Ask a Manager: How to tell your boss a sex worker stole your work laptop

[ermingarden]

I have a question on behalf of a friend (yes, I promise it is actually a friend and not me). He was staying overnight on a business trip and decided to hire a sex worker. This is perfectly legal in our part of the world and he used his own personal funds. While he was in the bathroom, the sex worker robbed him, including his work laptop. How should he go about informing work what happened?

In theory he could just explain that he had an “acquaintance” come back to his room and not proactively volunteer that the acquaintance was a sex worker, but the company will likely want him to file a police report (and will wonder why he hasn’t done that already). Once that happens, it’s going to be hard to avoid the rest of the story coming out … and that could potentially be very bad for your friend (not necessarily that he hired a sex worker but that he did it on a business trip and it resulted in the theft of company property, and possibly sensitive company property). He’d be more likely to keep his job if the laptop got lifted from a restaurant or other public place. It’s a bad situation.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

Yeah, I'm a little surprised at the non-answer because Alison isn't usually squeamish about sex work. I think your answer is more practical.

[bikergeek]

Regardless of legality, a lot of people still see hiring a sex worker as something shameful. Even in countries where it's legal there's a fair amount of public concern over sex workers and human trafficking. (and please, let's not have that debate here.) And/or that hiring a sex worker is perceived as a "means of last resort" for "incels" who do not meet conventional standards for physical attractiveness, "have no 'game'", etc., and "can't get laid".

If it got out that he'd hired a sex worker, that fact could cause serious damage to his professional reputation. Also, the company may not want to be known as one that hires the sort of people who would hire a sex worker, even if it's done with personal funds, on one's own time.

[cimorene]

That all makes sense, but it does make it sound, to me, like the guy actually needs regionally specific advice. The cultural mores and the opinions at work and how they're likely to be affected matter and so does the legal aspect. It could be that attempting to conceal the truth to a greater or lesser extent is his best bet.