Why a Workplace Romance is a No No
There are many reasons employees have their job and like their job, but there can also be a number of reasons people choose to leave their desired career. More than two million employees left their career voluntarily compared to the number who did so two years ago. Companies who recognize their employees tend to have happier employees, especially those who offer things like employee recognition programs and those who choose to employ managers with people skills and proper problem solving skills. Managers who encouraged their employees to do a good job and recognized them for doing so were considered scarce for eight out of ten workers. Aside from normal corporate and manager decisions, there are some things that cause other employees to leave the workplace, and one of those is knowing about or being involved in a workplace romance. These are not only damaging to those involved, they hurt coworkers, bosses and even the company, not to mention majority of hr executives frown on the entire concept.
Workplace romance policies should be drafted immediately by your human resources department. This should be reviewed periodically and especially when a human resource executive leaves and an hr executive search agency fills the void with a new executive. All employees should be aware of these policies. How and what they say is up to the company and the hr executive, since there are no laws governing workplace romance. When drafting these policies there are a few things to keep in mind.
Managers should never be allowed to have a relationship with employees who are under them. This causes an imbalance of power when it happens. Consideration should also be taken when one employee is promoted over another. Either someone will have to choose to leave or the romantic relationship will have to come to an end. Although a romantic relationship may not pose a problem now, there is no guarantee that it won’t later down the road.
Another factor to consider when drafting policies guidelines for workplace romances is current relationship status. If one employee is already married and begins a romance with another co-worker, not only will the co-worker be considered a homewrecker, but this could potentially cause issues for overall company at least for a small time. Anger, frustration and tempers could flare and some from the injured spouse could be targeted directly at the company as well as some employees.
It is important to keep in mind that workplace romances will most likely happen no matter what policies are in place, especially if you have a large number of employees. HR executives should place these guidelines near the sexual harassment guidelines. They should include who to go to, who to tell and any numbers to call. Anytime new employees, managers or hr executives hired by an hr executive search agency are introduced these guidelines should be reviewed. An hr executive search agency should be aware of the type of executive your company needs, so that the right candidate with the same mind frame on workplace romance can be brought in.