Inspy Romance

Inspy Romance—Fall in Love With a Good Book

Romance in the Workplace + Giveaway

by

Romance in the Workplace

Do you work outside the home? It’s been a while since I had an office-based job. I’ve been a stay-at-home mother now for far longer than I was a single, working woman. But for over a decade, I worked long hours in a professional role and my career was a huge part of my life.

Corporate settings are rife with rivalries. Money and livelihoods are at stake and, along with the constant pressure of deadlines and performance targets, people at work often have to deal with giant egos and navigate the minefield of office politics. Throw in the complication of colleagues dating each other, breaking up with each other, and romantically pursuing each other, and you have a delicious stew of conflict out of which many gripping stories can spring.

I love reading a good workplace romance because there is so much that can go wrong as well as right. We see real life office love affairs play out all the time. One of my best friends married our boss. They were both Christians and carried on their courtship in a dignified and above board way. But many other pairings did not fare as well, leading to messy splits that fueled gossip around the water cooler.

I’ve written one workplace romance so far. The story idea came as I thought about what might happen if the boss’s daughter were given a job ahead of somebody who “deserved” it more than she did, and what the fallout would be, especially when they develop romantic feelings for each other.

Lessons Learned in Love by Milla HoltLessons Learned in Love is about a young woman who is parachuted into a high-level managerial role in her father’s company. She struggles with insecurities that come from people assuming she owes all her success to her family name. Her immediate subordinate, the man who expected to get the job, worked his way up from a humble background and has never been handed anything. When he misses out on a promotion, he’s got his new boss pegged as a spoiled princess but will eventually learn to look beyond the surface.

In this story, I wanted to explore issues of entitlement, privilege, merit, and prejudice, all of which work both ways.

A Giveaway

To celebrate InspyRomance’s birthday month, I’m giving away two electronic copies of my workplace romance, Lessons Learned in Love, to two randomly chosen commenters.

I want your thoughts on love in the workplace. Have you seen it work? Have you seen it go badly wrong?

Milla Holt (26 Posts)

I write fiction that reflects my Christian faith. I love happy endings, heroes and heroines who discover sometimes hard but always vital truths, and stories that uplift and encourage. My family and I live in the east of England where we enjoy rambling in the countryside, reading good books and making up silly lyrics to our favorite songs.


Welcome to the community at Inspy Romance! The authors are delighted to see you. Jump in with comments, and let’s get to know each other!

Comments

  1. Your story sounds great!! My workplaces were always pretty small, and there wasn’t any scope for workplace romances. I do like a good workplace romance story. Elizabeth Maddrey’s So You Want to be a Billionaire stories were all about it!

    • Thanks for your comment, Margaret! In the two jobs I had with small workforces (fewer than ten people) romance didn’t bloom in the office, either. Elizabeth’s billionaire series is one I’ve been longing to get into once I clear my current round of reading commitments.

  2. Hi Milla! I have been retired for 10 years, so I am out of touch with the work place. Before that I taught school for 20 years and we had few work place romances. Most of the younger teachers were married when they started teaching. In the 1970s I worked corporate as an assistant buyer, but once again most colleagues were already married. I enjoyed reading Elizabeth Maddrey’s Billionaire series, because of the contest and need to collaborate rather than the work place romance. Never was one for workplace romance drama. Dealt enough with high school students romance drama. Snowy cold Mid Winter Break in Michigan. Monday is Presidents’ Day – remembering Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. Stay warm, safe, and healthy. Best wishes.

    • Thanks for your reply, Renate! For sure, drama comes with the territory when a big bunch of teens are thrown together. No snow here in the south of England, but the wind is wreaking havoc. I’m very glad I don’t have to be anywhere but home today.

  5. oh but this is a fun post that sends the imagination flying. LOL no I have not really had the pleasure of working where love was found and lost. While in high school mom worked in a hairdresser place. I got to help a little and keep the owners daughter happy. When I found out she started to learn piano, I could help a lot there. Then I went to work for my father who had his own company and there were not many people in the office. And dad didnt settle for any shenagins in the office. Then I got married and was a stay at home mom. The best job in the world.

  6. Most offices romances I know of have failed in the long run. And most companies I worked for didn’t allow dating amount their workers. A lot of times this can lead to favoritism.

    • Yes, dating in the workplace can lead to all sorts of complications! No wonder many companies decide to ban it completely. I’ve seen it lead to long, successful marriages a couple of times.

  7. Oh, wow, have I seen office romances! In one office I worked in, a supervisor was married (for less than a year!) to a woman who worked under him, and while they were married, he was having an affair with another woman who worked in a different office but in the same building! He ended up divorcing the one he was married to and married the other, and they’re still married now, going on about 30 years. I know of another couple, both were single, who met and married at work, too. I’ve known of others over the years, though most didn’t work out, a few did.

  8. I haven’t entered the job market yet and my parents got married before they were both working (my mom had a job before but they were only women there).
    But I know something fun! When my mother was a girl she attended a Catholic school with nuns and priests, one of the novices fell in love with the young priest, then they got married and as far as I know they stayed together… now they must be about the same age as my grandparents.
    I think it counts as “workplace romance” hehehe ah! and my dad’s secretary has a husband named Jesús, it’s really funny when christmas comes around and someone sees messages like “you need jesus for christmas” my dad often jokes that her husband must be really funny at parties if even magazines they say that lol

    • Wow, that’s quite a story about the nun and the priest. My writer’s brain is ticking away speculating about that one. And hilarious about your dad’s secretary’s husband’s name.

  9. They are only nice to read not watch it in real life. Please do not include me in the giveaway. I have the book already.

  10. I honestly don’t know since I haven’t seen it gone either way. But I guess that’s why I prefer to read about it anyway: it usually features my favorite trope, enemies to lovers, and the HEA is guaranteed. :)
    PS: not entering since I already own a copy of your book.

  11. I enjoy reading workplace romances but I think in real life they rarely work out well. It seems like there’s to much pressures and competition when you work together to have a good relationship.

  13. Sounds like a great book I enjoy reading workplace romances but don’t think it would last for long in real life.I never have had a real job yet cause after my grandma passed away suddenly on March 24 2020 at the age of 90 I started being a caregiver for my 94 year old grandpa he was 92 when I started taking care of him it’s only people from family and 2 ladies/girls that our family knows that take care of him so no romances involved.

  14. I have had two workplace romances that never worked out. Do you think I learned from the first one?? No way, lol! Well, technically I only count one because when I was 19 and working at McD’s, I had a HUGE crush on my manager that I thought was reciprocal. He flirted with me just as much as I flirted with him…so therefore I thought he felt the same as I did. Granted, there was about a 20 year difference in age (he was 30) but that didn’t seem to matter. I was crushed when he didn’t return the affection & basically turned me down every time I asked to have a date with him (movie or dinner). He even invited to his house to watch a movie, but nothing developed…much to my chagrin & not for a lack of not so subtle hints from me. My young heart was devastated. I felt very hurt because he had flirted with me so I didn’t understand why he would do that if he didn’t really feel the same? Looking back at it this many years past, I can see where, in the long run, it saved me even more grief if we had indeed dated and it not worked out.

    Second one (didn’t learn the first time I guess), I did date a coworker for quite a few months. I eventually broke up with him & it made it very awkward to work with him afterwards. I had realized that maybe he really wasn’t that good for me. Then come to find out, it was rumored he had been cheating on me. Thank goodness a year or so after all that, God brought me my husband!

    I haven’t seen too many work romances that actually pan out. I think it would make the relationship harder because they would need to be professionals and not let the romance be visible (public kisses, flirting, and the such). And most places frown on office romances for this very reason.

    My husband’s job is this way. But if there is a couple (married or not), they have to work different shifts or different departments to avoid problems.

    • Wow, you really went through the wringer, Trixi! I, too, have a long tale of unrequited love. But looking back, God was protecting me from that man! His plans are always best.

      I know one couple who stayed working together for a couple of decades until one of them retired. In another of the couples who met at work, both eventually left for different jobs. And the third couple, one of the partners sadly died four years into their marriage. There were many more partners who didn’t go the distance.

  16. Work place romance isn’t one of my favorite story tropes, however I have found some books featuring it that I actually really enjoyed, one of those was Love and Chocolate by Tara Grace Ericson! Such a fun story!

    • Thanks for commenting, Caitlyn. I love Tara’s books! Some of her Bloom Sisters books have love interests working together. She does it really well!

      • That’s awesome! Hoping for Hawthorne is the only other book of Tara’s I’ve read so far. I really enjoyed it as well, and I am super excited to read the rest of the Bloom Sisters series! Sibling series are my fave! 😊

  17. I have seen it work but it sure made it awkward for the rest of us and I would not recommend it if there are less than 30 people in the business.

    • For sure, the numbers make a big difference. Where I’ve seen it work, there were over 200 people in the office, spread over many different departments. And I hear you about the awkwardness. We could no longer grumble about the boss when he was dating and later married to one of us!

  18. Hi, when I used to work in an office, there wasn’t any romance there amongst workers. Your book sounds like a great read, Have a great weekend and stay safe. I am not entering this ebook giveaway as I am not tech savvy at all so I don’t read ebooks at all. Thank you anyways.

    • Thanks for your comment, Alicia. I started reading ebooks when we lived in a tiny town in Norway far north of the Arctic Circle. Although the library was well-stocked, it wasn’t easy to get hold of Christian fiction and international shipping costs were crazy, so ebooks were a blessing!

  19. I work in a small office with mostly women. There isn’t any romance going on, but your book sounds interesting!!

  20. I worked in an office that the office manager was dating the owner while they were both still married. It was a complicated issue. On top of that the office manager was out most of the time due to headaches, but he made sure she continued to get paid. In the long run, they did get married in a very large wedding and reception. The last I had heard, they are still together. Thank you for sharing. God bless you.

  22. I worked with my husband in my last workplace & it worked great. It was never better & loved seeing him as much as possible in my office.

    • That sounds really wonderful, Amy. When my husband was still my boyfriend, he helped me out with a work issue and seeing his amazing brain sort out a problem that had me stumped definitely helped our relationship! Thanks for your comment.

  23. I work where my wife can come with me to work & I enjoy her help & being with me. I also use to work as a couples position where I worked as a maintenaince person & she was in the office & we always saw each other & it was great.

  24. Im late had an interested day. (out of rain water and getting the gutters cleaned which explains why no water was going in the tank). (have enough drinking water for about 4 days but will get more at church tomorrow.)
    I did cleaning and other jobs outside the house but it was often on my own so no business dynamics.
    The book sounds interesting as I do know of places where a bosses family got the job because of who they are and in some cases it wasn’t a good outcome. Our town has places where its often not what you know who you know for some jobs which is hard when you are not from a well to do family or don’t have the relatives etc to put in a good word.
    Of course then there is the reverse where a bosses daughter, son may be the best person for the job but don’t get it incase it looks like favoritism.

    • Wow, I hope you get the water issues sorted, Jenny. Favoritism is such a tricky issue, isn’t it? I once worked in a place which was a family business, so it was expected that the boss’s sons and their wives would hold key positions. But it’s different when it’s a public company and the boss can’t just play favourites.

  25. I was an elementary school teacher and our staff was predominantly female. All of the men on staff were married or in a long-term relationship, so I didn’t see romantic relationships blossom among our staff firsthand.

    But I do think it creates an interesting dynamic for books since the characters have to see each other everyday at work.

    • Thanks for your comment, Akemi. Absolutely; work has its own tensions, and when romance and/or unrequited love are involved, it can make for a lot of additional stress.

  26. Office romances can absolutely go either way. I can only think of one offhand and it was messy and hurtful because there was infidelity involved—that’s a downside. But when my hubby and I got married, we worked at the same office and it was lovely! We got to commute together, have lunch together, and occasionally see each other passing by. I loved that extra time with him, especially as we were leading up to our wedding and as newlyweds. I feel like if we had met in the workplace, we would have been a success story, as we’re celebrating our 17th anniversary this year!

  28. I work in a hospital in housekeeping. I have seen nurses and police officers falling in love at work. Or nurses and other co.workers falling in love.
    Thank you for sharing. The book sounds very interesting.

    • Thanks for your comment, Tracy! I read a very good book a few months ago about a nurse and a police officer falling in love. It was one of my favourite reads of the year.

  29. Milla–the books sounds great! I’m in an office environment everyday, I’m married, and glad I am!! :) We do have a lot of couples that work here together and I admire that they can do that. Not sure I could work with my husband.

  30. For reading I’ve found that I don’t love workplace romances however in shows or movies I do. I don’t know why that is but I haven’t liked books as much as movies or shows with the trope!

%d bloggers like this: