Ask a Manager: My Wife Will Be Living With Her Coworkers For 3 Months

[minoanmiss]

My wife is an attorney at a small firm who has a once in a lifetime case with her boss, that will set national precedent. The trial will take three months and is in a different city, so she, her boss/law partner, and the client will be lodging there for the entirety of the case. Her firm has decided to short term lease a single family house that they all will live in for the three months of the trial. This decision was made without the input of my wife, who is okay with the living situation.

My question is about appropriateness of the living situation. Two married men (one a boss/law partner, and the other a client) living with a married woman seems inappropriate to me, and from a liability perspective seems risky for the firm. I am curious on your viewpoint from an external HR/managerial perspective?

It’s not inherently inappropriate for men and women to share living space, married or not.

I would be concerned about them not being able to get enough privacy and downtime to disconnect from work — but that’s not because of the genders or marital status. It’s not inherently inappropriate; it’s just that it’s a lot of togetherness with colleagues. The same would true if they were all single women. But if the three of them are all comfortable with it and (importantly!) no one was pressured into agreeing when they’re secretly dreading it, then so be it.

It sounds like you might be uncomfortable as a spouse, and if that’s the case it’s something for you to work out on your own or with your wife — but if I’m right about that, you’re more likely to be able to work through that if you own that discomfort rather than framing it as an HR thing.

Comments

"Appropriate" is carrying quite a load of BS here

[feldman]

Listen, friend, I'm far more curious about whether there's an assumption of her keeping the house than servicing the husbands.

I'm also side-eyeing the listed fallout including "liability for the firm" while not even mentioning that this would entail "career-ending trauma for my spouse".

[ambyr]

There are a whole lot of people in that thread who do not understand the 18-20 hour working days involved in being at trial.

[purlewe]

this. like even if they were in a hotel they would be pulling 18-20 hrs a day.

[sporky_rat]

My very first thought on finding out that it's two dudes and a lady is, 'I hope they budgeted for a cleaning service, there is hella no way that someone's gonna have time for much more cleaning than throwing blankets back over their own bed when they get up in the morning, maybe rinsing the coffee pot.'

Then I saw husband's concerns and just. Dude. Dude. They are going to be there in that house long enough to sleep, change clothes, maybe drink coffee in the morning. Might have a bagel. Have you paid no attention to how much work trials are? My dude. Seriously.

[conuly]

If they were all sharing a single hotel room for three months, that might be inappropriate.

But a house? They all have their own bedrooms. LW needs to trust his wife and lighten up. This may require therapy, unless he has reasons outside of his own weirdness not to trust her, in which case couples therapy may be the answer.

[ashbet]

Having pulled 24-hr shifts as a legal secretary during high-volume discovery, I would have been thrilled to have a COT IN THE COPY ROOM, much less a bedroom in a house, rather than my lengthy commute.

This is a bit out of the ordinary, in terms of house vs. 3 extended-stay hotel rooms, but it’s a reasonable cost-saving device for a small firm.