Dating at Work

In this video, I give my tip for dating at work: Just Don’t Do It! Watch the video…

VIDEO SUMMARY

I am going to talk about something they do not teach in you business school, and they really should. What I am talking about today is “Dating at work.”

I follow a very simple rule about dating at work. That rule is: Don’t do it. I apologize in advance if I am really blunt in this video. And I wanted to make this video, because they do not tell you this in business school. Your boss at work cannot really talk to you about this. But I can give you some friendly advice from my perspective. Whether you take that advice is up to you. But you need to be prepared for this. Because office romances are a very common thing. There has been some surveys out there that suggest around 40% of people have had an office romantic relationship. I do not know if these surveys are really scientific, because how can you reliably survey for this kind of thing. But it does show that dating at work happens a lot. If 40% of people are doing it, probably the majority of people have at least thought about it. So you need to be prepared for this situation, and you will be much better off if you follow my rule: don’t do it.

Let me explain to you what happens. Let’s say you move to a new city for a job. You do not know anybody, so you are lonely. You spend most of your time at work. You work very closely with your team members. You probably work late nights. Your team members are probably like minded people, who are intelligent, engaging, and probably good looking. So given all of that, it is not that far of a stretch to think about asking a co-worker on a date. When you have that initial thought, I want you to remember my voice in the back of your head saying “Don’t do it.” Just do not even consider it. Dating at work is one area of your life, where you need your rational brain to override your emotions.

I will give you some reasons why dating at work is a bad idea.

• First, it is not likely to work out. Dating is hard enough. When you add in the pressures of a work environment, it makes it even more difficult. To make this point, let’s look at this from a financial example. Imagine someone where to try and sell you a stock. And they told you that stock had a 90% chance of being worthless in the future. I am betting that most of you would not buy that stock. You have to look at dating the same way. Why would you date someone at work when the odds of success are so low.
• Second, there could be legal consequences. There are all sorts of bad legal situations that can arise from a workplace relationship. I am talking about sexual harassment claims. Even if the dating is innocent, there is the potential for people to misunderstand your intentions. That of course can negatively affect your career.
• Third, is office drama. I think this is even worse than the legal implications. It just creates all kinds of drama at work. It will make your work days awful. We have all experienced ex’s. Imagine if your ex worked in the office next to you. That is a lot of drama. You do not want to be dealing with drama at work. You want to get your work done and make money.

Even though I have given all these reasons, I know that a lot of you probably will not listen to me. People make rationalizations. The biggest one is “this person works in a different department on the other side of the business, so if dating does not work out, I will never see them again anyway.” My advice is not to make excuses. Here is what is going to happen. You will date that person. It will not work out. And then it will seem like you keep running into that person everywhere, even if they work on the other side of the business. So do not try to rationalize it. Just stick to my rule “Don’t do it.”

My final comment is that in today’s day and age, you have so many options outside of work to meet like-minded people. You have social media. You have local social activities and all kinds of clubs. There is a whole list of ways you can meet people today. Go date outside of the office. Work is for work. Do not use it as your dating scene.

Thank you for watching. Leave a comment down below letting me know what you think! The best way to supercharge your business is through accounting and corporate finance. I release a new video every week, so come back and check out next week’s video.

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Neither Zach De Gregorio or Wolves and Finance Inc. shall be liable for any damages related to information in this video. It is recommended you contact a CPA in your area for business advice.