She couldn't have possibly thought that broaching the topic of her own venture with her husband's employees could've been construed as anything but pressure to help her on it. Are people really this fucking dense?
Er, I originally came to the comments section to say the exact opposite. I guess this is what happens when you're too close to your colleagues and your company grows up.
> I guess this is what happens when you're too close to your colleagues and your company grows up.
There's also a difference between "colleagues" and "employees" let alone "partner's employees".
Look at it like this: a student flirting with an other student[0] is generally appropriate, a teacher flirting with a student not so much. Because the teacher is in a position of abusable power compared to the student an otherwise harmless situation easily becomes fraught with peril.
[0] assuming reason, acknowledgement of rejection, etc..
> Because the teacher is in a position of abusable power compared to the student
From what it sounds like, the relationship between the employees/execs at Github was much more friendly than the teacher/student relationship you mentioned. The pitty is that this is super common at small companies, and it would appear this is the relevant fallout after you grow beyond a certain size.
> From what it sounds like, the relationship between the employees/execs at Github was much more friendly than the teacher/student relationship you mentioned.
Teachers and students can have very friendly relationships (common when the teacher is young, or in uni-level courses, I've had excellent relations with teachers in the past). That does not change the power relation and the risks of abuse thereof.
It does not seem difficult to understand both sides in a situation like this. It seems like something that probably happens all the time, especially in regards to charities.
Absolutely.
Good fences make good neighbours.
To some, no fence or small fence is an invitation to overfamiliarity.
Make it too tall and create suspicion.
In the beginning of my career, certainly before I had the cash reserves to easily weather being laid off, I worked for a company that had a 4-month death march. The two nights before the work was due I literally didn't sleep. As an aside, I really can't recommend this; the code I produced was basically nonsensical. And I think I added far more bugs than I removed, but I did get the final blocking bug out (no matter how many every-so-slightly lower priority bugs I added in its stead.) The ceo came in the morning of the final due date and saw me -- wearing the same clothes for nearly 48 hours and utterly sleep deprived -- and made a crack about how I didn't look like I'm been working hard and I should get to work or he'd fire me. Joking about firing people may or may not ever be funny, but definitely stops being funny when the person has the ability to do it. And some managers fail to understand that - your relationships with employees change when you're their supervisor.
Similarly, it's really not hard to see how being too close or too friendly with people you supervise can cause all sorts of problems, ranging from letting them get away with things they shouldn't because of the friendship or them sharing things with you that force you, as a boss, to choose between your friendship or what your company requires.
I just don't think it's a good idea either way. It's a bummer that it makes workplaces a little more impersonal, but imo it's for the best. I bet it's the reason the military doesn't (from my perspective) seem to encourage enlisted and officers to co-socialize.
