Boeing ouster shows a tryst on job can be a risky affair

Boeing Co.'s ouster yesterday of its chief executive after learning of his extramarital affair with a female executive sent a warning to anyone involved in garden-variety office romance: Even consensual relationships can spell trouble if employees' desires conflict with management's goals.

The board asked 68-year-old chief executive Harry Stonecipher to resign due to circumstances arising from his relationship with an unnamed executive, circumstances that violated the company's ethical code of conduct, said chairman Lew Platt.

''The facts reflected poorly on Harry's judgment and would impair his ability to lead the company," Platt said in a statement.

Boeing would not elaborate, but the in-house dalliance was clearly an embarrassment for the Chicago aerospace giant that had installed Stonecipher in December 2003 to erase the tainted reputation of his predecessor, Phil Condit. Under Condit, two Boeing executives were charged with obtaining trade secrets from competitor Lockheed Martin, which led the US Air Force to temporarily suspend Boeing from some contract work.

Companies adopted a raft of sexual harassment policies in the decade after Anita Hill testified against her then-boss Clarence Thomas, accusing him of making lewd remarks while they worked together at the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Thomas, now a US Supreme Court justice, has denied the charges.

But the rules today remain murky for consensual relationships. Employees who engage in office romances may be taking a risk, particularly if the relationship involves someone they work with closely or -- as Boeing's board deemed -- if it causes conflicts with a company's code of conduct for employees.

Office romance ''creates issues," said Chicago employer lawyer Ronald Schwartz. ''It's as much of a sociological and a business matter as it is a matter of law. It is more complicated."

High-profile workplace trysts in recent years have made headlines, whether it's CBS Early Show anchor Julie Chen's marriage in December to CBS chairman Leslie Moonves or former New Jersey Governor James McGreevey's resignation after disclosing a homosexual affair with his security aide.

Serious relationships can often lead to marriage. But sexual harassment exposes an employer to legal liability. W.R. Grace in 1995 forced out CEO J.P. Buldoc for alleged sexual harassment, which he denied. Last fall, a Fox News producer sued her boss, Bill O'Reilly, saying that he sexually harassed her, and he said she tried to extort $60 million from him.

Nineteen percent of US employers have policies governing office romances, according to the Society for Human Resource Professionals. Such policies are part of codes of conduct, which have become more common at publicly traded companies like Boeing. Now the Securities and Exchange Commission and US stock exchanges require a code of conduct be adopted to protect shareholders from abuses.

Kirk Jordan, vice president of Integrity Interactive Corp., which provides Web-based ethics and compliance training to Fortune 500 employees, said Stonecipher's behavior specifically violated Boeing's policy, which states an employee may not engage in behavior that may ''cause embarrassment to the company."

If Stonecipher, who was ''brought in to talk about Boeing's conduct and ethical program, was having an affair with a colleague," the board ''thought that would be embarrassing," Jordan said.

While most employers do not ban romances among employees, they watch them closely, human resources executives said. That's because employees in romantic relationships may behave in ways that their employers deem are in conflict with the requirements of their job -- and risk a sexual harassment claim if a relationship sours.

''The biggest issue is when someone's personal life affects their ability to perform their job," said Rebecca Hastings, the Society for Human Resource Professionals information manager.

Sears, Roebuck & Co. has a corporate policy, said spokesman Chris Brathwaite, that seeks ''to prevent anyone in a personal relationship from working in a subordinate role, even if the relationship is voluntary and welcome."

There is room for in-house dating or marriage, he said. If the company is notified of a serious relationship, Sears may ''reassign the manager or assign another supervisor to a subordinate" to prevent potential problems, he said. Typically, he said, Sears makes changes ''at the management level. We try to have as little impact on the subordinate as possible."

There is no explicit policy governing romance at Partners HealthCare System, which employs 40,000 at Massachusetts General Hospital and other Boston-area hospitals and affiliates, said Susan Gormley, director of employee relations.

''Your personal life sometimes blurs with your professional life, and you're at the same events, and things happen," she said. But she warned that ''employees need to use good judgment."

Kimberly Blanton can be reached at blanton@globe.com.