Client relationship

caleb180

I work for a small service business and was recently made aware that one of our reps is in a relationship with a client. She works on that account and has done a good job of increasing our revenues from them (I know what you're thinking, but this would not have been possible based on the relationship alone). Our company owner has been hesitant to address the issue, despite the obvious conflict of interest, as he is fearful of losing the account in already tough economy. My advice to him is that with the high possibility of this situation ending badly, we should at a minimum reassign her and do what we can to maintain the busness.

Has anyone dealt with a similar circumstance?

Chicago1

I personally have not dealt with this situation, but I would definitely reassign this employee--just make sure she gets an equivalent assignment, not a demotion.  If this relationship goes sour, you may find not only that you lose a client, but also that you're facing sexual harassment or other claims -- things can get really messy.  Does the company have a policy on fraternizing with clients? 

TXHRGuy

[quote user="caleb180"]

I work for a small service business and was recently made aware that one of our reps is in a relationship with a client. She works on that account and has done a good job of increasing our revenues from them (I know what you're thinking, but this would not have been possible based on the relationship alone). Our company owner has been hesitant to address the issue, despite the obvious conflict of interest, as he is fearful of losing the account in already tough economy. My advice to him is that with the high possibility of this situation ending badly, we should at a minimum reassign her and do what we can to maintain the busness.

Has anyone dealt with a similar circumstance?

[/quote]

 

Big company line: move the rep.

Small company line: depends on how small, and also how large/small the client organization is.

The rock solid HR line is always going to be "move the rep".    HR professionals are trained to be very risk averse and that level of risk aversion is not always possible as a business reality.  Somethings are always possible, like preventing employees from using racially charged language and punishing them if they do so.  Other things are not, like might be the case here.  For a small company, this is as much a business decision as a HR decision.  The wisest thing is to re-assign the rep, if possible.

caleb180

Thanks for your response. There's no ploicy against fraternizing, but situations like these are often how policies are born.  What do you think the sexual harrassment scenario would look like?

Chicago1

I've read about cases where an office romance ends and one party claims the other is or has been sexually harassing him or her.  It could be that one person doesn't want the romance to end and the other person views the continued attention as harassment.  Something like that could happen here if the rep and client end the relationship and one claims the other is harassing him or her.  The employer could be liable if nothing is done to stop the conduct.  No doubt these can be tricky situations for the employer.

TXHRGuy

In this case, it's not an office romance, it's a romance across companies but the companies do business together, so each employer plays a role in "making" their respective employees interact with each other.

 

The harassment situation comes up when one employee tells their employer that the employee of the other company is harassing them.  It can really mess with the B2B relationship as well, as you might imagine.  That can be for any of the various reasons that come up in ANY harassment case.