McDonalds fires CEO over relationship with employee

[anon61221983]

@anon50609448

1. policies like this may interfere with people’s personal lives; 2. interfering with people’s personal lives is prima facie bad.

I don’t think that holds up, given that some actions have a negative impact on the lives of others. No one’s right to autonomy is more important than others. I’d argue that a government that is by the people for the people should have a role in shaping our public interactions to some degree, because some actions are inherently anti-social. I do think that we can most certainly roll around the idea of corporations doing this as being problematic, but the reality is that relationships in the world place are not neutral, especially between people at different levels in the company. The main reason they have policy on this is largely to protect themselves from lawsuits, which is entirely cynical, of course. That doesn’t mean that there are not other benefits, which include making the work place safer for a particular group of people who until relatively recently have been subject to exclusion from the work place and horrendous levels of harassment when they were in the work place. We’re talking within our life times, not back in the bad old days. Those material facts are worth taking into consideration when we talk about this. Again, if people believe that their having to let the company know when they are dating a co-worker or believing that romance is over if they can’t harass a woman on the subway, then they firmly believe that MY right to exist without being harassed is of a lesser importance.

@anon50609448

Basically I want to put “women living in a culture that systematically condones, encourages and facilitates rape” vs. “men living in a culture that systematically makes them occasionally feel a little bad” on the scales and see whether anyone wants to argue that we really ought to consider the latter to be an important consideration.

That is the problem, some people DO believe that, even if they wouldn’t put it exactly in those terms. They of course would not say that they have a right to rape people in public, but there are some who DO in fact believe that women are not equal to men in our society and as such are entitled to less rights with regards to bodily autonomy. This has a measurable impact on the daily life of women everywhere, because that is not just about sexual harassment and rape, but about the state making medical decisions on our behalf.

I understand the philosopher mindset, but at some point, the rubber has got to meet the road. As Marx said, the point isn’t to just philosophize, but to enact actual change in the world. Other people’s right to exist, unmolested in the world just isn’t the same thing as telling others not to actively inflict injury on others. One is an actual injustice and the other is people believing that others exist merely for their edification and exploitation. One is social and one is anti-social.

[ficuswhisperer]

@reallySorryAboutThat

By offering and promoting anonymous and independent channels for complaint and counseling? Instead of putting such a relationship under the a priori suspicion of being illicit, and threatening termination to anyone who can’t bring themselves to discuss it, of all people, with Jamie from HR, and put it into writing?

HR’s job is to protect the company, not the employee. The most likely end result of this will be the complainant being fired.

[anon50609448]

@anon61221983

Again, if people believe that their having to let the company know when they are dating a co-worker or believing that romance is over if they can’t harass a woman on the subway, then they firmly believe that MY right to exist without being harassed is of a lesser importance.

When I 100% agree with what your counterpoint I feel a little bit like we must be talking past each other. What you are saying here is exactly the point I’m trying to make. Obviously I’m not doing a good job making it (or at least not to some audiences).

@anon61221983

That is the problem, some people DO believe that, even if they wouldn’t put it exactly in those terms.

They sure do, and they mostly wouldn’t put it in those terms, and so my rhetorical strategy is to put it in those terms. On this forum they are either avoiding admitting that to us or they are avoiding admitting it to themselves. I’m trying to make it an uncomfortable topic to avoid. If someone’s genuine opinion is making it harder for co-workers who genuinely like each other to date is simply too large a price to pay to saving workers from being raped by their bosses, then they ought to come out and say that from the start and save us all the back-and-forth. I guess I fantasize that every now and then someone genuinely hasn’t thought what they are balancing their opinions against and that they learn something about themselves (something they presumably would want to change).

@anon61221983

I understand the philosopher mindset, but at some point, the rubber has got to meet the road.

Yeah, there’s only so much use I’m ever going to really be. At my root I’m a fear-centered liberal who loves Reason and is more comfortable with fascism than with radical change.

But if the rubber ever really does meet the road I’ll totally watch the kids and cook dinner while the real changemakers are out there bombing things.

[zathras]

@redesigned

Except that wasn’t correct and is not helpful.

I stand by my claim that companies in Austria and Germany do not have the legal right to ban their employees from engaging in relationships. I initially interpreted the McDonald’s policy from the article to be such a policy and I understand that this might not be the case. I still am under the impression that such policies are common in America, even though they are probably not the norm.

I managed to google your reference now, and I’m not convinced. “R198” is not EU legislation, but is in fact ILO recommendation 198, a non-binding recommendation by the international labor organization. R198 just consists of 23 short paragraphs, and it does not mention workplace relationships or company codes of conduct at all.

As for being helpful, nothing is ever helpful in a political debate, except for one’s own opinion. I wanted to contribute the idea to the discussion that this is not just about men vs women, but also about more power or less power for employers to have over employee’s private lives. I thought that pointing out that a country that managed to put a woman at the top at least 15 years before the US considered that kind of rules unacceptable for constitutional reasons might at least be an interesting data point.

[redesigned]

@zathras

I initially interpreted the McDonald’s policy from the article to be such a policy and I understand that this might not be the case. I still am under the impression

@zathras

do not have the legal right to ban their employees from engaging in relationships.

that’s still a pretty HUGE misunderstanding. they have rules that allow the termination of employment if inappropriate behaviour has occurred to protect people from abuse in the workplace. people have multiple paths to relationship even under these rules, like applying for exception and keeping things safely out in the open, or one person transfering to a different role within the company, or working somewhere else, or taking a demotion, or or. it is simply contract law for the purpose of safety. understanding what they are before arguing against them would go a long ways.

@zathras

I stand by my claim that companies in Austria and Germany do not have the legal right to ban their employees from engaging in relationships.

personal claims aside…i wasn’t aware that they were allowed to have laws that supersede those of the EU? Can you please cite the law that forbids this?

It would be a real shame to have laws that block workplace protections. hopefully the people can work to improve this if that is true. yikes.

The OSA laws are different that the ELLN recommendation, funny those both have a similar numbers, i hadn’t caught that. Ironically, both contain sections on workplace relations and the shorter of which is 93 pages, so not sure what you read?

@zathras

As for being helpful, nothing is ever helpful in a political debate, except for one’s own opinion.

thats a low bar. facts are also helpful? considering the impacts on others collectively is helpful? if we inform our opinions then we don’t have to fall back on opinion in debate, no?

when i said not helpful i simply meant that it is arguing against hard won protections for people from sexual predation and assault using some incorrect information. why argue for that? conversely, how is that helpful? what does it achieve?

@zathras

but also about more power or less power for employers to have over employee’s private lives.

these rules aren’t at all about private lives. they are about protecting people in the workplace from exploitation.

@zathras

Austria and Germany…I thought that pointing out that a country that managed to put a woman at the top at least 15 years before the US considered that kind of rules unacceptable for constitutional reasons might at least be an interesting data point.

i’d rather argue points based on their merit and impacts/outcomes, not opinions about which countries have historically been bastions of human rights.

[zathras]

@redesigned

when i said not helpful i simply meant that it is arguing against hard won protections for people from sexual predation and assault using some incorrect information. why argue for that? conversely, how is that helpful? what does it achieve?

That is of course a serious charge, and one that always happens when one doesn’t want to solve a real problem in exactly the same way that America tries to solve it. For my part, I’m arguing for hard won protections against employer overreach. Defining what is and what is not appropriate behaviour between the sexes is parliament’s job, not my employers. And this applies to other things that my employer might want to make rules on, as well.

I’d rather have a general law that says employees have to report relationships with their subordinates or superiors to their companies, than to give individual companies the right to make up the rules. Democracy over plutocracy. I trust company bosses about as far as I can throw them, which is not far at all. Collectively, we can throw our government and our parliamentarians out of office, which is a lot farther, so they get to make up the rules. This is probably just my cultural bias - I was raised in a culture that chose and continues to choose these priorities.

@redesigned

do not have the legal right to ban their employees from engaging in relationships.

that’s still a pretty HUGE misunderstanding.

My original claim refers to company policies that say “employees may not engage in relationships with other employees”. I have meanwhile understood that the policy in question is a different one, but (a) I still had to defend my original claim, and (b) I gather that such blanket policies are not unheard of either. It is a blanket policy of that kind, introduced by Walmart for its German subsidiary, that has been ruled illegal by a German court.
And in order to impose a rule that says “you may not engage in a relationship without disclosing it and officially applying for an ‘exception’”, companies have to have the right to make rules on the subject in the first place.
So like it or not, the blanket bans are also part of the conversation, but I understand that the rules in question here are far more nuanced.
I don’t know if a “code of conduct” that requires employees to report their relationships would be enforceable. Transferring people within a company in order to avoid direct subordinate-supervisor relationships is considered common sense. Cultural differences make it less likely for there to be formal “code of conduct” on the matter, but that’s just a matter of style. What would definitely not be possible is to tell an employee to end a relationship or be dismissed, unless there have been other problems (suspicion of harassment or, conversely, of favorable treatment).

But even in the absence of a reporting rule, I trust that if it is in the interest of either partner, the relationship will quickly become known throughout the company. I’d much rather spend effort further strengthening the protections against wrongful dismissal of the lower-ranked partner in the relationship than make formal rules forcing them to make it public. The latter still means giving companies the right to force employees to disclose their love life.
Are gay relationships exempt from the reporting rule, or are gay couples forced to out themselves? Or is everyone so woke that no gay person would have a problem with that any more? What gives my employer the right to decide what the appropriate rule is in this case?

@redesigned

these rules aren’t at all about private lives. they are about protecting people in the workplace from exploitation.

That is their purpose, but they are about private relationships between those people in the workplace. They regulate things that are part of private lives in the sense that the term has been used in employment law related matters around here. Private lives happen, in part, at the workplace.

@redesigned

they have rules that allow the termination of employment if inappropriate behaviour has occurred to protect people from abuse in the workplace.

Why do you need rules for that? Companies are allowed to fire criminals even in “socialist” ( ) Europe.

@redesigned

personal claims aside…i wasn’t aware that they were allowed to have laws that supersede those of the EU? Can you please cite the law that forbids this?

Sorry, I cannot (quickly) find the relevant local laws. What I have is countless “how to deal with workplace romance” articles on the net, some of them written by organisations that routinely provide legal advice to employees (the one I linked to in my initial post), that agree that “bans on workplace relationships such as are common in America” (their claim) are illegal/unenforceable here in Austria/Germany (depending on where the article happens to be from).

In general, the EU doesn’t (usually) have laws, but directives, which state that member states have to enact legislation along certain lines. And the local legislation is then subordinate to the local constitution. If the local legislation fails to follow the intent of the EU directive, the EU commission sues the country responsible.

I seem to be singularly unsuccessful at following your references. All the links you have provided seem to have been about “providing workplace protections” but not about what kind of measures would be allowed to achieve that goal, and all the non-link references led me into google void. Do you have a name and year for the directive in question?
Googling for OSH (occupational safety and health) directives led me to a wiki with a list of directives considered to be OSH directives, and none of them are about safety from harassment.

@redesigned

It would be a real shame to have laws that block workplace protections. hopefully the people can work to improve this if that is true. yikes.

It would be a real shame to have companies, and therefore, the rich people that own them, make up the rules that govern our private lives. Hopefully the people in America can work to improve this if that is true. Yikes.

There are other, hypothetical workplace protections that are blocked by laws. For example, you could have a single-gender hiring policy. In a company consisting of 100% men or 100% women, there would be a lot less sexual harassment, but yet we probably agree that laws prohibiting companies from picking their employees by gender are in general a good thing.

@redesigned

i’d rather argue points based on their merit and impacts/outcomes, not opinions about which countries have historically been bastions of human rights.

Of course. But whenever a measure intended to achieve a good thing is proposed, anyone who argues against the measure is immediately suspected of arguing against the good thing (“unhelpful”). Pointing out that another country has a decent record on said “good thing” while still doing things differently seemed worth a try.

[redesigned]

@zathras

just my cultural bias - I was raised in a culture that chose and continues to choose these priorities.

@zathras

one that always happens when one doesn’t want to solve a real problem in exactly the same way that America tries to solve it.

You are literally arguing against the official EU recommendations.

@zathras

Defining what is and what is not appropriate behaviour between the sexes is parliament’s job, not my employers.

Sexual harassment and pressure isn’t just between “the sexes”. this is only about power under/over situations, gender and orientation regardless.

@zathras

That is their purpose

It really isn’t. smdh. protection rules weren’t secretly crafted to get us and control our personal lives.

@zathras

I’d rather have a general law that says employees have to report relationships with their subordinates or superiors to their companies

okay.

opinions noted.

[tuhu]

There are a lot of protections in Europe for not firing people based on a consensual relationship.

It’s not illegal to require people disclose their relationships.

European companies can have relationship guidelines that call for this.

Liam Grime, an employment law and HR consultant at The ELAS Group, agrees, adding that employers are entitled to take precautions to ensure workplace relationships don’t negatively impact the business.

“Employers may want to introduce a Personal Relationships at Work policy to inform employees of the balance between their rights to a private life and the company’s rights to protect its interest,” Grime says.

"Employers may want to include a guideline in their policy that requires management be informed of any close personal relationships between employees so that they can review the situation in relation to possible interference with their work.”

While imposing a complete ban on relationships between colleagues may seem unfair, Kate Palmer, associate director of advisory at global employment law consultancy, Peninsula, explains that it is not illegal.

“This is not unlawful but can be challenging to enforce in practical terms and could, in extreme circumstances, be seen as an infringement of an employee’s human rights.”]

Everything you need to know before engaging in a workplace relationship

[redesigned]

When I had to look them up earlier, these workplace disclosure protections are some of the officially recommended ones by the EU. Makes sense there would also be stricter laws protecting termination as well.

whether or not someone can be fired over it, or whether firing intersects with another protection, certainly is a discussion, and an interesting one. I appreciate the clarity, that delineation likely bridges much of the above commenters concerns and my own. Nicely done.

[zathras]

@redesigned

You are literally arguing against the official EU recommendations.

I haven’t found any that match your claims… I am arguing against alleged EU recommendations. Do you have a link now that does not lead to the ILO instead and actually talks about what kinds of rules employers are allowed to make about relationships?

@redesigned

That is their purpose

It really isn’t. smdh. protection rules weren’t secretly crafted to get us and control our personal lives.

You misunderstand me. I was agreeing that their purpose is to protect people from harassment. I was trying to distinguish their purpose from their method. They achieve their purpose by making rules concerning a part of employees personal lives. Interference with personal lives is not their purpose, but the method that is used to achieve that purpose.

@tuhu

While imposing a complete ban on relationships between colleagues may seem unfair, Kate Palmer, associate director of advisory at global employment law consultancy, Peninsula, explains that it is not illegal.

… not illegal, in Britain. A German court has left no doubt that it is illegal in Germany. And it hasn’t been tried in Austria, though our courts and laws tend to be closer to the German ones than to the British ones, and our lawyers seem to be working on the assumption that the decision would be the same as in Germany.

Once again, British laws and traditions seem to fall about halfway between continental Europe and America.

And I just found another reference about the situation in Germany, written by a German law firm specializing in employment law:

Liebe am Arbeitsplatz - Was muss man beachten und der Chef wissen

I quote from the Google-translated version:

Basically, one’s own love life is an absolute private matter - even if the relationship is started at the workplace. So the boss does not have to know.

But now there are employers who are openly against relationships among colleagues or want to be informed immediately about any relationships. Such requirements or even prohibitions are in any case ineffective.

(not sure if “ineffective” is the correct translation, maybe “null and void” is better).

[tuhu]

You’re not making your case about disclosure.

The article you link to does not say that workplace guidelines about disclosure are illegal, which is the same in other parts of the EU. In fact, you’re only indicating that companies currently have those guidelines, not that they’re impossible.

It’s your claim, and you haven’t pointed to anything that says guidelines that ask for the disclosure of supervisor-supervisee relationships are illegal.

[zathras]

@tuhu

It’s your claim, and you haven’t pointed to anything that says guidelines that ask for the disclosure of supervisor-supervisee relationships are illegal.

Wait, it’s right there in the last paragraph I quoted. Those German lawyers claim that guidelines that require disclosure are just as illegal in Germany as guidelines that forbid relationships. Or, to be exact, “unwirksam”, which means that a company can write the guidelines down, but the employee has the right to ignore them…
For supervisor-supervisee relationships. those same lawyers even recommend keeping them secret at first, and then disclosing them for ethical reasons (not because of any legal requirement) when they have become long-term.

[tuhu]

I recognise that you’re communicating in a second language, but arguing that a company can write these guidelines down is not lock solid proof that these guidelines are illegal.

I also posted an HR advisor who said these guidelines are possible but can be hard to enforce. You handwaved that away because it was in English, so you assumed it wasn’t for anybody but the UK, but it’s the same conclusion that you’ve provided.

[zathras]

@tuhu

but it’s the same conclusion that you’ve provided.

Sorry, not following

@tuhu

I recognise that you’re communicating in a second language, but arguing that a company can write these guidelines down is not lock solid proof that these guidelines are illegal.

Well, I’m drawing my conclusions in my first language, from sources in my first language, from sources whose credibility I feel capable of judging within the context of my own culture.
But I’m posting Google-translated snippets which are apparently no longer as blindingly, obviously clear, and having just read the first-language version before reading the Google-translated version, it becomes very hard to judge whether the meaning gets lost/distorted/unclear in some places.

I swear that the links I posted in this discussion, when read in the German original, leave no doubt that any rules employers want to make about relationships between employees and/or disclosure of such relationships, are considered illegal in both Germany and Austria (by people who ought to know, even though not everything has been actually tested in court, because such rules are uncommon here).

I have, despite sincere efforts at googling for it, not found any German-language source that disagrees.

Also, I live here. I might not know the law by heart, but I have a reasonable grasp of what is considered appropriate here and what isn’t. I wrote a short post that basically said “this is the situation over here”, and I really never expected anyone to just not believe me while just citing foreign sources for their disbelief.

I did expect discussion about whether the different approaches are good or bad, but unfortunately, we hardly got around to that. But for the discussion we managed to have, thank you .