In certain social milieux, a polygynous sex life is considered a marker of virility (to the point where wives *almost* expect it) and men *want* people to find out about it.

In France, in particular, you cannot fire an employee without “real and serious” cause, meaning you have to cite facts of faults the employee has actually committed directly related to the office. The French code contained a provision allowing employers to fire employees in whom they have “lost trust”; such a provision might have allowed for the firing an employee whose personal conduct was obviously reprehensible, but the courts have for several decades held this to be unenforceable (unless of course material facts can be cited for the lead-up to the mistrust, facts which are themselves “real and serious”) as it is too vague and subjective and therefore can easily become the instrument of arbitrary abuse.

As for dating coworkers, my workplace is the unsexiest place in the world, and is a real moodkiller.

Here’s the thing. If I don’t know about it, clearly, I’m not going to act on it. If i do know about it, it’s already affected the office. So, yeah, it’s a trust thing. If I can’t trust you, I can’t have you working for me, end of story.

Earlier you said you would probably fire someone for cheating because it means he cannot be trusted with your business. Here you say only when outside relationships are physically intruding with work.

In my office, we would not terminate someone for cause without asking them about the alleged misconduct. Someone crying at the door claiming to be a girlfriend would not be enough. But if you are saying you would terminate someone for that, but not ask them about it first? Hard-nosed.

Security would not let in spouses / girlfriends in my office. Sure someone could be terminated for taking too many personal calls at work, but that would be unrelated to whether the calls were from a cheating spouse / girlfriend / uncle. And it would take a lot of calls that was affecting one’s work, not for the calls themselves, or the cheating.

I would never, not in a million years, ask. As long as they keep it out of the office, no one knows, and no one cares.

It’s only when it comes into the office that it’s a problem. So if you’re having an affair, whoop-te-do, until your wife starts calling, your girlfriend starts showing up in tears and the whole drama explodes on my doorstep. Then it’s “don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

I am not a fan of bosses digging into their employees private lives, which I said at the beginning. But when it starts to interfere at the office, then yes, I think it’s reasonable to have consequences at the office.

Probably those people that put razor blades in apples on Halloween.

I’m not saying there aren’t any out there, just that it’ll be a long time before we’ll need to update the policy manual.