Office romances ruinous for women in Australia

SYDNEY - Women in extramarital affairs in the workplace just can’t win: regardless of whether the man’s the married one, the romance is almost certain to damage the woman’s career prospects.

Australian social researcher Geoff Carter found that half of women, exposed as being in inappropriate relationships, ended up leaving their jobs.

“The view is ’she should have known better - what do you expect from guys?’” Carter said. Dr Carter, a lecturer in management at Griffith University, interviewed 400 managers to find their views on office romances.

He told The Sydney Morning Herald that he was “absolutely stunned” when a quarter of them said they had had an extramarital affair with a colleague.

“It almost always ends in tears,” Carter said. “Especially for the women. They are pushed out of the organization.”

Perhaps the most revealing aspect of the research was not that office flings rarely last but that they are almost always discovered.

It’s then that management gets involved and when pressure is exerted on the woman to help ease the situation by clearing her desk.

DPA

Have something to say about the article. Send it here

**************