There are rumours of an affair between colleagues at my work…

Well Munrobiker is now in his meeting telling them how muddy the trails were this weekend, it reminds me what a good move quitting salaried work at the age of 36 was. I managed to run my own business for ten years with up to nine staff and never had a staff meeting. There wasn’t a staff room either, just a kettle and instant coffee on a table in reception.

Handle it maturely and with dignity. Firmly, but professionally state that there is nothing going on and that scurrilous rumours can be hurtful and dangerous.

Then see if there’s any prospect of a three-ball in the future.

the idea that I have been identified as the most desirable man at the office is batshit mental.

I’d be embracing that, maybe have it put on a t-shirt to wear especially at team meetings.

Difficult as it is, I would keep quiet and ignore the nasty gossips.
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Or, go full circle and see what wild and outrageous gossip I could spread around the company. Back at my old village the gossip was out of control. My old work colleagues would often start a rumour to see how far it would go in the village. My finest hour was being asked at the school gate why I was issuing pink Crocs as staff uniform to the outdoor instructors…

there are some blokes who seem unable to have friends of the opposite sex unless they are (trying to) have sex with them.

This. And by extension, assume that everyone else is the same as them.

I’ve shared beds with several platonic female friends many times over the years and not once did I trip in the middle of the night and accidentally fall into their fanny.

 just a kettle and instant coffee on a table in reception.

You monster!! Instant coffee?

Perhaps if they want to know what you got up to over the weekend you should direct them to your Only Fans site

The OP loses points for coming back on the thread…

the weekly catchup meeting is not the place to air this

It is if you aspire to legendary status. I’d dignify the rumours with no more than an enigmatic smile and single raised eyebrow, if I could raise an eyebrow independently.

Most people won’t have given this any thought at all, or for no more than a minute or two. You’ve brightened our day a bit here with this tale, so maybe it is your duty to become talking point of the year at work? Losing a friend probably as collateral…

avdave2 – for me it would very much be an OnlyFan page. I was going to say there’s only one person who wants to see me at it, but actually my wife just tends to close her eyes.

but actually my wife just tends to close her eyes

Show off – how does she watch the telly over your shoulder?

Teams meeting right?

custom backdrop in huge text, I’m not shaggin x ?

or be more subtle and set it to the playboy mansion or something

Either tell them the three of you are now in a polyamorous relationship or, 

Been there done that, was absolutely hilarious.

Mainly as we were, at the time, in one…

What questions would they be?

I genuinely don’t see what your personal life has to do with your employer. If a manager was “asking questions of me” in relation to what I was or wasn’t doing with my penis they’d get told to mind their own business and I’d suggest that they made every effort to quell any malicious rumours. The only work-related issue I can see is that there’s potential to have a fling and then fall out, but even then I’ve managed to work alongside coworkers I absolutely despised without causing a fuss.

Many employers will have policies about workplace relationships, some for no good reason but at least some are to legitimately protect the employees, employer or service recipients.  It shouldn’t be too hard to imagine situations where a relationship is exploitative, leaves an employee open to blackmail, could result in unjustified promotion, could remove the apparent independence of decision making, may bend or which might prevent complaints or concerns being properly identified / addressed, or security rules being overlooked.   The OP will have a better idea if these are likely to apply to his workplace or not.

These happen every Monday morning, a video meeting that lasts about twenty minutes where all 25 staff say what they did at the weekend

I’d be looking for another job just because of this. Do you have a “what I did on my holiday” session after annual leave?

As for the gossips, they can do one. If all the relevant parties know there’s nothing to see then it’s no business of the people you’re forced to work with.

I managed to run my own business for ten years with up to nine staff and never had a staff meeting. There wasn’t a staff room either, just a kettle and instant coffee on a table in reception.

That you managed to run a business for as long as 10 years whilst providing staff with nothing but instant coffee is a remarkable achievement. What was the staff bonus? Milk and sugar?

I’d be looking for another job just because of this. Do you have a “what I did on my holiday” session after annual leave?

Ok, so a little illumination on my current job.

Every monday at 0900 we have an hour “planning” meeting that consists of us going through the list of open tasks on our board. We have a ‘short’ 30 minute meeting on the other days of the week so that everyone knows what the other people did yesterday and are doing today. 1500 on Friday is an hour meeting to discuss what we did during the week and close of the tasks that we’ve done.

My boss also loves collaborative work, despite accepting that it is way less efficient than people doing work on their own. I’m leaving the company so, for the last two weeks have been forced to do my daily stuff in a group of four (aka the whole team but him) with the usual morning run taking three hours instead of the 30 it normally takes me on my own.

This is one of the reasons I’m leaving btw.

Just remembered that two of my colleagues went on holiday to Turkey in September. She’s 10 years older than him and in a relationship.  (She’s mid 30s, he’s mid 20s)

Not entirely sure how it came to be that they went together, but no one has suggested there is anything going on between them. My colleagues must be more mature than I thought!

2 of my co-workers were rumoured to be having an affair. He worked for her.

Transpires that they are. Came to light after she cleaned out all of the competition for a promotional opportunity in the team (lying about people’s performance, or what they had/hadn’t done  – compiling dossiers against them…over the space of a year, 3 people were implicated). All of those people were moved out of the team (a spineless VP who let it all slide didn’t help), and then promoted her dalliance into a newly created role.

Big Blue Chip too.

He then left his wife, moved in with her – and got made redundant within 12 months for being out of his depth.

All very odd.

Every monday at 0900 we have an hour “planning” meeting that consists of us going through the list of open tasks on our board. We have a ‘short’ 30 minute meeting on the other days of the week so that everyone knows what the other people did yesterday and are doing today. 1500 on Friday is an hour meeting to discuss what we did during the week and close of the tasks that we’ve done.

What they need there is trust and email.

This is one of the reasons I’m leaving btw.

Can’t say as I blame you.

I’d be respecting my wife’s wishes on this matter.

Agree with the opinion of ‘go to your line manager and then HR’

Not least, the other person being gossiped about may be the object of the vindictive behaviour not you and this could make it worse not better. Do not escalate in public as this is what the gossips want.

Changed days I guess.

When I was in my early years at work there were both real and imagined relationships aplenty. Nobody really cared one way or the other. Office gossip of any sort was just not a thing anybody seemed to get upset by.

Agree with the opinion of ‘go to your line manager and then HR’

Not least, the other person being gossiped about may be the object of the vindictive behaviour not you and this could make it worse not better. Do not escalate in public as this is what the gossips want.

+1

This sounds like one of those situations where in retrospect people would ask “well why did the man involved in the situation not speak up”?

I’ve shared beds with several platonic female friends many times over the years and not once did I trip in the middle of the night and accidentally fall into their fanny.

You know, if Prince Andrew had used this line of defence, things might actually have gone a bit better for him.

🙂

My boss also loves collaborative work, despite accepting that it is way less efficient than people doing work on their own.

I love collaborative work. I also love team members who get a good view of the problem they are working on from interaction with other team members, and who help team mates to do their best work by contributing knowledge and experience. Sometimes it takes longer. Always the result is better.

You know, if Prince Andrew had used this line of defence, things might actually have gone a bit better for him.

You mean the “I tripped and accidentally rogered a child” defence ?

I agree with the person above who says that the most important opinion in all of this, is that of your wife.

I previously worked for a large corporate. 2 senior directors were sacked because they failed to disclose their relationship as they worked together and he was effectively signing off her work. If they’d been upfront a simple organisational shuffle would have removed the conflict of interest. Ironically, they were HR directors so there was no excuses.

You mean the “I tripped and accidentally rogered a child” defence ?

I mean, in his arrogance, he could hardly have done worse than his plainly ridiculous assertions and his car crash TV interview.

I’d be respecting my wife’s wishes on this matter.

I agree with the person above who says that the most important opinion in all of this, is that of your wife.

I’m not even sure I’d have told my wife, although if I did she’d likely laugh and say something supportive like “do they really think she’d put up with you” or “she’s welcome to have you” or “she does have a general air of disappointment about her”.   If the OP thought his wife’s reaction was 100% the best course of conduct then I suspect he’d not have started the thread.  I can’t see what benefit this could possibly bring, even if it might be “career limiting” doing nothing, its not like “making a public fuss” is often “career enhancing”.

Most of the time I’d like to think the rules make sense and will avoid the “well they only got a promotion because they’re shagging X” or similar gossip. Rule 1 should apply but so often it is an aspiration….  Big organizations should have a whole decision tree to deal with all the permutations on this given romance at work is very much a thing.

In this case assuming there’s no line management conflict between the individuals then I’m still of the opinion that it’s the other line manager (who if I’m keeping track made the comments) that needs to be put back in their place via either the OP’s manager having a word and/or HR…

but actually my wife just tends to close her eyes
Show off – how does she watch the telly over your shoulder?

More likely updating her TicToc…

…Fnar.

Most places I’ve worked over the years have had a number of members of staff in relationships with other employees, including me!
We were together for three years, she went to Basingstoke to train as a nurse, back around ’82. Sadly it didn’t last due to distance and infrequently being able to get together. We are, however, still very close friends.

And naturally, the idea that I have been identified as the most desirable man at the office is batshit mental.

#humblebrag 😉

I work in a ~90% female workplace and there are endless rumours flying around about who’s doing what with whom. I’m completely oblivious to it.

I recently heard one woman (sitting behind me) had an affair with her subordinate (next desk along) who then left and moved in with the woman over the divider. All three were previously in relationships and only one of whom was with another woman. I missed the whole thing and don’t really care about it anyway. If there were rumours about me I’d equally disinterested.

Either tell them the three of you are now in a polyamorous relationship or,

Been there done that, was absolutely hilarious.

Mainly as we were, at the time, in one…

If we’re on the lookout for humblebrags…

About 15 years ago there were rumours abound that i shagging my female boss. At the time it wasn’t true, however I did end up nailing her after a work night out a few month’s later..

Makes you think…

I wouldn’t be taking advice from this lot, Pukey.  We all know what happened to Houns and his gym girl…

Scorch those rumours by appearing on teams in that classic sartorial garment, the twosie

If we’re on the lookout for humblebrags…

Nothing humble about it 😉

Few quid to be made here, if you can get yourself set up with an OnlyFans page before 9:30, let them know that they can subscribe to see all the details.

Charge them all £100 each to see a picture of you with the caption “I AM NOT HAVING AN AFFAIR”

nailing her

That how you really refer to it, or are you just trying to impress da ladz?