Love is in the air at this time of year with Valentine's Day just around the corner and deadlines passing on custom gifts for that special person in your life. It's also the time of year when readers ask me about non-fraternization policies that forbid dating coworkers or bosses at work.

I'm a huge believer in prohibiting employees from dating their boss or any person who reports to them or who has any impact on their pay, performance rating, or promotions. In fact, if an employee has any impact on the working conditions or rewards of an employee, the two should not be dating. Period.

Love is in the air at work these days, though, as work expands to fill the majority of the hours in a day. Speaking realistically, where else do people meet others who share so many common characteristics? They have similar incomes, similar interests, and similar ages. They live within dating proximity and have their common interest in the company. Where else will any employee meet a person with whom love is more likely to bloom?

Consequently, I do support office romances between unmarried employees who are discreet. If the romance overflows into the office and causes tension, conflict, or impacts work in negative ways, then I have to intervene.

But, the dating couple needs to be aware of potential fallout in the future and factor the fallout into their dating decisions. When loves fades at work, the parties still need to be able to work together. And, the possibility always exists that one will report to the other or have to work closely together in the same department. As an employer, my advice to the person in this situation is, get over it. This potential existed when you dated, and it is not up to me to affect careers, responsibilities, and promotions because of your dating decisions.

What's Love Got to Do With an Office Romance?

Quite a lot, actually. To answer Tina Turner's proverbial question, I checked out current research on workplace romance. If the office romance is just about sex, if the romance is an extramarital affair, or if the relationship's goal is personal gain at work, coworkers and companies frown on love relationships in the office.

In our offices, we have experienced a number of serious love relationships. Several couples have married and those marriages have spawned additional relationships that have also ended up in marriage.

Several earlier marriages are working and couples have added children to our extended work family. In the research I highlight in a related article, Human Resources managers said that the most likely outcome of office romances that they have experienced is marriage.

So, if a couple is genuinely serious about dating and building a relationship, popular opinion is more favorable. And, these days, with the number of hours employees spend on work-related activities, they are likely to meet their friends and eventual spouses at work - even, if this can cause problems for employers.

If one employee is managing another employee and they are dating, one employee's job needs to change. What if performance problems arise later with one person in a married couple? I once worked with a client who opened a branch in another state and sent twenty married couples to staff the new location.

As you can imagine, when one partner was angry, two people were unhappy. The life and work balance was hurt also, because couples went to work together, worked together, went home from work together, and talked about work - together, all the time.

Learn more about dating, sex, and romance in the office. I've provided advice for both the dating couple and for HR staff and managers who are occasionally, and unfortunately, called upon to deal with problems that result from an office romance - gone good - or bad.

_{Image Copyright Susan Stewart}

More Related to Office Romance

• Why Sexy Isn't Better: How Sexual Behavior Can Submarine Your Career
• How to Demonstrate Respect at Work
• Sexual Harassment
• How To Address an Employee Sexual Harassment Complaint
• The Scoop on Love Contracts

Connect with Susan: Free Newsletter | HR Forum | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ | @AboutHR on Twitter

Need a quick, easy ice breaker that requires almost no preparation yet is versatile enough to use for just about any occasion? This ice breaker is a direct result of notes I received from two readers. They both wrote to tell me how well the ice breaker had worked in their meetings.

I was, of course, thrilled to get the feedback, but both writers really caught my funny bone. They had not used the one-word ice breaker that I had tested in the field for them. They both took part of the blog post I wrote to tell my readers about the ice breaker and used it as an ice breaker. I asked, in my blog post, "What's rocking your world this month?"

Turns out that it made a great ice breaker. How fun. Had to share that with you. So, I wrote another ice breaker, Rocking, Rolling Ice Breaker Questions, using many more examples of ice breaker questions that you can use in meetings.

I hope that you tuck these away because they sure come in handy when you lead a meeting. I hear regularly, too, from readers who use these ice breakers in civic groups, teen activities, church groups and more.

More Ice Breakers

• My Best One Word Ice Breaker
• 10 Favorite Foods Ice Breaker
• Everything Ice Breakers
• My Favorite Ice Breaker

_{Image Copyright Digital Vision / Getty Images}

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Looking into merit pay and what I find is that - bottom line - it is difficult, if not impossible, to remove the manager's opinion from the performance mix. (See the advantages and disadvantages of merit pay.)

I've had the opportunity to look at the merit pay systems of several companies in the process. One company (with 60-70,000 employees) had invested about five years in creating their merit pay system and had systematically created metrics for most components of most jobs, including specific deliverables.

Each of the systems that I've looked at do what I do not recommend that employers do. Their merit pay systems rate employees with grades of A-E or they rate employees from 1-5. Some of the companies, then, determine and establish an artificial percentage of employees who can receive each rating. Ugh and yuck!

Merit Pay Rewards Performance

Yet, I am a fan of merit pay. There is nothing so demotivating to your best employees than receiving the same pay increase or profit sharing check as the under-performing employee in the next cubicle.

From an employer perspective, when employers assign percentages of employees to the ratings categories, I always wonder why they still employ any employee who is performing in a way that earns the lowest two ratings. I have also seen employers invest hundreds of hours into designing systems that claim to objectively rate employee performance in a merit pay system.

Once they have these objective merit pay systems in place, then the managers decide, objectively, of course, how well the employee is performing within the rating system. And, assign a rating - and recommend a ranking. Ha.

I'd love to hear from you if you have designed, or are aware of, a merit pay system that works without demotivating half of your employees. Won't you please share it? I won't publish the merit pay approach, without your permission, but I am here to learn, too. I have written about numeric rating in the past and it's time to update my thinking. Merit pay, here we come.

_{Image Copyright Phil Date}

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On Sunday all eyes will be glued to their TVs watching the Super Bowl showdown between the New England Patriots and New York Giants. It’s sure to be a great game.  Did you know that Super Bowl Sunday is also considered the second largest day of food consumption in the United States?  Yep, and not surprisingly, Thanksgiving is the first.

How much food you ask?  Well, it’s estimated that Americans will eat 90 million pounds of chicken wings, 14,500 tons of chips and 4,000 tons of popcorn.  That doesn’t even include the number of pizzas that are delivered.

This year, Mr. Bartender and I splurged on some Pat LaFrieda hamburgers and will (hopefully) cheer the Patriots to victory.  Oh, and let’s not forget the commercials.  Here’s a fave from years ago.

Are you watching the game this weekend?  Tell us who you’re rooting for and (more importantly) what are you eating?!

You May Also Like:

1. Friday Distraction – Time Well Spent
2. Friday Distraction – Training for Cappuccino
3. Friday Distraction – The Working Gender Gap [Infographic]

John Roppo recently joined Select International as Chief Financial Officer.  In this new role, he will be responsible for finance and accounting, tax, banking, and providing decision support across the entire organization.

Prior to joining Select, Roppo held Chief Financial Officer positions with Tangent Rail, Tegrant Corporation, and Roadside Telematics.  He began his career with Ford Motor Company as a financial analyst, ultimately serving as the senior financial executive for the Lincoln Mercury business group and Jaguar Cars North America.  His background includes international assignments with Ford in Argentina and Brazil.

Roppo received a bachelor’s degree in Administration and Management Science and Economics, and a master’s degree in Industrial Administration (MBA) from the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University.  He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation and is a Certified Treasury Professional (CTP).
 
“We’re excited to welcome John to the Select International team,” said Douglas Wolf, Chief Operating Officer at Select International.  “His strong business background and leadership will contribute significantly to our continued growth and expansion.”

A global provider of employee selection and hiring systems, Select International helps organizations identify, select and develop a strong workforce.

About Select International
Select International develops employee hiring assessments and hiring systems to help organizations build a strong, productive workforce.  The company’s employee selection and development solutions include pre employment assessments, executive assessment, online interview training, manufacturing assessment tests, healthcare hiring assessments, customer service assessment tests, and tools to help organizations hire safe workers.  Select International works closely with its clients to improve hiring at all levels, and across all industries, including manufacturing, healthcare, customer service, energy, retail, transportation and logistics, and distribution.

Select International is headquartered in Pittsburgh, PA, and maintains offices throughout North America and around the globe.  For more information on Select International, call 1-800-786-8595 or visit http://www.selectinternational.com.

HAZLET, N.J. (January 9th, 2012) – iCIMS, provider of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) talent management and acquisition solutions, announced today the company will now offer Tracker I-9 software and E-Verify® compliance as part of its Onboarding Solution.This comes as iCIMS and Tracker Corp., a leading provider of innovative software for immigration management, Form I-9 compliance, and E-Verify® regulations, announce the formal expansion of their partnership.

Customers leveraging iCIMS’ Onboarding Solution can benefit from a fully integrated system that provides automated and paperless preparation, signing, management, auditing, and storage of I-9s forms, as well as automatic E-Verify® submission. The software guides new hires through form completion and virtually eliminates I-9 errors and audit risks through alerts and next-step notifications. Tracker Corp prioritizes legal compliance, and users can be assured that their information is accurate and security is maximized thanks to a dedicated database on a single tenancy.

Founded in 1998 in San Francisco, CA, Tracker Corp. operates with a vision of solving the market’s immigration and compliance challenges with innovation and excellence.  Tracker currently services more than 400 clients, including approximately 70% of the top immigration law firms who buy case management software (according to IndUS Business Journal and American Lawyer Media).  Common clients between Tracker Corp and iCIMS include Citgo, Mohawk Industries, and Defense Support Services LLC (DS2).

 ”We are excited to see our relationship expand with Tracker Corp and are confident this new functionality will provide customers with easy, important tools needed for compliance purposes,” expressed Susan Vitale, Chief Strategic Officer at iCIMS. “This partnership provides a natural extension of iCIMS’ offerings, as more and more organizations look to iCIMS to support not just their applicant tracking needs, but also their onboarding requirements. Our ability to support E-Verify® will surely help to make clients’ lives easier as they manage their full talent acquisition process via one platform.”

Brett Weiss, Chief Executive Officer at Tracker Corp, added, “We are very proud to be able to enrich the iCIMS experience with our software.  We’re confident that we can provide the easiest I-9 and E-Verify® process for corporations of all sizes.”

Enhanced with new compliance features, the iCIMS Onboarding Solution reduces audit risk exposure, while continuing to providethe right tools needed to smoothly transition new recruits from candidates to employees quickly and effectively.

About iCIMS:
iCIMS, a leading provider of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) talent management solutions, is an Inc. 500 and Software Satisfaction honoree focused on solving corporate business issues through the implementation of easy-to-use web-based software solutions. iCIMS’ Talent Platform, the industry’s premier candidate and employee management solution, enables organizations to manage their entire talent lifecycle from candidate management through employee management with a single web-based application. With more than 1000 clients worldwide, iCIMS is one of the largest and fastest-growing talent management system providers with offices in North America, UK, and China. To learn more about how iCIMS can help your organization, visit www.icims.com or view a free online demo of the iCIMS Talent Platform.

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA – Feb. 1, 2012 – Today, Visier Inc., announced its sponsorship of IQPC’s 8thHR Metrics & Performance Measurement Summit, taking place Feb. 27 to 29, 2012 in Miami, Fla. This event brings together Human Resource professionals to discuss how to validate the role of HR departments using effective metrics and result in tangible financial results that generate ROI.

This event provides a wide array of learning and networking opportunities through panel discussions, business meetings with solution providers and roundtable discussions to elevate the HR department’s role by exploring:

- Finding ROI in Training Programs

- Social Media Recruiting: How to Effectively Implement New Metrics

- Effective Metrics: Finding Areas to Cut Costs and Predict Future Trends

- Creating a Globally Integrated Enterprise with Consistent Measurement Solutions

Visier’s Workforce Analytics offering is an end-to-end, cloud-based application designed for HR professionals to identify and understand the ROI of their human capital, by showing them how to reduce costs and improve productivity associated with workforce strategies, including attracting and retaining top talent. Visier Workforce Analytics is a powerful, intuitive and interactive solution that uncovers deep insight into the core metrics of your workforce, by answering the most critical and fundamental questions facing HR professionals about their past and present workforce and more importantly – with predictive what-if analysis that helps to predict and plan for their future needs.

There is still time to register and hear from Dave Weisbeck, CSO for Visier Inc. as he presents “Best Practices & Trends in Workforce Analytics” in person, on Wednesday, Feb. 29, 2012, at 12:00 p.m., at the Hyatt Regency in Miami, Fla.  

This session is designed for HR professionals who are looking to be more strategic, and to better understand the benefits and future trends of HR metrics and workforce planning.  This session will highlight:
– The complete working knowledge of workforce analytics and how to get started in your organization.

- How workforce analytics can benefit an organization in the creation of more strategic people agendas.

- What future trends exist in workforce analytics and planning that every HR professional should know.

- Two customer success stories of organizations that have used workforce analytics in strategic ways.

Full Event Brochure is available here: http://www.visier.com/events/8th-hr-metrics-performance-measurement-summit/

Dave Weisbeck leads the overall solutions success and strategy at Visier. Dave is a seasoned software executive who has experience ranging from building development teams to growing multi-billion dollar businesses as a general manager. Prior to joining Visier, Dave spent over 15 years in the information management and analytics industry, which included helping to build Crystal Decisions and Business Objects products and product strategy. Most recently Dave was the senior vice president and general manager responsible for Business Intelligence, Enterprise Information Management and Data Warehousing at SAP.

For more information on Visier, please visit http://www.visier.com/

Contact:

Visier Inc.

Melanie Aizer

Marketing Manager

778.331.6955

www.visier.com

###

Companies that are growing quickly invest a lot of staff time in interviewing and selecting the right candidates for their jobs. Participative companies like to hold small group interviews in which four or five employees meet with each candidate in the first round interview.

While I support their interaction and believe that this is an effective method for assessing the candidate's ability to fit within their culture, it is a heavy investment of staff time. If you invest staff resources in interviewing, you may want to adopt the phone interview as an initial screen. The phone interview is a method for making sure that only the most qualified candidates receive a first round, time consuming interview on site.

The telephone interview allows the employer to determine if the candidate's qualifications, experience, workplace preferences and salary needs are congruent with the position and the organization. The phone interview saves management time and eliminates unlikely candidates.

Review my suggested format for a phone interview.

_{Image Copyright Marili Forastieri / Getty Images}

More About Recruiting and Hiring

• Recruiting Stars: Top 10 Ideas for Recruiting Great Candidates
• How to Recruit and Hire the Best: A Checklist for Success
• Recruit and Hire the Best: Free Email Class

Connect with Susan: Free Newsletter | HR Forum | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ | @AboutHR on Twitter

I think a lot about trust. And maybe more importantly, I think about how mistrust happens. Specifically when it comes to writers, columnists, bloggers, and journalists.

Often, when people talk about disclosure, they are usually talking about money. And if you’re a blogger or writer and money is changing hands, I think you should always be on the side of clear, full disclosure. And just for the record, I’ve been called out about disclosure. More on that in a second, though. First, let’s talk about money.

$ $ $

Money is powerful. I think about the work I do with ERE and how I take our work there (and especially the parts I’m intimately involved with) very personally. But I should, because ERE doing well means I do well and there’s a trigger there in my brain. That’s why I disclose when I talk about our events or publications, usually right in line with the text so you can’t miss it.

I also think about the relationships I developed with the folks at Crimcheck, Halogen Software, Rypple or Vault.com (who paid me for the first time, not as an advertiser, but as a writer). Or when I worked on MeritBuilder or for some of the other companies I’ve been lucky enough to be at, it makes sense that I became vested.

That’s not easy an easy reality when you’re solo and trying to put your best pieces out there without conflict of interest. We have a stellar sales team at ERE and they take care of all of the deal making. It is so much easier when there is that separation. When it is just you, it is a struggle. And I’ve seen a lot of bloggers and writers go down that path and take some wrong turns.

Even though it is difficult to know when or where to disclose, I think there is a clear line: when money (or something of value) changes hands, that’s when you look for opportunities to disclose. And the part about looking for opportunities to disclose is the distinction there, and I think it is the right and appropriate choice. Do it often, with clarity and bake it in with a one-time visitor in mind (if someone comes in off a Google search knowing nothing about you or your publication and reads a piece with a conflict of interest, do they know money changed hands?).

Beyond Money: Honesty

So if you disclose money relationships, shouldn’t that be enough? Well consider what I did above: I linked to an article critical of my ability to disclose. Now obviously, I wasn’t paid by Workforce to include that link. While I didn’t think it was very fair at the time, I do think it is fair to point out that some may have questioned my approach in the past. You should have the opportunity to see that.

Similarly, I may disclose the fact that ERE is my employer, but if I blow smoke up your ass about the company, spin the truth or you get the feeling like I’m not giving you the full story, I become less credible. At least as far as writing is concerned, being honest about both successes and struggles of what we’re doing means people take me mostly at my word, even with the knowledge that I’m an employee.

That’s why disclosing about money is simply not enough. The best way to gain and maintain trust is by abandoning (as best as possible) the built-in bias that the relationship creates and speak the plain truth. And you have to do both, consistently, over a period of time to gain trust.

The Changing Rules Of New Media? Not So Fast

Two and a half years ago, I said at a conference that bloggers were not, in and of themselves, journalists. That’s still true today. I struggle with the term myself but I don’t lose sleep over it, either.

The principles of the old ways, of that idealistic view of journalism as the respected fourth estate, is still within reach, even in this digital, anon-blogging, rumor-monging, money-changing-hands-under-the-table environment that the new media works in these days.

What’s easy to forget is that there was a time when the most prominent people evaluating technology didn’t just pick a side and arrogantly and mindlessly defend it until the bitter end. Or that trading money for half-hearted disclosures and favorable coverage was harder to come by. Or that concepts like black hat SEO, astroturfing and throwing anonymous commenters at a situation could influence the discovery and perception of information.

We’re not talking about a zine or underground newspaper with significant costs and logistical hurdles to get it beyond a few dozen miles of its origin. We’re talking about the same web that you used to get to this very low cost blog today can get you to other sources with millions of dollars staked into their sites.

The biggest misconception is that old media rules are outdated and unneeded. In reality, the key thing that happened is that not playing by those rules was finally a choice for nearly anyone who wished to publish something with almost unlimited (and low-cost) distribution.

That’s a great thing for information flow. But if you want to be trusted wholesale as a writer, blogger, or whatever you want to call yourself, you’ll quickly learn that these journalist quacks may have been on to something with their silly rules. They knew it was about trust. Even if you had to get ink on your fingers to read about it.