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Office Romance

Well, it's Valentine's Day again and what better time to share some interesting results from our office romance survey. Did you know that as many as 8 million Americans every year enter into an office romance? Not hard to understand why when you consider the sheer number of hours that workers put in at the office, it's a likely place to meet a love interest. I can attest - I met my wife of nearly 4 years at the office, although we didn't start dating until I had left the company... which brings up some interesting issues when it comes to dating coworkers.

Does dating a coworker jeopardize your career? Do you try to keep a relationship secret or formally announce it? What's the company policy? Spherion's latest Snapshot survey looks at these issues and how workers today feel about them. Here's what we found:

Derailing Your Career. According to the Spherion survey, 41 percent of U.S. workers think openly dating a coworker would jeopardize their job security or advancement opportunities.

What's the Company Line? More than half of U.S. workers say their employer does not have a policy regarding workplace romances, and 16 percent say their employer does have such a policy, according to the Spherion survey. Perhaps most noteworthy, nearly one-third of workers surveyed were not sure if their employer has a policy regarding workplace romances.

Mum's the Word. When it comes to secrecy and office romance, Spherion found that 41 percent of workers who had a workplace romance said it was conducted in the open, while 35 percent claimed they kept it a secret.

Cupid's Success Rate at the Office. Among those workers who have had a workplace romance, 30 percent say they dated for several months, 15 percent dated for several years, and one quarter resulted in marriage.

What do you think? Finding romance is great but is it worth jeopardizing a career? Or being the subject of office gossip?