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agonyaunt2025-05-27 10:42 am
minoanmiss) wrote in agonyaunt2025-05-27 10:42 am
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Two Ethics Quests from Ask A Manager
I am having trouble including the link, due to not being able to see properly. sorry about that.
1. Manager husband is cheating with a much younger employee
A very dear friend of mine has recently learned that her husband/partner of 10 years has been cheating on her. They work together, in different departments but with some overlap, and everyone at work knew that they were married with children. Her husband is 31 years old and a manager, the affair partner is 20-21 and a junior staff member on his team. He has been scheduling them on late shifts together in order to facilitate the affair.
He has decided to continue the relationship with the affair partner rather than pursue marriage counselling or reconciliation. My friend is job searching, but in the interim her performance is suffering because she regularly has to see her estranged husband and his affair partner at work. He has told some of their coworkers about the separation but obviously has not disclosed the details, and he and the affair partner have not made their relationship public.
My friend is crushed and humiliated and is just trying to push through it, but I think her managers need to be told about the concerning nature of a manager starting a relationship with a direct report 10 years their junior, affair or not. As a manager, would you want to know the full context of this situation?
Hell yes. It’s a serious breach of ethics (and usually company policy) to have an affair with someone you supervise, and it opens the company to legal liability as well.
That said, your friend might have her own reasons for not reporting it. She might know enough about her company to know that too much of the fall-out would land on her, or she might have children and wants her ex to keep his job in order to keep financially supporting them, or all sorts of other things. You can encourage her to consider disclosing it, and you can point out that most companies would want to know and would take it seriously because of the legal liability, but in the end it should be up to her. If she doesn’t want to, it’s her call (and definitely not one you should make for her).
2. My employee has terrible attendance issues … in this economy?
I have an employee with terrible ongoing attendance issues — not calling in when he’s going to be late, not calling in when he’s going to be gone all day, saying he’ll be in at noon but not showing up until 2:00, etc. I’ve clearly stated what I need from him (call in when you are going to be late/out), and I helped him take a month off for FMLA earlier this year, but the issues just continue.
My issue is, he’s Latino, he’s a second generation immigrant, he has no other job history besides this one (other than a brief stint bagging groceries in college), and if I cast him out in this political climate, appropriate as the action is, I genuinely think that would be an act of evil. Is there anything I’m missing in order to get him back on track, or do I need to bite the bullet?
Have you asked him what’s going on? On the face of it, it sounds like simple irresponsibility, but it’s possible there’s more to it — like that he’s dealing with a crisis at home or who knows what. It’s worth asking what the obstacles are to him calling in, if you haven’t already (not because it would change your need to be called, but because it might help you collaborate on solutions with him).
But ultimately you can’t be more invested in keeping him employed than he is in staying employed. You can give him the opportunity to tell you if something is going on, and you can make it clear that you cannot keep him on if this continues, so that he understands the stakes, but from there it’s really up to him. I’m sorry; it’s a rough position to be in.
1. Manager husband is cheating with a much younger employee
A very dear friend of mine has recently learned that her husband/partner of 10 years has been cheating on her. They work together, in different departments but with some overlap, and everyone at work knew that they were married with children. Her husband is 31 years old and a manager, the affair partner is 20-21 and a junior staff member on his team. He has been scheduling them on late shifts together in order to facilitate the affair.
He has decided to continue the relationship with the affair partner rather than pursue marriage counselling or reconciliation. My friend is job searching, but in the interim her performance is suffering because she regularly has to see her estranged husband and his affair partner at work. He has told some of their coworkers about the separation but obviously has not disclosed the details, and he and the affair partner have not made their relationship public.
My friend is crushed and humiliated and is just trying to push through it, but I think her managers need to be told about the concerning nature of a manager starting a relationship with a direct report 10 years their junior, affair or not. As a manager, would you want to know the full context of this situation?
Hell yes. It’s a serious breach of ethics (and usually company policy) to have an affair with someone you supervise, and it opens the company to legal liability as well.
That said, your friend might have her own reasons for not reporting it. She might know enough about her company to know that too much of the fall-out would land on her, or she might have children and wants her ex to keep his job in order to keep financially supporting them, or all sorts of other things. You can encourage her to consider disclosing it, and you can point out that most companies would want to know and would take it seriously because of the legal liability, but in the end it should be up to her. If she doesn’t want to, it’s her call (and definitely not one you should make for her).
2. My employee has terrible attendance issues … in this economy?
I have an employee with terrible ongoing attendance issues — not calling in when he’s going to be late, not calling in when he’s going to be gone all day, saying he’ll be in at noon but not showing up until 2:00, etc. I’ve clearly stated what I need from him (call in when you are going to be late/out), and I helped him take a month off for FMLA earlier this year, but the issues just continue.
My issue is, he’s Latino, he’s a second generation immigrant, he has no other job history besides this one (other than a brief stint bagging groceries in college), and if I cast him out in this political climate, appropriate as the action is, I genuinely think that would be an act of evil. Is there anything I’m missing in order to get him back on track, or do I need to bite the bullet?
Have you asked him what’s going on? On the face of it, it sounds like simple irresponsibility, but it’s possible there’s more to it — like that he’s dealing with a crisis at home or who knows what. It’s worth asking what the obstacles are to him calling in, if you haven’t already (not because it would change your need to be called, but because it might help you collaborate on solutions with him).
But ultimately you can’t be more invested in keeping him employed than he is in staying employed. You can give him the opportunity to tell you if something is going on, and you can make it clear that you cannot keep him on if this continues, so that he understands the stakes, but from there it’s really up to him. I’m sorry; it’s a rough position to be in.
no subject
#1 I dont know if LW's friend has an ethical duty to report her cheating soon-to-be-ex, but I would advise her to tell her manager about how he's disrupting her worklife.
I am honestly not certain about the second one . Some people disingeusously cried 'racism' but others called it "the soft bigotry of low expectations" and others pointed to the political climate. Is this a situation where equality and equity diverge, and in which case, which should we choose?
no subject
+1 LW1 may feel disclosing all details will be risky for her, but "as you may know, because he has been open about it, Bob and I have separated. What he hasn't been open about is that we've separated because he's having an affair, and I find the situation very painful." That's ordinary, human context that tells the manager that LW is having a tough time for very understandable reasons.
Second one, this sounds possibly like a relatively young person, and frankly, some of them are idiots about reasonable behaviour as an employee. I'd also wonder whether he has a second job, possibly evening or casual work, as a reason for absences (I have known this in practice). Alison's response seems appropriate, ultimately you can’t be more invested in keeping him employed than he is in staying employed is a good way of putting it.
no subject
He's clearly begging to get his life blown up even worse.
no subject
And here’s an archived version of the link if need be: https://archive.ph/pXgRs
no subject
That doesn't mean you fire him immediately necessarily; give him the same leeway, counseling, etc. you might give any other employee who might be currently under a lot of outside stress. But it sounds like you already did that and more, and you shouldn't have to worry that firing him will cause immediate bad consequences to him beyond being fired.