Thursday, January 2, 2014

SEX ON THE JOB

    "She said I'll show ya how to fax in the mailroom honey
    and have you home by five"

    — Steven Tyler, "Going Down/Love In an Elevator" (song, 1989)
          performed by Aerosmith on the album "Pump" (2001)

According to Business Insider, a 2013 survey shows about 54% of people have had sex with a colleague. (And 49% of those people say they have had sex at the office!)

Well, I'm here to tell you people to knock it off!

Respect

Now, I know what you're going to say, "What are you, some kind of prude?"

Actually, no, I'm not. Let me give you an example. I'm involved with a computer graphics society called SIGGRAPH.

Once at a big planning workshop a fellow volunteer told me about a party held at the previous year's annual convention, at which the planner had hired women dressed as bondage queens to come out and mingle with the crowd, followed by a whipping demonstration.

"That sounds like a great party," I told her. "I'd love to go to a party like that. But it doesn't sound appropriate for a SIGGRAPH party." I went on to explain that people from all over the world from many cultures came to this event. Very shy Japanese people showed up. A lot of Mormons came, especially from Utah where computer graphics is very big. Kids came — we even had a SIGKIDS program to drag them in. None of these people had signed up for a kinky party, and it could upset, embarrass, or offend them and "turn them off" to what our society was all about.

In this case, it wasn't really about sex, it was about respect.

Risk

    "Now wait a minute!
    Okay, this guy is a real zero. That's true.
    Think back to when you were freshmen.
    ...
    I myself was so obnoxious the seniors beat me up once a week.
    So this guy is a total loser? Let me tell you the story of another loser."

    — character of Otter in "National Lampoon's Animal House" (movie, 1979)

The tale of Patrick Naughton is blood-curdling. He should be a hacker hero, having helped create the Java language among other techie accomplishments. Instead he remains a pariah — a confessed child predator — and has been partially erased from history in some quarters.

Naughton co-founded the early search company Infoseek, which was purchased by the Walt Disney Company and moved from Seattle to Santa Monica. He was tasked with helping to build the new "portal" that CEO Michael Eisner wanted, to be called go.com, and the scuttlebutt in the media press was that he was the "go-to guy" for Disney's web strategies. He also had a smart and attractive wife who was an acclaimed fine artist. But in September of 1999 it all fell apart. After contacting what purported to be a 13-year-old girl in a chat room he arranged a meeting at Santa Monica pier and was arrested in a Sheriff's sting. An article in WIRED magazine said he "lost his Seattle home, his $183,000-a-year job at the Go Network, $10 million-plus in vested stock options, and his freedom." They neglected to mention that he also lost his wife. His employers lost money as well; Infoseek and Disney stocks fell immediately.

Of course there's a moral component to this tale of woe. It is virtually a universal human value that child molestation is evil. In his defense Naughton claimed that he thought he was really chatting with an adult (and in fact he was). Law enforcement erred in the bust and was unable to prove intent. Other technicalities kept him out of jail. But let's look at this from another angle. He was tasked with providing leadership on the web strategies for the world's largest media company. What should he have been doing? How about polling fans of Disney movies, stores, parks and web sites? How about researching competing HTML standards in the browser wars? How about meeting with Disney executives to assess needs from their point of view? The company certainly wanted him to take thus kind of initiative, and took a risk in promoting him — such a young executive with more technical than business experience — to this key position. And he flamed out by any measure. Risky behavior in a chat room was a distraction from facing the awesome opportunity and responsibility before him.

In this case, it was about risk, not sex.

A good rule of thumb about the business world is that people — whether investors, managers, employees or customers — don't like surprises or drama. Predictability and reliability are key, and for you that means personal integrity.

Knowledge

Now, I'm not saying there's a moral equivalence between child predators and people who date co-workers. But you need to understand just what a fishbowl you are in. The British have a figure of speech, to "chat up" someone, which means to hit on them by making small talk. They understand how fine that line is. I once worked in a small division of a large company and met a woman in accounting who told hilarious dirty jokes. I would stop by her desk occasionally to hear her latest joke, until another, older employee said to me, "every one in the company can see how you're romancing that girl in accounting." What? I protested. I was happily married, and I wasn't the one telling the jokes, and other people would visit with her too. But it gave me something to think about, and alerted me to how appearances can be negative, and perhaps made me question my own motives.

Later, working for a small but well-funded startup company in a field office I heard persistent rumors that the married vice president of sales was having a high-profile affair with his new secretary, with lots of drama, friction, shouting and door slamming. I had met this woman at a company dinner, and she seemed rather predatory to me, flirting heavily with those having the most apparent power. But the affair rumors reached 2,000 miles away, and occurred at a time when the company was falling apart mostly due to lack of sales. The implosion took out most of the headquarters people, leaving only a division sold to Japanese investors and a small software spinoff which the philandering VP was not invited to join.

Still later, when I was senior enough to know better, I was conducting a week of software training for a customer company and met a very talented and fascinating Bulgarian woman who bragged about her mathematician father. I told her I was married early on, and we only discussed software and math. She showed me a program she wrote that played the board game "Mastermind" perfectly. I showed her an interactive 3D visualization I had done of the famous Ordinary Differential Equations (ODEs) called "the Lorenz Attractor." She offered me a ride to the airport at the end of the week. Somehow another customer figured this out and thought it was fishy. He made a point of offering me a ride himself in front of the training class, forcing me to admit I already had a ride from the Bulgarian, and then he flashed a mean grin.

Well, she took me to her apartment first, and it turned out the other customer wasn't the only one expecting hanky panky to be going on. But it gets weirder. I apparently had impressed her with my brains, and that was something she was searching for, and she announced that she wanted to have my baby! I told her that I was happily married and also that I didn't think I could stand knowing I had a kid somewhere whose life I wasn't part of. It was an unbelievably awkward scene, and who knows what kind of rumors it sparked.

Drama

If you must have drama in your life I recommend you keep it away from your career. Don't end up in jail or in the news, with visible tats, or hung over at work. Seek drama in other ways. I'm told that Internet dating can be a high-drama activity. Nearly every major metropolis in North America has "goth" clubs that feature very unconventional people in provocative outfits. Search Google images for "goth club" to see what I mean. Or you could try to get a date with a celebrity, or decide to run a marathon, or join a paintball club. But remember that in your business dealings everyone is constantly evaluating you, asking themselves if you are a risk for them to deal with. Don't give them anything to worry about. I have on occasion joked that the standard business necktie is sort of an icon that says "You can strangle me at anytime," or, more generally, "I am not a risk."

Balance

Now, I'm not recommending you seek drama in your life. It's important to find a balance. I would advise a life filled with loving family and friends, with drama as an occasional spice. There's an excellent TED talk, "Esther Perel: The secret to desire in a long-term relationship" which explains the tension between intimacy and surprise.

I would also recommend the book "Why Men Don't Get Enough Sex and Women Don't Get Enough Love" by Jonathan Kramer.

(Adapt the obvious gender stereotypes to your unique situation.) A key to happiness, I have found, is honest and good-faith negotiation for your needs. Just like in business.

Authenticity

It is a nugget of folk wisdom in business that you never talk about sex, politics or religion in a business setting. (These days I would add drugs to this list.) But countering this is the need to be authentic with your associates. Keith Ferrazzi in his book on business networking, "Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time" tells a story that illustrates this balance.

At a business dinner he found himself unengaged because of a recent romantic breakup. Finally he apologized to the woman next to him, explaining his situation. It resulted in a very meaningful discussion of breakups that grew to engulf the whole table because of its emotional relevance to people. But notice that in this scenario no one was arguing with, or lecturing, or hitting on anyone. It was just a conversation about authentic human emotions. That's what can work.

I remember an occasion when I was giving some relationship advice to a co-worker as we walked in a group to a lunch location together. "One big problem" I explained, "is that pop music is almost exclusively focused on the beginning of relationships — getting to know each other, falling in love and the first exciting days of a romance." I added that I've only been able to think of two songs that are about long-time love: "I Say a Little Prayer" by Dione Warwick (1967)

and "Everlasting Love" by Howard Jones (1989). "The problem," I went on, "is that after a while you begin to get the idea that you're missing out on all the fun, since the mythology of our culture celebrates only the early phases."

"So what do you do about this?" asked my coworker.

"I've found you have to create your own mythology about your relationship."

Another coworker stopped dead in his tracks. "Wait a minute, say that again," he said. I repeated myself. "Can you do that?" he asked in astonishment.

"Sure, why not?" I replied. These are the sorts of conversations you can have with your colleagues, and they can help build trust and respect.

Also, I figure if it's okay to talk about relationships in a respectful way, it's also okay to ask your colleagues to fix you up. Let your associates act as the yentas (matchmakers) like in "Fiddler on the Roof" — I've never heard of anyone objecting to dating a coworker's friend. Plus, it gives you something interesting to talk about.

Self-help guru Tony Robbins once told a story of how he met his wife when she was a stewardess on a flight he took. He asked her if she had a sister and then talked her out of her sister's phone number. Then he called the sister and asked what the stewardess liked to do for fun, what she liked to eat, what music she liked, what flowers, etc. (Market research.) Lastly Tony arranged a date with the stewardess, and surprised her with everything he learned about.

This kind of careful, respectful communication is how you build solid relationships. If you can be authentic, respectful, and risk-averse in your business communications, you can gain respect and credibility, and perhaps even have some fun.

Meta

Okay, some wiseacre will probably ask why is it OK for this blog to discuss sex, etc? That's because this blog isn't a business communication, it's a meta-communication. Got it? Don't go reading it aloud at the office. Just stay out of trouble. And get back to work!

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