It's intersting that the LW's principles included not moving out of the professional box for sex with the visiting biz leader hottie...but did not extend to cutting the flirtation off once he was involved in a serious relationship. I think I would be a little stung by my SO's desire to keep up a flirty correspondence with a woman who propositioned him for sex. While one is perhaps supposed to focus on the fact that he turned her down....human nature being what it is, the SO likely would focus on the fact that hottie biz leader still turned him on, and as long as they were still corresponding, the door to a potential future offer, this one far more likely to go unrefused given the long-time simmer, was still ajar.

So it's good for both their sakes that she cut him off. Secret flirtations need very little oxygen to come into full flaming flower.... if hottie biz leader returned to his city next month, and had there been no interruption in their correspondence, would our fearless LW venture into another wine-soaked dinner with the utmost confidence that he'd stay true to his SO? If that is a decision he has already made, then sure, great, fine, continue the friendship. But I suspect he hadn't, really -that's what makes flirations so fun, their open-endedness. When the door is firmly closed on a fliration, it becomes a real friendship, a mere acquaintanceship, or a nullity. Hottie biz leader turned off the back burner by choosing the latter, which is the stand up thing to do when they both have serious relationships on the front-burner.

I think the LW should feel great about sticking to his principles. Character is what you do when no one else is looking. It can be hard (no celebrity sex) but in the end is almost always more rewarding (e.g. his year-long friendship) than not.

The disparaging comments from the NPO are like a little fire burning out there on the web. Forget contacting the larger org - you'll just seeem whiny and unprofessional. They have bigger fish to fry than get involved in something that will seem like it is (or will turn into) a personal vendetta.

Instead - have the person who passed along the info about the NPO finally taking LW's ideas write you a letter of recommendation to produce for future prospecrtive employers. And contact the NPO - preferably some of the people that actually implemented and complimented these ideas that they were not at first all that keen on listening to - and get letters of reco from *them*. Frame it "Person X in larger organization passed along your very kind remarks regarding some of the ideas I proposed when working there, that (your NPO) ended up implmeneting. I was really happy to hear that I was able to be of some use to (NPO); I liked working there and found the people really dedicated and passionate. I was really impressed that you went so far beyond the ideas I proposed - it made me feel good to see a lot of good work rise organically from some of my own. I was wondering if you'd mind writing a short refernce for me that references this experience, as I hope to continue my career doing exactly this sort of thing, and a reference from you would be invaluable."

You are a) acknowledging you know the NPO liked your work, b) avoiding the sticky wicket of letting them know you know they were less than professional in their remarks, and c) flattering them without kissing ass, and the combination is likely to produce a polite and positive reference letter that you can then use as a defense should, at any point in the future, a prospective employer question you on what was said about you in those publicized minutes.

If it does come up with an employer, avoid saying anything negative about the NPO - the comments about 'NPO workers are clueless children' littering this board might have some truth in them but it will just sound retailatory and be stooping to using the same tactics that were used against you. Instead, be ready with something like this: "I''m never too concerned about remarks that are directed at my person rather than my work - those things can sometimes happen when you mix lots of personalities together. As you can guess, it was a a bit of a fraught situation, the larger company hiring me to come into the NPO and give advice it didn't think it needed. Naturally the NPO folks were a bit resistant to being told what to do by an 'outisder' they thought didn't share their personal commitment and passion to the NPO. Who knows, maybe I"d have felt the same way in their shoes. But in the end, some of my ideas were adopted, worked out pretty well, and I even have letters of recommendation from so of the people who were initially so resistant. overall, it was a positive experience for me, since it's always good to be able to do what you're hired to do, even if you have to take the long road to get there."

Good luck.