Which makes sense conceptually, but her portrayal doesn't really mesh with that because she seems to genuinely like him too much for it to be a purely strategic decision. I think they just fell in love with her playing it as pure comedy, which I can understand.

This does seem definitely to me be a case of that. Probably, could have benefitted from a little more portrayal of Gail having conflicts... something that pushed or pulled her a little outside of just her direct scenes with Jim. It's funny how Profit seems to be the only character aware of how important secretaries can actually be... and how that really helps him with Gail.

Maybe we could have gotten some future episode with a subplot of Gail and Sykes' (heretofore invisible) assistant or something.