Rollback Analysis: Should you date your co-workers?

Anyone who is single has probably thought to him or herself “where can I meet someone?” Non-single people will commonly say things like, “oh, you should have your friends set you up” or “have you been going to church?” But, there are often mixed reactions as to whether or not singles should be looking for that special someone at work. Why is that? I think there are two reasons:

1) People value the payoffs differently: If people value finding love infinitely higher than they value their reputation at work, then they will always give you the advice to date at work. In the decision tree, that means that they value the payoffs of B infinitely higher than the negative payoffs associated with D. Maybe they value the payoffs this way because they are just truly romantic people. Alternatively, the negative payoffs associated with D may not be as bad to them. Perhaps they tend to change companies a lot, and therefore the loss of reputation or awkward situation in one workplace is not as big of a deal in their eyes.

2) People assign different probabilities to the outcomes: Everyone always has an opinion as to whether or not they think a relationship will work (perhaps this is why Us Weekly does so well on the newsstands). So, if you are getting dating advice from someone, they will either consciously or sub-consciously assign a probability to the relationship working out. In the decision tree below you can see how changes to probabilities of a co-worker being the love or your life or not can completely change the outcome of the game. Or, despite whether or not they think the relationship will work out, the person who you are seeking advice from may assign different probabilities to the relationship ending amicably or bitterly. So, you may hear things like “yeah, but even if it doesn’t work out, he is such a nice guy he would never say anything bad about you.” Or “he is very mature and will value your privacy even if you break up.” These opinions will change the rollback analysis as well.

All in all, I believe that - since the payoffs and probabilities of success and failure in this game are completely subjective – this age-old question will continue to puzzle singles everywhere. What do you think?