Ladies, lead not your male colleagues astray

"More often than not, guys interpret even friendly cues, such as a subtle smile from a gal, as a sexual come-on, and a new study discovers why: Guys are clueless."

This doesn't prove that guys are clueless, it proves that guys think with something other than their brains (ie Larry Craig, Eliot Spitzer, Kwame Kilpatrick, et al)

Not long ago I was having a joking conversation with a male co-worker with whom I'd always been friendly (though never flirtatious). He made a sarcastic comment and I responded by making a face and sticking my tongue out. The look of shock he gave me when this happened was startling. A few minutes later I said quietly, "You know I made that face just to tell you that what you said was mean, right?" He sighed and said, "Oh, all right." He'd obviously thought I was suddenly coming on to him, not thinking about the context or the fact that neither of us had ever shown any interest beyond friendly professionalism before.

Ew. Ew. Ew.

There is nothing worse than a guy you work with who thinks you like him when you SO don't.

The only really recent example I have is kind of a hybrid. I worked at a company where a husband and wife worked. I worked with the husband on a daily basis as he was a manager of a big department and I was HR (lots of recruiting going on as well as employee relations issues). He was always very professional and so was I - just like working with anyone else. His wife glared daggers into my forehead everytime I saw her. It was so unnecessary. It was weird. The only thing I could tie it to was that I worked so much with her husband. I guess I could be wrong...

Ew. Ew. Ew.

There is nothing worse than a guy you work with who thinks you like him when you SO don't.

The only really recent example I have is kind of a hybrid. I worked at a company where a husband and wife worked. I worked with the husband on a daily basis as he was a manager of a big department and I was HR (lots of recruiting going on as well as employee relations issues). He was always very professional and so was I - just like working with anyone else. His wife glared daggers into my forehead everytime I saw her. It was so unnecessary. It was weird. The only thing I could tie it to was that I worked so much with her husband. I guess I could be wrong...

We guys are indeed very clueless(the correct term is dense). It takes a lot of training to be able to distinguish the cues, and even then we might mess up. Generally, it's safer and less awkward to assume it's a friendly smile then to assume it's anything more.

At least that's how it is with me. I always wait for the clue-stick to hit me before I jump to any conclusions.

Oddly enough, with both of the girlfriends I've had, I suspected/hoped they liked me before they said anything, and I gently coaxed them into telling me what was on their mind because I didn't want to assume anything.

What is worst than inability to read non-verbal cues is inability to read verbal cues. Being a female engineer, I got really frustrated with the ways guys were treating me in my lab. I ended up instructing them how to behave around me ("please respect my personal space", "notice the stuff that you do that make me cringe and try not to do them again", etc etc.) Even with explicit instructions, some of them still fail to foster friendly relationships with me.

I truly believe that there's a reason why women that succeed in tech profession are either 1) manly looking or 2) ice queens. They're trying to navigate in this non-verbal-cue-ineptness-world! Ah! Science is not hard! Dealing with these people is hard!

My gosh, it's great to know that I'm not the only one...And the thing is that it's not just in the workplace!

When I was in college, men (boys) would think that asking to borrow a pencil was also an invitiation to the dormroom. It couldn't be farther from the truth. I just wanted a pencil!

But then again, could it be possible that men over-interpret our actions because women aren't always direct? (Like how "I'm fine" means "I'm mad at you and you should know why.")

Could it be that men are evolving and reading between the lines?

No smiling, or men will think you're flirting. Got it. Maybe THAT'S why I seem to be the only person smiling in this entire office building. All of the other women are workplace savvy and I'm just grinning like a moron. Everyone must think I'm a total sleaze.

Now this is an interesting topic!

I've worked in a major corporation for the last eight years, and I've definitely seen some love in the workplace for sure.

I do agree that most men do over-analyze and misinterpret gestures from their female counterparts.

However, I do know a lot of single women in the workplace who enjoy those misinterpretations and that extra attention.

At the end of the day, we all want to be loved, and we spend much of our waking hours at work, so it only makes sense that relationships do grow and develop into sometimes strong feelings of passion.

As a result, we are often inclined to indulge in a little office romance.

Just throwing this out there, but the intention of nonverbal cues sometimes really can be ambiguous. For example, I had always thought of winking as a sign of interest, becasue it is not a cue one sees very often in day-to-day interactions.

However, I have had a girl wink at me in trying to convey friendliness and no interest. In my mind, this was a confusing signal that went against my rules of communication. Am I just off base? Or was there legitimate confusion in that signal? To me, a wink is much more than a smile or a nod and should be used with care.

All of that having been said, context does matter to some degree. I would be much more likely to take a gamble on an ambiguous nonverbal cue at a bar than at work, personally.

huh. i'm a winker. i wink to punctuate a joke or to leaven a sarcastic comment. i've never once thought it a sexual gesture. anyone?