On the job, charms become credentials

Where only first names appear, names have been changed to protect the identities of the sources.

Last fall, Lily, a senior, walked into her job interview at a Rockville restaurant with no previous work experience. But she secured the job with a skill she had not listed on her résumé.

Flirtation on the job

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She knew how to flirt.

Her manager, who is in his late thirties, made the first move — he asked if she was a model — and she returned the compliment. "He told me I had a beautiful smile, so I showed him one," she says. She told him that his shirt was neatly pressed and called his bald head "nice and shiny." Then, she brushed against him as she laughed.

For Lily and other Blazers, flirting with an employer for a job and on the job is a tactic with a payoff. These teens, taking their first step toward hook-ups in the workplace, continue a trend of the professional world: A survey by the American Management Association found that 80 percent of workers know of an office romance or have been involved in one. According to the Society for Human Resource Management, workplace romances often result in favoritism, sexual harassment and loss of productivity. But despite the risks, some Blazers hit on their employers, hoping for salaries, job benefits or even genuine relationships.

Giving the eye

Since her interview, Lily has worked at the restaurant as a hostess five hours a day every Monday through Saturday, leading customers to their tables and collecting their bills. At the end of every shift, she gives the money to her manager, who regularly praises her looks. The red flower she sticks in her hair every two or three days also catches his attention. He often asks, "You wore that flower for me today?" she says.

For Lily, the intimacy between employees at the restaurant makes casual flirting feel natural. So, she says, the hugs and flirtatious quips between her and her manager do not stop when her manager's wife comes to visit, and Lily acts the same way with the male hosts.

Unlike Lily, freshman Isiah Hollins did not wait to be complimented on his looks during his job interview at Foot Locker in Prince George's Plaza. He found his 17-year-old boss so attractive that he had to put his best foot forward. He asked her if she had a boyfriend, and when she replied that she did not, he said, "Why doesn't a good-looking girl like you have a boyfriend?"

Hollins believes the flirting earned him both his job and his starting salary: While most employees start at $7.25 an hour, he started at $9 an hour.

Though Hollins's sweet talk got him a foot in the door, students should generally avoid flirting during a job interview, warns Shawn Boyer, chief executive officer of SnagAJob.com, a company that works to ease the recruiting process for job seekers and employers. "[Flirting is] risky. If you're doing it overtly, it sends a signal to the hirer that you might not act professionally on the job," explains Boyer in a phone interview.

Boyer discourages students specifically from touching their interviewers and complimenting them on their appearances. "I would save the compliments for how they run the business," he says.

A pat on the back

But senior Ryan Downey can attest to the benefits of flirting. In the six months he worked at the Starbucks in Burnt Mills, the technique earned him tips from his customers and even a gift card to the Gap from one lady. Downey is an equal-opportunity flirter, sharing his charms with customers, coworkers and managers.

Behind Downey's charisma lies a rationale. He explains that in middle school, he felt uneasy with himself, so as he matured and became comfortable with himself during high school, he tried to make others feel comfortable as well. Starbucks hired him, he believes, because he presented himself as personable and confident.

Chuck, a junior, was not so forward during the first two weeks he worked at FootAction in Prince George's Plaza last summer. Once he settled into the job, though, he decided it was safe to ask for his boss's number.

As the two grew closer, she took to patting him on the cheek, occasionally in the store. Chuck soon found that being in her favor worked to his advantage. "If I came in late, it was okay. If someone else came in late, they'd get grilled," he recalls.

The two also spent their breaks together, and after work, they would go to McDonald's or to his house. Because of the age difference — she was 23, and he was 16 — they kept their after-hours meetings under wraps. Though they had sex frequently, Chuck says, they did not consider themselves boyfriend and girlfriend.

In fact, at the time he began flirting with his boss, Chuck already had a girlfriend. But he felt that the relationship was not working out, so he left her. He had found someone else.

A boss-employee relationship like Chuck's has more reasons to fail than an average relationship, Boyer cautions. In the workplace, the boss gives instructions to the employee; if the boss becomes too controlling outside of work, the personal relationship may suffer. Also, an employer-employee breakup would likely create friction at work, Boyer says.

Since Chuck and his boss never had an official relationship, they never broke up, either. During the fall, she sometimes took days off to visit him. They have since stopped seeing each other, but they still talk on the phone about once every two weeks.

Nudging forward

The relationship is fresh in Chuck's mind when he sums up his stint at FootAction as "a good job experience," laughing. Aside from the obvious perks, he's glad he warmed up to his boss because she wrote him a recommendation for another job.

Like Chuck, Nina, a senior, considers herself a charming favorite of her two male managers at a clothing store in Wheaton Plaza. The store manager has already asked her out, she says. Because she feels no attraction to him, she has not given him an answer, but because she wants more convenient work hours, she plans to continue playing hard-to-get by nudging him playfully and giving him the occasional hug. If he thinks he has a chance, she says, her boss just may bump her from the night shift to the afternoon shift.

But in more professional careers, flirting appears to have little leverage and may even be detrimental. A 2005 study by Tulane University found that women with business degrees who use flirtatious tactics in the workplace earn fewer pay raises and promotions than their more conservative counterparts. And according to the American Management Association, 92 percent of companies with written policies on employee dating forbid workers from dating subordinates.

Such policies seem unheard of in stores as casual as Nina's. Her former male manager had open discussions with female employees about their sexual experiences, she says, and was also "very touchy-feely," grabbing girls' shoulders and squeezing their waists. Still, Nina does not consider the touching a form of sexual harassment. The flirting is mutual and usually in jest, so it does not offend her, she says.

The flirtatious atmosphere exists, Nina believes, because the store has young employees, half of whom are under 25, and an upscale urban culture that is more tolerant of physical contact.

In Lily's eyes, this culture is not so tolerant of job applicants who don't fit its norms. "You have to be a certain way to get a certain job," she says. "You have to dress way up there. Your attitude, it has to be quick." And in the same way, she suggests, society pressures teens to flirt for these jobs.

Lily, who hopes to become a doctor, plans to give up flirting at work once she enters the professional world.

But for now, she will keep wearing that red flower.