The Fair Work Commission has found that a senior manager who held a position “which required a high degree of honesty and personal integrity” was guilty of misconduct in failing to inform his supervisor that had entered into a romantic and physical relationship with subordinate who he managed, contrary to an express policy of the employer requiring employees to disclose all conflicts of interest and also for dishonesty in lying about the relationship.
According to Hamberger SDP “Employers cannot stop their employees forming romantic relationships. However, in certain circumstances, such relationships have the potential to create conflicts of interest. This is most obviously the case where a manager forms a romantic relationship with a subordinate – especially where the manager directly supervises the subordinate. It is virtually impossible in such circumstances to avoid – at the very least – the perception that the manager will favour the subordinate with whom they are in a romantic relationship when it comes to issues such as performance appraisals, the allocation of work, and promotional opportunities.
Mihalopoulos v Westpac Banking Corporation (2015) FWC 2087 delivered 15 May 2015