Nearly 25% employees find love in their workplace. Among them, Lara and Antoine who fell in love while they were working together.
The place of work is one of the most popular places in terms of dating: more than one in four French people has already fallen in love with their workplace , as revealed by an Opinion Way poll published in October 2015.
Among those employees, Antoine and Lara who were kind enough to share with us the story of their meeting.
Love in the office: "everything depends on the relationship"
What do you think of couples who work together BEFORE you meet?
Lara: Just before we go out together, there were already a couple of couples in our company who did not necessarily hide. It all depends on the relationship we have with the person. It can turn into a nightmare, like being completely invisible to the eyes of other employees.
How did you meet?
Lara: We were working together on a few projects. I was already a couple when I arrived in the company.
Once I was separated, I began to open up to the others, and at a Christmas party, I talked a lot with Antoine. We had a really good time. And we actually went out together 1 month later.
Love in the office: "at first it was exciting to hide"
Tell us the beginnings of the relationship? How to reconcile the first feelings with an office life?
Antoine: We were not the kind to spread out our personal life at work and decided together that we wanted to be the longest hidden. It was almost exciting: the secret lunches, the arrivals to the office offset by 10 min to try to blur the tracks.
But after a few months, as the relationship began to get serious, we got tired of hiding. A lot of people were beginning to know that. And we just started to assume ...
And your colleagues or your hierarchy?
Antoine: The hierarchy does not care too much about this kind of rapprochement. They see it as a personal matter. The colleagues on the other hand were at first amused: a nascent love story at work that is necessarily talking.
From when did you formalize the relationship to the office?
Antoine: After about 3 months.
Love in the office: "you have to know how to keep a certain distance"
How do we build a couple when we see each other every day at the office?
Antoine: We were on different floors, so it happened on certain days that we did not meet at all. Apart from that, we are quite fusional, so it did not bother us to see each other every day. And in work, one must know how to make the difference between the colleague with whom one works, and the lover of the morning and the evening.
Should we divide his professional life more often than not?
Lara: Indeed, having a lover with whom you work every day requires effort: you have to know how to keep a certain distance, and know how to distinguish the moments when you talk to your colleague, lover.
