The Last Word on Office Affairs

On Channel 7 this week, we saw the last episode of Alan Sugar’s UK version of The Apprentice.  The series, originally shown in the UK in 2006, saw Michelle Dewberry, a 26 year-old telecoms consultant, snatch victory from the hands of Ruth Badger, a hard-talking and tough sales consultant from England’s north.

Checking to see what became of Michelle Dewberry following her victory, I was astounded to read that she’d had a fling with fellow contestant Syed Ahmed during filming, and appears to have continued the relationship for some time afterwards.  In fact, several months after The Apprentice, Dewberry miscarried Ahmed’s baby.  On this basis, the fact that Dewberry picked Ahmed as her second choice team-member in the last episode is far less surprising than it might have been.

This raises the question of office affairs, an issue especially relevant as we radidly move toward the season of office Christmas parties.  Are they acceptable or unacceptable?

Unless two singles with no other attachments and who don’t work directly with each other happen to meet and develop a relationship (which is something different to an affair, since an affair implies that the relationship is occuring in secret or alongside existing attachments), the bottom line is that office affairs are always out of order. 

For those already attached, someone (or more than one someone) will be hurt, often catastrophically.

For those whose work is negatively affected by the relationship, the coupling is both unwelcome and unhealthy.

If the affair brings down the productivity and personal effectiveness of those involved, it is similarly unhelpful.

This one is close to home for me.  My late father began an affair with his secretary some years before I was born.  When I was six, he left home for the last time, subsequently marrying his secretary and moving away, wanting little to do with his former life.

In a possible echo of my father’s life, I was once tempted in a similar fashion.  Thankfully, sense prevailed, after much angst, and I can happily say that my 18-year marriage to Wendy was strengthened rather than diminished through this challenging time.

Why are office affairs more common than they once were?  First, we live in a culture that encourages us to move on to the next model of whatever it is we value.  Don’t like your car?  Upgrade.  Don’t like your house?  Borrow some more and move up?  Don’t like your wife?  Trade her in or carry on illicitly.  Second, family law has evolved to the point that divorce need not be anybody’s “fault”.  For anyone who strays, that means that they can keep half of their assets even though they may have been almost completely responsible for the breakup of their partnership.  The “progressive” Family Law Act of 1975 is behind this outcome.  Perhaps that’s why my father left in 1974 and divorced in 1976!

Perhaps most importantly of all, we tend to spend much more time in the office than we once did, expect to build friendships and solid relationships in the office, and build our identities around our professions and our status in the organisational hierarchy.  So, we are less often at home, exhausted and grumpy when we are, and rarely feel the satisfaction from tasks at home than we take when given a promotion or bonus or pat on the back at work.

For us aging guys, the possibility of an illicit affair can also create excitement in that potentially challenging middle period of our lives.  It can remind us of our virility, of our perceived attractiveness, and of our continued standing as “masters of the universe.”

Bollocks and tosh.  In reality, it is a failure of self-discipline and a victory for the boys within us, still demanding to be kings of the playground, to be envied as ”the guy with the best girl in the class”.  It is an indicator that there are significant parts of us yet to mature to adulthood.  It is a sign that parts of our lives require radical reshaping if we are to reach old age with any shred of dignity and self-respect.

That’s a tough call. 

It’s also a true call.

I’m with you.