Sherin*, 28, is no stranger to a workplace romance. In her last job, which she left earlier this year, she dated three coworkers — one casually and two more seriously — one of whom she’s still in a relationship with. “It was common for people to date and hook up,” she says. “With long hours and intense deadlines, we’d often get to know the people on our team very well and quickly. It was also a massive company, so there were so many people to meet. It became an inside joke with close work friends that Friday night at the pub would be an opportunity for me to find a new boyfriend.”
Although it doesn’t feel like it — what with the dominance of dating apps, rise of remote working, and after-work drinks in decline — the workplace romance appears to be alive and well. When digging into the topic for this piece, it turns out people are hooking up with colleagues left, right, and centre; consequences be damned.
And yet, nobody seems to be talking about it. Most of the complaints we hear about dating on social media tend to relate to app woes or the difficulty meeting anyone IRL, and when someone does post about fancying or hooking up with a colleague, you’ll find the comment section flooded with variations of, ‘Never shit where you eat!!’. This hesitation, or even antipathy, towards workplace romances could be a uniquely Gen Z phenomenon. Although they’ve always been taboo (which is — duh! — part of the fun), with 75% of workers keeping theirs a secret, a 2025 survey shows that they’re particularly looked down upon by younger people. As per dating app happn, 32% of Gen Z actively disapprove of workplace relationships, citing concerns over professionalism, productivity, and career impact.
This condemnation likely stems, at least in part, from the MeToo movement, which shone a light on the prevalence of workplace sexual harassment and abusive dynamics, and led to much-needed policy changes, emboldening workers to speak up when colleagues and managers acted inappropriately. “Workplace romances are now subject to greater scrutiny,” agrees Chantal Gautier, sexologist and senior lecturer in organisational psychology at the University of Westminster, “and employees are expected to exercise greater discretion and caution when pursuing romantic relationships with their colleagues.”
Even if they’re engaging in workplace romances, the issue is much thornier now than it once was, which could be why younger employees are so quick to disavow, or be more subtle about, them. Openly hooking up with someone at work — consensually and devoid of power imbalances — could cause more trouble than it’s worth if you have to sign a ‘love contract’ (more on that later) or talk to HR about it, before the two of you have even had the ‘what are we?’ conversation. Jobs are also just harder for young people to come by these days; is it really worth risking stable employment for love (bleak, we know), or, er, a fling?
And yet, despite all this, recent statistics suggest that two in three UK workers are open to the idea of dating a coworker, while between 25% and 66% of people have actually done it. Workplace romances did, unsurprisingly, given the WFH circumstances, take a hit during the pandemic, with 47% fewer people in the UK finding love at work between 2020 and 2021. But those committed to the cause, like Sherin, were never really deterred. In fact, Sherin’s three romances span pre, mid, and post-pandemic.
Everyone's clicking on...
Whether you love them or hate them, then, workplace romances can seemingly endure even the biggest global disasters and cultural transformations. So, what’s the state of them today? Against the backdrop of a so-called ‘sex recession’ and the general sense of depressing doom that surrounds our love lives today, is workplace romance actually the answer to all our dating woes? And, this Christmas party season, should you shoot your shot with your work crush?
The enduring allure of the work crush
First thing’s first, why have we historically been so hot for our coworkers? “Many of the basic ingredients for attraction exist in the workplace,” says Amy Nicole Baker, a psychologist and professor at the University of New Haven who’s studied workplace romances. “We’re attracted to people who are familiar to us; we grow to like people we see every day. We’re attracted to people who are similar to us — and people in a workplace often share expertise, education, and training. We’re also often attracted to people who share our values; people who enter a particular profession [tend to] think the same things are important.”
Essentially: work is the perfect petri dish for connections to grow. For 32-year-old Valerie*, for instance, regular restaurant shifts with a colleague last year led to the two of them bonding more than they ever would have in a non-work setting. So much so that they both ended the relationships they were in for each other. “It’s easy to develop intense feelings for someone very quickly,” she says. “When you spend so much time together, it can feel like you know them so well. Being around someone like that can intensify feelings of intimacy before you’ve actually reached that deeper stage of intimacy. You’ve got a shared world, purpose, and language that other people don’t necessarily get, and it connects you. But it’s ripe for fantasy because you build this rapport, understanding, and attachment [without really knowing them outside of a work context].”
This can be particularly true in hospitality work, where long, often ‘antisocial’ hours and, especially in bar and restaurant work, a thriving after-work drinking culture unaffected by remote working mean colleagues tend to spend an inordinate amount of time together. “Within the industry, people hook up all the time,” says Valerie. “It’s not necessarily seen as a big deal.”
It’s also just exciting to have a work crush. God knows most of us would rather be anywhere else than at our jobs, so having someone to flirt with at work can often help make the time we have to spend there more fun. In fact, Gautier says that workplace romances can actually be good for job satisfaction and morale. “Employees who feel happy and fulfilled are likely to be more engaged and motivated at work,” she explains. “Employees in a relationship with a coworker may also feel more committed to their job, which can increase productivity.”
Remote or hybrid working doesn’t seem to have dampened this excitement, either. In fact, suggests Gautier, it might have even enhanced it. “Remote work can create a more relaxed and informal environment, and colleagues may feel more comfortable expressing their romantic interest in a colleague over a video call or instant message than in person,” she says. “It also allows people to connect with colleagues from various departments that they may not have had the opportunity to meet previously, thus expanding their dating pool.”
Interestingly, this might have contributed to the overarching perception that workplace romances are dead. “Remote working has reduced the opportunities for more spontaneous connections — in-office socialising, proximity, reading chemistry in real-time — so perhaps workplace romances are less visible (or more hidden) and more intentional,” adds Gautier.
There’s another reason why workers might not want to be too open about their relationships at work: the rise of companies requiring employees to disclose romantic relationships with colleagues to their superiors. In the US, these have been dubbed ‘love contracts’, which Gautier describes as “written rules and policies which the partners agree to, affirming that the relationship is consensual and voluntary”. In the UK, they tend to be known by the less-intriguing title: ‘relationships at work’ policies. “Love contracts are not only designed to protect [coworkers in relationships, including when they break up], from dismissal, demotion, or transfer, but also the organisation from being sued for sexual harassment.”
This may be so, but a contract for ‘love’ — and one that might need to be enforced on even the most casual of relationships — feels awkward and dystopian. As Gautier puts it: “When relationships are mutually agreeable and consensual, this begs the question: who ultimately has the power to decide who (or who not) we should be candoodling with?” Besides, how would ‘love contracts’ work in the absence of an office? How can employees monitor romantic activity online — and, importantly, should they?
“Some of our communication [with colleagues] is through our personal devices now, which isn’t subject to organisational oversight,” adds Baker. “So, in a way, communication is actually more private today. You could be in a Zoom meeting while texting funny and flirty jokes to a coworker, and no one else would ever know [nor find out].”
Under pressure
Ofc, there are other downsides to workplace romances that might lead younger people to avoid them or, at least, keep schtum about them. “People knew about my crush right from the beginning,” says Valerie of the coworker she left her ex for, “and so when it developed into something, there was no keeping it a secret. That put a lot of pressure on the relationship [in its very early stages], with people making jokes about us seeing each other.” Valerie says the stress of trying to remain professional while being observed by colleagues, all alongside trying to navigate a new relationship amidst both of their break-ups, eventually led to it all blowing up. “When it ended, it was a hot topic at work. Then we had to make the transition from seeing each other to being just coworkers again. It was really complicated.”
Although Sherin, who works in the film industry, says she doesn’t regret any of her workplace romances, she does admit: “If I had any regrets about dating people at work, I’d say it’s being so vocal about it when I was starting out at the company. As open as my workplace was, there’s still a certain reputation you could get.” While one of Sherin’s romances blossomed when the pair worked on a project together — “we were very flirty during office hours,” she recalls, “much to the disgust of our colleagues at the time I’m sure” — her other relationships formed at after-work drinks.
Unlike Valerie, though, Sherin kind of got away with the break-ups. “Break-ups at work can be awkward, but I’ve been lucky that they usually swiftly leave the company after we end things,” she says, adding that with one ex, they spoke so little to each other during the working day when they were together, that after they broke up, “we continued not to say a word to each other. So much so that I had no idea he’d handed in his notice and subsequently left the company”. (Admittedly, Sherin’s exes leaving the company so soon does play into the stereotype that workplace romances are a bit of a nightmare…)
At a time when more and more of us are afraid of being vulnerable with one another, owing to our collective fear of embarrassment, hurt, and difficult conversations, the risk of workplace romances often outweighs the positives. For a generation who grew up meeting people and having their relationships mediated through a screen, it can be terrifying to navigate the ups and downs of a romance in a place where the person causing the ups and downs — under the ever-watchful eyes of your gossip-loving coworkers — is inescapable.
But, as much as we might try to avoid it, the workplace romance will probably one day come for us all. For what it’s worth, one 25-year-old woman I spoke to said her friends are always hooking up with people they work with these days — and, if you ask me, that’s no bad thing (as long as it’s a genuine, safe, and mutual attraction). We could all do with putting ourselves out there a bit more, even if it means we make a few mistakes along the way. And even if it all eventually blows up on company time, because, cheesy as it is to say, there’s nothing more invigorating than fancying someone.
As Valerie concludes: “Obviously you don’t think about the potential consequences when you’re going into something because you’re so focused on the fact that you just really like someone. And that’s how it should be. Having a work crush keeps things interesting.”
*Names have been changed
