As in Real Life, Most Office Romances Fail
Monday, April 20th, 2009
Office Romance: Career Perk or Career Suicide?
Whether it’s Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in Desk Set, Renee Zellweger and Hugh Grant in Bridget Jones’ Diary, or Demi Moore and Michael Douglas in Disclosure, Hollywood has provided us with decades’ worth of examples of office romance — the good, the bad and the ugly.
In real life, office romance is a controversial topic that’s not resolved in 90 minutes of screen time and a box of popcorn. As professionals, we tend to send a “mixed message” when it comes to how we feel about romance in the workplace.
In a survey of 1,000 American adults, for example, about two-thirds indicated that workplace romances “cause favoritism and poor morale.” But the exact same percentage - 66 percent - also believed such relationships are “personal, private and shouldn’t be regulated by employers.”