While I think that the spouses are probably being at least somewhat unreasonable with their discomfort over these potential trips, I think that there might be something to what Disheavel says, too, at least with regards to the OP’s wife’s reaction.
The OP does make it sound like previous such trips (with the former, male paralegal) contained a fair amount of socializing. If we assume that the OP’s wife is aware that the previous trips did include “a few beverages at the local watering hole” (the OP’s phrasing), she may very well assume that trips with the new paralegal would do so, as well, and that (along with what could theoretically happen afterwards) is making her unhappy.
While a business trip like this shouldn’t be a situation where spouses at home should feel automatically feel uncomfortable about it, I can see how an insecure spouse might feel uncomfortable.
…how well do you actually think the OP knows what the spouse of the woman in question *actually *really thinks? How much of the OP’s thought processes are being “projected” onto the woman’s spouse? We don’t know what the woman’s spouse actually thinks. This is all about the OP. He doesn’t need to “solve anybody else’s attitude.” He simply needs to provide a safe work-space that doesn’t discriminate on the basis of gender.
He’s the employer. It’s his problem no matter what.
If visiting prisons on overnight trips is a requirement of the job then the OP needs to explain to his wife and make her understand that she doesn’t get the right to veto the genders of the people he hires. Yes, this may cause problems, and if there is literally no way to come to a mutually agreeable resolution then he needs to restructure the job so that overnight trips aren’t a requirement.
If neither of those options work then you have a real stalemate. Do you let personal preferences dictate gender discrimination in hiring? In a small enough firm that won’t run afoul of hiring laws but in a larger company they would. An unreasonable spouse doesn’t give you a free hand to violate employment laws.
As to the employees spouse; the OP needs to determine what the is required to perform the job. If overnight visits are required then it’s up to the employee to decide if the job is right for them. If accommodations can be made to avoid overnight trips but still perform the tasks those should be offered to any employee.
The first time I went on an overnight business trip with a female coworker was in 1981, and to top it off, I was married and the women weren’t. Somehow (and on all the business trips I’ve taken with women over the years) everyone managed to control their carnal urges. I’m more than a little surprised this is still an issue for anyone.
On the other hand, having “a few beverages at the local watering hole” isn’t a job requirement and the spouses should know that.
My advice for you, the worker going on business trips, is that so long as there are separate rooms, it shouldn’t be a problem. My advice for you, the husband, is to pay out of your own pocket for your wife to come with you on these trips.
Not to be a twerp, but I think my suggestions here could solve the problem in a professional and gender-neutral fashion that also ought to satisfy both spouses. Is there any problem with this solution?
I’m very sure that it would help if you and your paralegal did not talk about work during these get-togethers. Make sure that the conversation includes everyone at all times. Make a point of showing in small ways that it’s you and your spouse who have a special relationship, not you and your coworker.
Excluding some people from a small group conversation is rude under any circumstances. In your circumstance, it’s asking for trouble.
That is how I meant it. Sorry for the confusion, and thanks for the clarification. We have no marital problems now, and while I hope that no serious problems ever arise, they might. And I agree with fillmore above about how human failings can be. I’m not 19 years old and I have been around the block. It is easy to fall into a trap with a casual female acquaintance and when troubles come at home (for either side) and you start talking about it, you get the feeling that he/she “understands” me and is not like the non-understanding person at home. It is playing with fire to a degree. But again, no intentions of cheating at all!
I have given her maximum flexibility up to and including not going. She certainly is not required to drink. Although my office has a strict no-alcohol policy, that is until after 4pm and if nothing is due, then there is booze in the kitchen area. Some days we stay; most days we don’t. Sometimes the spouses will drop by after work and we will order in dinner. As far as these trips go, she can be as dry as the Sahara desert if she wants. Sometimes I am. I do have trouble sleeping in a strange bed, so a couple of drinks helps me relax. I am like George Thorogood, though, I can drink alone.
I’m not sure how the “she pays first and I reimburse her later” idea would help. The objection is not the payment method, but the fact that we are out of town together.
The separate hotel issue has two issues: 1) At about half of these places, the hotel option is limited to one. West Virginia loves to locate its prisons at remote locations, apparently on the theory that if you escape you will immediately be eaten by a bear, 2) The other half are located near cities and we would have options of staying at a different hotel. But even if I booked two rooms at separate hotels, and bring home the receipts, how does that prove to a suspicious spouse that we didn’t fuck in one of those rooms or indeed we did not spend the entire night together in a single room, the booking being a ruse?
As to your third point, she can drive up early. It makes for an extra long really shitty day and that’s why I don’t do it. My policy is that she (and he previously) can do whatever she wants up to and including not going. But she wants to go and enjoys visiting these clients.
I see your point and I think I am socially aware. I’m not saying that these entire conversations are me and the paralegal talking while the spouses look at their cell phones. Your point is well taken, but they ask how our day was and how the “Smith” case is going or the “Jones” case is going. One or both of us respond to the latest outrage the judge handed us or the latest small victory in the case. It is just that we are more animated about it. I’ll consider this more.
From reading letters and comments over at Ask A Manager, sharing hotel rooms during work travel is by no means unusual in certain industries. In my own experience, I’ve shared rooms with bosses, colleagues, even strangers, usually of the same sex but not exclusively. I didn’t mind any of this, because we’re all professional adults, and we were traveling for professional development, trying to stretch our non-profit budgets as far as possible. My husband didn’t mind either, again, same reason: adults. Mature.
I missed this in my response earlier. I agree with your basic premise. That a guy, traditionally, would have trouble with that. Ten years ago I would have had trouble with that, but I have changed my thinking on it.
This is 2018. My wife wants a career and frankly I cannot imagine her being a housewife; she would hate it. She went on a business trip to California last week with several people, but only one from her home office, a gay guy (or so she says. ) But hers is a large and impersonal corporation, and unlike me, she never comes home emotional about her job, nor does it result in freedom or imprisonment. That’s not to denigrate it; I am jealous of that sometimes as at least she doesn’t have nightmares about old cases.
Women today want careers and many times those careers start and/or part of them take place in small businesses. Many times they are in male dominated professions like law. This paralegal loves the law and wants to make it her career. I hired her because a lawyer across town was retiring and laying off his staff. My previous paralegal left because he wanted to go into a different area of law instead of working with “criminals.” So the situation worked out nicely. I honestly did not give the hiring decision one iota of thought that she was a woman. Not one. I didn’t even know when I hired her that she was married; I didn’t care.
Mr. Retiring Lawyer across town told me that I need to hire “this girl.” (his words, not mine) and after interviewing her, I did without hesitation and she has been proven to be excellent at her job. But I digress.
So, if my wife, in pursuit of her career works for a small firm and goes on overnight trips with only her and her boss, I might let some of that old school traditional thought creep into my mind, but after working in this profession for so many years (even hearing female lawyers being called “honey” and “sweety” by other male lawyers) I realize the injustice of it all and I would not do anything to hold back my wife’s career. If she fucks the boss on the business trip, then that is on her to live with and work out the problems with me that caused that.
I don’t think that keeping her, and I hesitate to say prisoner, but confined from certain things about her job will keep her from screwing around if a serious problem arises in our relationship. If I think that my lack of supervision will cause her to fuck her boss, then our marriage has more problems than an overnight business trip.
But I don’t think she will do that at all. I think she will talk to me and if our conversations are at an impasse, then the overnight trip might be a bad idea. Regardless, I am not her master, she is not under coverture, she is free to work at her career because that is what makes her happy. It is not my job to make her my servant and unhappy.
I do, however, appreciate the suggestion because it is one that is still very prevalent in this area as the opinion in deep red WV is not the opinion of the SDMB.
First, the “pay first and get reimbursed later” would work in terms of putting the control in her hands. She wouldn’t need to discuss with you whether to get a hotel with you, wouldn’t need to get permission to drive up the next day; it would formalize her control in a way that could soothe tensions.
But if she really has maximum flexibility, then I think there are three problems remaining:
Her husband’s discomfort. While I understand why you feel affected by that, that part is 100% on her to figure out. Let it go.
Your wife’s discomfort. That’s the part for you to figure out. Or, more realistically, for your wife to figure out. Does she get how unfair it’d be for you to nix these trips for your employee based on her sex? If she gets that, then she ought to make some suggestions of her own that will assuage her discomfort.
The drankin. This seems like an easy one to resolve. Don’t drink with her on these trips. That part isn’t work, it’s socializing, and I can certainly see how it’d look too much like a date to both of your spouses. Getting rid of these after-hours drinks in hotel bars might go a long way toward making both spouses feel better: make it clear that your trips together are strictly, and solely, professional.
This. In my first job, I was denied several opportunities that required travel solely because of my gender. It was a fairly long time ago and my employers were unabashedly honest about it being because of my gender.
After I left that job it never became an issue again, I got lots of travel opportunities at my next job and after that I began working for myself. But I still get touchy about the subject.
If your wife is not perfectly OK with this, then your marriage is in major trouble. Not potential major trouble if you go on the trips, but current and actual major trouble now, retroactively to when she started this kind of bullshit. Or retroactively to when you proved untrustworthy in the past. (If you didn’t prove untrustworthy in the past, then it’s just her bullshit, but that doesn’t let your marriage off the hook, just you personally.)
I agree with you that the spouse issues are something that we have to work on, but to your point #3, I see your point. Much like I can go out and have a beer with Jim the neighbor, the wife doesn’t care, but if I go out and have a beer with Julie the neighbor, then the wife would certainly have a good point about not liking it.
However, and it is amazing that we are seemingly on different sides of this issue given our politics, this is not a date. It is a meeting with co-workers on a business trip. If I don’t have a beer with Julie the neighbor, then everyone still lives happy.
If I would have a beer with a male coworker on a business trip and enjoy the camaraderie and build our understanding with each other, but refrain from doing so with a female coworker, then that puts her at a disadvantage. Perhaps the disadvantage is slight, perhaps it is great. I know I personally would not take intentional punitive action, but perhaps I would do so unconsciously.
For example, on trial prep or reviewing post-conviction cases for truthfulness or actual innocence, we all gauge how a jury would respond based on our own experiences. My last male paralegal was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and took vacations in high school to Europe. He would be an atypical juror and we can both view his judgment through the lens of experience. But there might be rich guys on the jury; should we strike them or keep them?
If I am unable to have these type of conversations with the female coworker (again, not because she chooses not to, but because her husband or my wife won’t let her) then I have less to go on. Suppose after a few drinks (purely fictional) she discloses that she was sexually abused as a child, and the guy we are visiting tomorrow is accused of sexually abusing a child. Isn’t that relevant information that would help the case and the client? Likewise, if she has never been sexually abused, can she sufficiently relate to those women who have?
And this feedback is very important. I can make a decision on whether I think a guy is being truthful, but it is so very easy to get tunnel vision. I think I have the ability to get the pulse of jurors, and sometimes I nail it. But sometimes I have been very wrong, so terribly wrong as to be laughable.
In short, I don’t want to upset my wife or her husband. I don’t want either of them to think that we are doing this as a ruse to have an affair or that one could reasonably happen given the state of our respective relationships. Perhaps if I was severely pissed off at my wife, we would not take one of these trips, or vice versa.
And if we ended up having an affair (which I do not see happening) then that is not the fault of a business trip but because of a personal failing of mine or hers and it could just as easily happen at the office.
This is all spot-on. It’s why it’s workplace discrimination to allow male journalists into athletes’ locker rooms but ban female journalists.
It’s why it’s workplace discrimination to have business meetings at men-only golf clubs.
And you’re exactly right—it definitely hurts the employee who is being discriminated against, but it also robs the employer of the employee’s services.
I’m wondering how much of this is related to the beer and how much is related to the lack of there being a perfect analogy . Using myself and my husband as an example, I would absolutely be upset if my husband made arrangements to leave our house one evening and meet Julie the neighbor for a beer. I’d even get upset if he made those arrangements to meet her for coffee. However, if he and Julie bowled in a league together, I wouldn’t get annoyed if they had a beer in the bar afterwards. If he just went to the local bar and ran into Julie, I wouldn’t care if that sat together and talked. Just like I wouldn’t care if they sat in the breakroom and had coffee together or left the office and had lunch together. In my mind, what makes the difference is whether he specifically left the house to see Julie or whether he and Julie happened to be in the same place for another reason and simply had a meal, coffee or drinks together. For some people, it would be the beer that was the problem and there wouldn’t be an issue if you and the paralegal were in a diner having the same conversation over coffee and pie, just as long as it wasn’t a bar and beer.
