Chief Marketing Officer Danylo Orlov said that he found his love at work — in a company where relationships between colleagues were forbidden. The topic of relationships at work turned out to be very sensitive for the community — Danylo’s post received about a hundred comments.
Chief Marketing Officer Danylo Orlov said that he found his love at work — in a company where relationships between colleagues were forbidden. The topic of relationships at work turned out to be very sensitive for the community — Danylo’s post received about a hundred comments.
«It’s actually a very interesting topic that I want to reveal through my own experience — because I found my person at work, where company policy forbade it. I’ve always devoted a lot of time to work, and most of my environment was formed by colleagues. This is normal. A close-knit team is always a plus: you quickly understand each other, there’s a light atmosphere, jokes, you’re not afraid to be honest. And as a result, it brings a great financial result for the company,» he wrote .
But there is another side, when friendship at work goes too far, says the specialist. «Subordination suffers (especially if you are a manager, as I was in the role of CMO), it is more difficult to fire or make remarks, sometimes you are defending not the result, but the person,» said Danylo.
According to Orlov, with experience he learned to separate these things: «At work we are professionals, outside of work we are people. For me, these are two different roles. But everything changes when a friendship develops into a relationship. That’s exactly what happened to me. And although HR regularly reminded me that this was a violation of the rules, I don’t regret it for a second,» the marketer admits.
Danylo said that he eventually left that company, but the reason for his dismissal was not the relationship. «I don’t regret breaking the rule. Because instead I found my person, with whom I’m building a family. And in general, where else can you meet people if not at work?» he sums up rhetorically.
The specialist asked the community to talk about the relationship at work. And the IT people gladly responded.
«I think it’s normal. That’s how I met my ex-husband,» says tester Kristina Azarova .
Recruiter Viktoriya Kaminska shared her story: «I met my future husband at work too. It wasn’t forbidden in our company, but we still didn’t advertise it — we just wanted to keep it personal. In addition, we were lucky to work in different departments, so communication between us was minimal. Perhaps this is what helped us maintain a balance between work and personal life,» she said.
Content Strategist Veronika Vasylina believes that building relationships at work is normal. «I literally ask the same thing: where else? For people who work a 40-hour workweek and whose colleagues are the closest people in terms of values and views, this is a very logical and natural scenario,» she believes.
«I worked at a telecommunications company and, it seems, there aren’t enough fingers to count how many colleagues got together and got married in those four years, including me. And even more, our former colleagues are now our best men. In another company, it was a little different: in addition to forming new couples, many people brought their husbands/wives to the company for open vacancies. In both companies, there was no strict policy regarding this,» said QA Engineer Iryna Solodukhina .
«I married a colleague 13 years ago, we have three children,» wrote recruitment specialist Olga Radziyevska .
HR specialist Yulia Kayunko notes that couples at work even make her happy. «I’ve noticed an interesting pattern: couples often appear at work. And what’s most interesting is that almost 90% of them are truly happy. As an HR professional, I’m glad that this doesn’t pose any risks to the business (at least in our case). But what’s even more interesting is that none of these couples stayed with the company for long. Can this somehow affect the quality of work? Probably not. But one thing is for sure: when something personal appears at work, changes begin,» she noted.
Tetyana A., Senior Android Developer, believes that not all relationships are appropriate at work. «When a director marries a subordinate, to be honest, it looks bad to me. Especially if the subordinate stays in the company and holds a management position. In other cases, it can be normal, I think,» she wrote.
«I’ve stepped on this rake twice. I don’t want to anymore,» admits User Acquisition Manager Tanya Koval.
Petro Marchenko, Senior PHP Developer, said that he worked with his wife at the same company for 11 years. «There were no problems, but we were in different departments and did not overlap on work issues, the company is large, so we could not see each other at all during the day,» he explained.
Among the advantages of such relationships, Petro names the following: it is convenient to commute to work and back together, you can have lunch together, and have joint parties where people who are not from the company are not invited. «The disadvantages are ‘all eggs in one basket’ — there is no diversification of risks,» the developer notes.
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