Love is in the air!

Well it's Valentine's Day and love is in the air.  But a survey commissioned by XpertHR, based on responses from HR professionals at 200 UK organisations, indicates that a third of employers say they have prohibited relationships between managers and subordinates and one-in-six employers have prohibited relationships between employees and customers.

Interestingly, the survey found that more than two-thirds of employers do not have a policy in place to deal with workplace relationships. Among those that have no policy, the most common approach is to cover it within broader policies, such as those on conduct or ethics.

Respondents to the survey gave some insight into the type of action taken when relationships develop in the workplace. Most commonly employees are asked to inform line managers or HR departments when notifying the company of a workplace relationship.

Respondents also said they embarked on informal discussions with HR or line managers, while on a more negative note, some said that they monitor colleagues in relationships "for problematic behaviour".

But all is not lost on this Valentine's Day, some employers said they support workplace relationships and the most common response from those surveyed was to take no action at all on learning of relationships between colleagues.  As many people meet their future spouses in the workplace, let's hope that employers take a sensible approach to such developments.

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!