware of the possible (or probable) break-up of your relationship.

The 2^nd thing that happens, when your office romance ends, is:

2. You face the awkwardness (to say the least) of still having to work shoulder-to-shoulder with your ex-schmoopie

Navigating the day-to-day at the office was intricate enough when you were still together – now what? Even when your office romance ends – working together still continues, and this is a Petri dish for a zillion kinds of personal and professional entanglements:

The overt or covert tensions between you two ;
The awkwardness it causes with your coworkers (which is why you “come full circle” to becoming a distraction, all over again, as mentioned before) ;
The realignment of interpersonal cliques: In the form of whom of your mutual friends on the team, when you were a couple, is going with you, and whom is going with schmoopie (who’s not your schmoopie anymore), and whom is undecided, which adds yet another layer of awkwardness all around…

You know how it is – and you know it is so – I am not contriving, nor exaggerating.

What exacerbates this whole mess is that, even when you present it to everybody at the office as a “mutual breakup”, we all know there’s never really such a thing as a truly “mutual” breakup – or maybe there is, but it’s extremely rare.

Most always, there is one who wants the relationship to go on, more than the other, and eventually, one will initiate the break-up, which will leave the other one deeply hurt.

Sometimes the one who initiates the break-up is, paradoxically, the one who actually wants the relationship more, but does it in hope of igniting the partner’s jealousy or regret…

So, either way, not exactly “mutual”. You know it. Your co-workers know it. Your boss knows it.

So, if you are the abandoned one, there is yet another layer to the compound burden on your psyche, the fourth one. There’s the break up itself, there is your deteriorating performance, and there is your diminished chance to get ahead in terms of promotion, or pay raise, or both – so that’s three crippling layers, and now the fourth one, which is the shear humiliation of everybody knowing it – that you are the abandoned one…

There’s no face-saving possible: Everybody knows everybody involved. If you don’t tell, schmoopie might. And even if schmoopie doesn’t tell, you wouldn’t have to be a particularly busy-body to guess the truth, by merely observing your reactions to one another. So you’re an unintentional open book.

At least when this happens outside the office – when you are abandoned and betrayed by your partner – both of you can maintain better separation of your personal and professional lives, and keep your humiliation to yourself, and save face, at least during work hours. In such a case, work can actually be a refuge. Here, on the other hand,  everything is tangled up…

The amount of tension between you two, also depends on the reason for the break-up. Was it “just” a “drifting apart” situation, or an “irreconcilable differences” one, or a full on betrayal situation. In which case, the tension can grow to a level of full-fledged toxicity, that can poison your soul and everybody’s around you, not to mention the whole other level of humiliation…

And what happens when schmoopie has a new partner – outside of the office, or, God forbid, at the office, on the same team with you… Somewhere else in the department… The floor… The organization…

Oy.
Vey.

[That’s not in Yiddish reference, but a Two and a Half Men reference – never mind]

And just like with the break up initiation, this never happens simultaneously, exactly, on the dot, for both of you: One of you will fall in love with another person, first… Then what?

And even if the break-up is truly amicable, that doesn’t exclude the possibility of jealousy that stems from the remnants of a sense of ownership and entitlement to the partner’s favors – I don’t mean it in any bad way, just in the natural, human, way, we have all experienced… 

And all of this mess applies even to just generally being on the same team. Imagine what it’s like, if you’re actually having to cooperate on a specific task or project… Maybe even just the two of you alone… Yikes!

The 3^rd thing that happens, when your office romance ends, is:

3. You must de-tangle your “Brangelina” joint brand…

…To become, once again, an individual professional, rather than one half of an office couple. This is a prerequisite for becoming a real contender, assuming you still want to have a shot at that promotion, and/or pay raise, you so wanted, all along.

Indeed, you need to undo the damage of the diluting, and the blurring, of your own your personal brand,  which occurred in the process of dissolving it into the “Brangelina” joint brand, you had with schmoopie, while your office romance was still on.

This takes time. And the longer you were together – the more so.

The 4^th thing that happens, when your office romance ends, is:

4. One of you may need to leave

Leave the team… Go somewhere else in the department, the floor, the organization…

Why? Because:
a. everything I’ve described above might become unbearable
and
b. a new image you do not want to have, might stick to you, through the Grapevine, if you stay.

How so? Well, if you were labeled the “villain”, i.e. the one who cheated, or the one who initiated the break-up, this will chase you wherever you go, at this office. You will have to always start any interaction, from a negative starting point from which you will have to dig yourself out, each and every time, and prove yourself a non-villain, in the eyes of each and every beholder.

So, you would be spending a lot of mental, and emotional, and behavioral, energy, on just digging yourself out, from this minus whatever-number-of-feet underground you were relegated to, just to back to zero, to ground level, and only then, would you be able to start off any new interaction at this office…

This is especially true if – and here I’m going to say something, some of you may not like, but I call it as I see it – so this is especially true, if you are a man, in an office romance break-up situation. Because, as of now, there is a cultural bias against you, meaning, being a man in a relationship, lends itself more easily, to being perceived as the villain, when a break-up occurs. And in an office relationship – all the more so, because everybody knows schmoopie also and because she’s a woman, in this example.

(Just to emphasize the cultural bias issue, and why it is relevant here: Culture always seeps in into the workplace, thus the workplace is a reflection of culture and society as a whole, thus any cultural bias is bound to be reflected in the workplace, as indeed it is.)

If however the Grapevine has labeled you the victim of the office romance break-up, this is also extremely bad for you if you’re a man, because it goes against everything you are supposed to be, all the more so, one who is seeking a promotion to a leadership position: In the case of men, they want men who take charge, not who are victimized. They won’t say it, but they’ll think: “What a wimp”.

If you are woman, however, the situation is the inverse: A woman does not lend herself easily to being perceived as the villain, even when she deserves to be. (Check out Amber Heard and Johnny Depp. Allegedly.)

And if she is perceived as the villain, (through the same Grapevine as the man, and in the same context of an office romance), then, as of now, she is more likely to be lauded, and cheered with a “you go girl”. This may actually contribute to her candidacy, for a promotion and a pay raise, because she’s such a “bad-ass” “Boss Babe”. (I don’t like any of these terms, but, again, I’m just calling it as I see it I don’t care about PC culture you should know by now I abhor it.)

The same inversion is also true, if you are a woman who has been dumped by your office romance schmoopie, so the Grapevine has labeled you the victim.

In such a case, because being a woman lends itself more easily to being perceived as a victim (first and foremost by women themselves, unfortunately), this will not have any negative effect on your brand, in terms of your promotion and pay raise chances – it will not detract from it.

Moreover it might win you some points, as somebody who needs to be supported, and compensated, to offset the predicament she has just suffered, in the break-up of her office romance, buy her villain ex-schmoopie man.

So, FYI.
(For your information)

By the way, this distortion, and bias against men, and for women, exist in workplaces nowadays, regardless open office romance – but that’s a whole other issue.

And, last, but not at all least – the 5^th thing that happens, when your office romance ends, is:

5. It’s everybody’s break up (and you are to blame)

You have to understand that when you break-up an office romance, it is different than any other romantic break-up. And this goes back to your “Brangelina” “power-couple” status: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie cannot break up in private. Neither can you.

There are three issues here:

1. It’s everybody’s business:
   By now, everybody knows you’re couple, so everybody will know about the break-up. You will be going through your grieving process, in plain sight. And your awkward (at best), or tense (at worst), relationship with your (now ex-) schmoopie, will be scrutinized, overtly and covertly, by everybody and their uncle.

Hey, you were the one whom mixed business and pleasure, and imposed your personal issues on your teammates, and boss, and maybe even clients and vendors. So you have no case for complaining, now that you want to separate the business from the pleasure, but since everybody is in the same pressure cooker (i.e. team, office, schmoopie included), you find that they are all, still, very much mixed.

1. It’s indeed everybody’s break up (not just yours and schmoopie‘s):
   There is a shared, communal grieving process (as weird as it may sound)

In every breakup of a relationship that went on for a while, you have “collateral damage”: On top of your adjustment to the new situation,  everybody around you, who was positively invested in your relationship, has to come to terms with it ending, as well.

By “people positively invested in your relationship” I mean anybody and everybody at the office, whom, although maybe pissed off with you two, at the beginning, and trusting you had implemented every fix this Deck teaches you (starting in the next post), they came around to root for you, and whom were happy for you.

So, your break-up takes a toll on their day-to-day at the office, and their emotions, as well. Of course, it is not a grieving process that is equal to yours, in intense or volume, but it is, nevertheless, a grieving process.

This is true, if the break-up is amicable. Imagine what it’s like if the break-up is not! It can get to be stressful, and even toxic, to everybody around you, especially if they have to choose sides.  

Which brings us directly to the third, and last, issue in regard to the fact that it’s everybody’s break-up:

1. Everybody is pissed with you, all over again (because of all of the above):
   Thus, you are back to square one, in yet another way (on top of what we’ve seen before).

* * *

Okay guys, I’m glad to say, this wraps up nicely, the whole first part of this Sex And The Workplace Deck, in which, for 8 videos straight, we have painstakingly, and meticulously, drilled down into the 7 original + 1 bonus office romance BossProblems, that you will encounter, if you embark on an office romance, or are already encountering, if you are already in the thralls of such an affair.

We have done so in depth and scope I have not seen anywhere online, e.v.e.r – of which I’m very proud, because I know this Deck can save your career, no less! Specifically, saving your eligibility for that promotion and/or a pay raise, you so wanted, all along!

Join me next time, where we embark on the second part of this Deck, which will focus exclusively, and as painstakingly, and as meticulously, on the fix or sometimes fixes, plural, to each and every of those 8 office romance BossProblem we have covered.