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Office Romance and Creating an Ethical Culture

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Submitted By Robertnzioka
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Janet Lever, Gail Zellman, and Stephen J. Hirschfeld, “Office Romance: Are the rules changing?” Reviewed by, Robert Nzioka, 09-0199, Feb 2010.

The corporate world has for a long time been bedeviled by the issue of office romance. In addition to meeting corporate challenges, companies must effectively deal with the likely impasse posed by office romance. It is imperative that companies effectively rise up to these challenges posed by the controversies of office romance which they often view as a thorn in the flesh in order to guarantee their survival in a highly competitive environment.

Lever, Zellman and Hirschfelds article “Office Romance: Are the rules changing?” is based on research done on office romance in American companies. The authors offer a pragmatic and cautionary view of the dangers of office romance and strive to offer solutions to the pitfalls of that can afflict companies if office romance is not handled in a professional and ethical manner. The authors are quite categorical that office romance cannot be completely eliminated. They point out through statistical information that office romance is a growing phenomenon that can be viewed as a double edged sword bearing potential dangers but also carrying inherent benefits for innovative companies.

The authors’ tone is indeed cautionary and they attempt to offer solutions that comprehensively cover the crisis that is office romance. The title of the article is indeed telling of the fact that as much as companies frown upon office romance for fear of legal tussles and tense working environments, there is a changing global view of how these relationships should be handled. The authors’ solution to this dilemma is “Developing broad based personal relationship policies” (Paragraph 23). One may argue against their views because they may be seen as being intrusive and curtailing personal freedom. One

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