CNN exec Zucker's ouster shows peril of hiding work romance

NEW YORK (AP) — For all the potential peril of a workplace romance, the most common source of trouble, experts say, is allowing it to remain a secret.

A case in point was this week’s abrupt ouster of longtime CNN chief executive Jeff Zucker, who said he was ‘’wrong’’ in not being upfront with the network about a consensual relationship he was having with another executive.

Zucker only acknowledged his relationship with CNN chief marketing officer Allison Gollust after being questioned about it during an investigation of now-fired anchor Chris Cuomo. The executive shakeup comes at a pivotal moment for CNN, and prominent employees have expressed dismay that things weren’t handled differently.

“He should have known better,” said David Lewis, CEO of Operations Inc., an HR consulting firm. “He decided to avoid what was a clearly stated policy by his employer. The problem with that is there was no good outcome once he decided not to tell.”

Zucker is hardly alone in finding love at the office. About a third of U.S. workers say they are in a workplace relationship or have been in one — and the trend has been on the rise since the start of the pandemic, according to trade association Society for Human Resource Management.

Most big corporations have a policy on workplace romance, but the majority of U.S. businesses do not, according to SHRM. Corporate policies can vary from forbidding all relationships to just forbidding relationships between managers and subordinates. Some simply require disclosure.

Among smaller businesses, there are rarely rules at all. Nearly 80% of U.S. workers say that their employer does not require them to disclose a workplace romance, according to the most recent data from SHRM.

And that can cause just as much trouble as employees keeping...