Consensual Relationship Agreements
Involving in romantic relationship is a part of human nature. No one can deny this right or even interfere in it. Office romance is an issue we face in our daily life among every employee demographic. Essentially it is their personal business, but many times their private behavior affects their professional life and their workplace as well. Hereby, some companies human resources managements stepped in and ask their employees who involved in romantic relationship to sign Consensual Relationship Agreements (CRAs). CRA is a written contract, in which the romantically involved parties acknowledge that:
· Their relationship is voluntary and consensual.
· They agree to abide by the employee’s antidiscrimination, and anti-harassment, and workplace conducts polices.
· They promise to report any perceived harassment to management, if occur.
· They agree to behave professionally and not to allow their relationship to affect their performance.
· They agree to avoid behavior that offends others in the workplace. They agree not to engage in favoritism.
Question1. Argue for the use of the Consensual Relationship Agreement (CARS) in your current or future workplace.
In my future workplace I will adopt CRAs policy, and encourage employees to sign it. I believe there is no way to forbid office romance. Therefore we need to regulate this issue carefully to avoid any problems that may occur in the future. Especially avoiding sexual harassment litigation or at least decrease the amount of claims that may cost our company huge compensations. Some states’ law interpreting sexual harassment has third party, in case of such claims the organization will pay huge penalties too. By signing CRAs employees and the company will be protected by having compelling evidence that the employees entered the relationship voluntary in case their relationship failed. We need to act professionally and have the abilities to accept changing in our workplace culture. I also will educate employees to accept this policy and create ethical forums to discuss ethical intensity for my decision. Employees need to be aware that sexual harassment is more likely if the refuse to sign SRA. Both the company and the employees will benefit by signing SRA contract.
Question2. Create a counter argument against the use of CRAs in your current or future workplace. Critics of CRAs may say it’s too interfering in employee’s privacy, which consider unethical behavior. Employees normally want to keep their relationship secretly. But at the same time their behavior may affect their workplace. Therefore the organization’ management should avoid any risk that may occur as a result of this behavior. As long as they chose to engage in office romance. Critics may also say signing CRAs is unnecessary and the employees will follow others organization polices that could be enough in such situation. Alternatives policies they may follow are, no dating, or supervisors should not involve with their subordinates in romance relationship. I think we need to be realistic these polices wouldn’t be able to avoid office romance. According to office romance Survey conducted by Vault, Inc., 58% of employees say they have been involved in an office romance. Critics also may suggest that office romance won’t be delinquent if the involved employees are in different departments. This solution may help to avoid engaging in favoritism, but it will not fix all others problems especially sexual harassment lawsuits. Beside seventy two percent of companies had no policy regarding workplace romance, according to the society for Human Resource Management (SHRM). In case of conflicts regarding office romance issue, these companies will not be able to solve problems; therefore adopting CRAs will