
Handling attraction in a professional setting - joshAg
https://jordancooper.blog/2017/06/23/i-was-an-investor-she-was-a-founder/
======
rayiner
Relevant article: [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/upshot/members-of-the-
opp...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/upshot/members-of-the-opposite-sex-
at-work-gender-study.html).

A study conducted for the New York Times study shows that Americans,
especially women, have quite negative views of being alone with members of the
opposite sex. Only 29% of women consider having a drink alone with a man who
is not their spouse to be appropriate behavior, and only 63% think a one-on-
one workplace meeting is appropriate. Some trends are surprising: when it
comes to dinner, 60-70% of women 18-29 view it as _inappropriate_ , but only
30% of women 55+.

I'm not sure what the takeaway is. To me it seems like the product of a
culture that has trouble drawing appropriate boundaries between romantic and
other contexts. Perhaps it is an outgrowth of the fact that people are
basically institutionalized from ages 13-22. School is all consuming--it's
where you "work," where you socialize, where you pursue romantic
relationships. When people get out into the "real world," they have little
experience with all the myriad difference social contexts of ordinary life,
and see the workplace as a similar environment.

~~~
landon32
Wow, this is wild to me. At first I thought this was only in a professional
context, but it's not. I cannot believe a plurality of people think that
having dinner 1-on-1 with someone of the opposite sex is inappropriate if
they're not in a relationship. I have friends of the opposite gender and it's
pretty normal for us to catch up over dinner.

~~~
istorical
There's a chilling effect with regards to beliefs that fall outside the
Overton Window.

As norms change within a group, those who hold beliefs outside the Overton
Window can become afraid to express those beliefs, and that leads to people
simply not even comprehending another group's views. How did Trump get elected
president? Why didn't we see it coming? This is what the people in my
Manhattan office were thinking the day after the election. On the other hand,
family members from Nebraska were laughing and asking how the coastal elite
"didn't get it". We aren't talking because we can't disagree without falling
out with each other.

I expect the same is true of sexual norms, dating norms, social norms, norms
about drugs and alcohol, etc.

Generationally, the Snapchat generation probably has no idea what those
growing up in the 1940s believed, and those who were teenagers during the
American sexual revolution of the 1960s would probably be surprised by the way
teens date and have sex today. We have vague ideas and notions but how many of
us have had 30+ min conversations about these topics with people who are from
a far off generation?

No one communicates and I believe historians of the future will feel it's an
enormous tragedy that we don't have better surveys and public records of
personal beliefs in areas that are controversial or highly personal. And more
than just 'what do you believe', but 'what are the circumstances that led you
to have those beliefs, what were the consequences around your actions that
influenced those beliefs', etc.

------
2309kdujj
This isn't the difficult situation.

The difficult situation is one where you develop genuine feelings for someone
that you work with every day, intensely, day in and day out. When the attempt
of both parties to refrain from a relationship itself becomes an issue that
you console each other over, ironically sending you into a relationship.

Or what if the woman approached the man, aggressively so? This does happen.
Maybe not so difficult, but a different dynamic, and maybe a different reason
to refrain, that turns this piece on its head.

Although well-intended, there's a certain sexism in these kinds of stories, a
kind of "knight in shining armor" for the modern age. I realize that in most
cases the issue is male -> female attention, but sometimes it is female ->
male, or [fe]male <-> [fe]male, and it seems like we tend to assume everything
is the same.

I'm trying to figure out what concerns me about this piece, because I'm not
sure I have a problem with its content. I'm thinking it's not really what's
written in the piece, but the subtext, context, and assumed reasons for
writing it, and what to generalize.

I guess I worry that in trying to deal with the massive problem of sexual
harassment, the actual messiness of other situations becomes stereotyped and
painted over. And then we get blowback.

~~~
ec109685
The answer has to be to change jobs if you are in a situation where it would
be inappropriate to attempt to form a relationship.

------
rmason
It's important that these stories be told because somehow people need to be
led by example this is how you deal with female founders if you're an
investor.

Eliminate any excuses at all. It's just common sense for a lot of people, but
as we've seen recently not all.

~~~
roflc0ptic
I second that. Modeling appropriate, pro social behavior has to be a part of
improving bad behavior. Pitchforks are fun, but it's not how the real work
gets done.

------
pm90
Anecdote from personal life:

I was meeting potential roommates when I met a girl who I found very
attractive. We had a great conversation, but for other reasons (location,
timing of leases) it didn't work out. Later, after finding a roommate and
moving in, I checked in with her to see if she would like to go out on a date.
She replied yes, and we went out and had a great time.

Despite not being coworkers, I was mindful of the fact that we had initially
met for the purpose of discussing being roommates which I consider a platonic
relationship. Just like what the OP says, when I asked her later, she
appreciated the fact that I didn't ask her out right away, but waited until
later to do so.

Its not rocket science to get this right. Its pretty much common sense.

~~~
joshAg
I disagree that it's common sense, especially in the tech industry. I shared
it because of recent high-profiles cases about this issue. Like, we assume the
absolute best of Dave McClure, he did not know better and made literally this
exact mistake that the article discusses about the boundary between
professional and personal lives.

If we're still assuming the best, then part of the way to fix this issue is to
explain to the people who know don't know better what the boundaries actually
are and why. This is the same reason why it's important to teach people about
affirmative consent.

On the other hand, if we stop assuming the best, then we start getting into
"they're violating people's boundaries on purpose, not by accident, so
teaching them boundaries will not help, they cannot be helped" territory.

~~~
pm90
I agree with your point that it may not be common sense. However, please don't
use Dave McClure as an example of someone "who didn't know better". He knew
exactly what he was doing and apologized only when his actions were being made
public by multiple women.

Perfect hypothetical example of someone "who doesn't know better" would have
been if the OP of the article had ignored the Investor/Founder boundary and
asked her out on a date.

~~~
joshAg
I agree that he's probably lying about not knowing better. That's why I said
'if we assume the best'. The best case scenario for Dave McClure is that he
was painfully ignorant about basic human interaction, because the other option
is that he's a predator.

But even if we do assume that he's a predator, the fact that he (and many
others who have used similar excuses) thinks that saying he didn't know any
better is a valid excuse means that we need to work on emphasizing that that
sort of thing is absolutely unacceptable, so that it stops becoming an excuse
predators can use.

------
valuearb
A huge amount of married couples met at work. Isn't it possible to ask someone
at work out respectfully? I fear we focus on edge cases where guys who do that
end up acting like creeps.

After all, two people falling in love is more important than any business
deal.

~~~
rayiner
In fact only 10% of married couples meet at work:
[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/upshot/members-of-the-
opp...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/upshot/members-of-the-opposite-sex-
at-work-gender-study.html). And I'd bet that only a fraction of those people
met in a context where there was a power imbalance.

Two people falling in love is _not_ more important than love-seeking behavior
poisoning the well for everyone else trying to make their careers. There are
tons of other more appropriate avenues for that.

~~~
gpawl
Why do you say 10% is "only"? That's millions of people.

Why do you assume there power imbalance was rare? Before recent years,
marrying a boss or a professor was quite common.

FWIW, among famous people in tech: Jeff Bezos married an underling; Bill Gates
married one of his employees; Sergey Brin married an employee's sister, and
dated an underling; Larry Page dated an underling.

~~~
rayiner
> Why do you assume there power imbalance was rare? Before recent years,
> marrying a boss or a professor was quite common.

That occurred in a context where women were categorically limited to lower
level roles, so almost any heterosexual workplace relationship involved a
power imbalance. You wouldn't expect the same dynamic on a going forward
basis, nor is there any reason to structure the workplace to accommodate such
relationships.

~~~
valuearb
Yea that's crazy. If two people are attracted power imbalance is meaningless.

------
Mz
_there is a right way and a wrong way to handle attraction in a professional
setting. The right way is to back the fuck off and let people do their work
despite any attraction. The wrong way is to blur the line._

We need a lot more people saying this sort of thing. I am so glad to see this
on the front page.

~~~
aaron-lebo
It's kind of crazy to me that it's not blindingly obvious and needs to be said
like it's a hidden wisdom.

Isn't it just being a professional? Why is that difficult for some people?

~~~
joshAg
Because there's a large swath of people in the technology industry who
consider not understanding social graces well to be a virtue. Most of the time
that just comes out as being awkward in a stereotypically nerdy way, but it
also manifests as being unable to see what is so wrong with hitting on someone
in a business setting or being unable to see why someone might be so upset
about it.

~~~
pm90
Ah, you know what, I had been thinking about this for a while and I think your
comment nails it. Most of my programmer friends seem to have some degree of
social awkwardness (including myself, although I did recognize it as a
liability and chose to change it) and just like you said, its usually just
harmless nerdy behavior. But when these same people come across power in any
form, that same social awkwardness can cause serious problems.

~~~
joshAg
You don't even need to be in power for this issue to cause problems. If
someone in power does something bad, if the lack of social skills prevents you
from realizing what they did was bad, then you're essentially going to let it
continue by not speaking out about it and you're going to reinforce that
whatever that thing was was actually ok. And this is all done without you even
realizing what you are doing, because you don't have the social skills realize
that you are doing it at all.

------
maerF0x0
This story worked out. I wonder how his tune would have changed if she married
someone else in the mean time and he missed his chance with her.

Seems to be a bit of a confirmation bias.

~~~
pm90
Maybe you subscribe to the "one perfect spouse for me" philosophy? From what I
see of his attitude from the article, he probably would find someone similar.

~~~
maerF0x0
Not so much that as maybe some amount of dashed hopes?

------
a_puppy
In most of the recent threads about investors hitting on founders, the HN
discussion has focused on the fact that investors have power over founders.
However, parts of this blog post seems to imply that hitting on someone in a
professional setting is _never_ OK, even if there's no power imbalance:

> I guess the point of this story, and why I share it now, is that there is a
> right way and a wrong way to handle attraction in a professional setting.
> The right way is to back the fuck off and let people do their work despite
> any attraction. The wrong way is to blur the line.

I'd like to hear peoples' opinions on under what circumstances (if ever) it's
OK to hit on someone at a corporate holiday party, assuming there is no power
imbalance.

~~~
joshAg
Hi, I'm the person who submitted this link (I didn't write it).

IMO, assuming no power imbalance it's only ok if you don't work together in
any capacity regularly or could, if the relationship goes south, stop working
together regularly in a very quick timeframe.

------
js2
_be a decent and respectful person_

That's all there is to it, and I don't know what else to add. Do some folks
not learn this, not care, or just don't know what it means? Really, it's just
the Golden Rule isn't it?

~~~
joshAg
People have different definitions of what is is to be decent and respectful.

And really, we should update the golden rule from "do unto others as you would
have them do unto you" to something more like "Do unto others as they would
have done unto them," because people can have different preferences.

------
agumonkey
Gosh, I read the title wrong (setting -> typesetting) and thought someone
invented a new algorithm to handle kerning through character "attraction".

------
mankash666
Let me state that I strongly back appropriate behavior between the sexes
regardless of the setting.

What the author is suggesting is that romance is inappropriate between
potential investors and founders, regardless of how objective their roles and
interactions are outside the sphere of Romance. I disagree with this zero-sum
approach. While it's essential to maintain objectivity, if it takes away the
humanity, what exactly is the point of this, or anything

~~~
chrisbennet
The "rules" against this sort of behavior exist because people can't be
trusted to maintain objectivity in these sorts of situations. "Oh but I really
like her." is not an excuse to do whatever you want.

Lets take a more common and less obvious situation; dating coworkers: If
things don't work out, often one of the pair will need to leave their job -
probably her.

A _considerate_ person would realize that "Would you like to get drinks
tonight?" really means "Hey, lets see if we have some chemistry and if it
doesn't work out, I'm OK with you losing your job."

~~~
pertymcpert
Wait, are you saying that dating co-workers is wrong? Seriously?

~~~
chrisbennet
Yes, dating co-workers is wrong. Yes, seriously. People who just work at the
same company, no.

Work isn't the same as school.

I think males tend to be oblivious to the downsides of asking a scrum-mate out
on a date. After all, it's not awkward for _them_. I mean, who wouldn't be
flattered to be asked out by _me_ right! Even if she didn't accept this time,
she's really going to enjoy pair programming with me in the future.

This is where the concept of _consideration_ comes into play - a considerate
person thinks about how their actions will will affect others, in this case
the coworker you ask out or the rest of the team.

