Posted on: Monday, March 24, 2003
Lose control at happy hour, and you'll lose respect at work
By Chad Graham
Des Moines Register
Late Friday afternoon. Happy hour.
Most customers appear older than 30 and drink dark European beer that flows like molasses.
Most have advice for young twentysomethings who decide to hit an after-work bar with co-workers or the boss: Don't make a fool of yourself.
"You want to look like you're in control and not some wild, immature person," said Grimes, Iowa, resident Sue Trow, who works for a bank and sets a two-beer limit in many social situations.
Des Moines, Iowa, resident Gary Martin, who works for an insurance company, says: "Don't swear. It may offend some of your colleagues.
"Don't do shots, either."
Happy-hour drinking with co-workers and supervisors — especially ones you don't know — can turn embarrassing real quick:
6 p.m.: A mass e-mail directs everyone to that patio bar with the two-for-one plastic cups of beer.
8:02: Three beers. Vigorous debate erupts about the ugliest person you've ever made out with. The loser buys shots.
9:02: Five beers. That "Bette Davis Eyes" song blasts from the jukebox.
Requisite table dance follows.
10:00: Beer count is lost. These people are not just co-workers. They are your new best friends. The conversation has turned to renting a U-Haul tonight so everyone can ride to Canada.
10:01: Someone asks: Do Canadian gas-station clerks take personal checks for beer? The waitress says yes.
10:50: Canadian vacation plans are ditched because Big Tomato Pizza Co.'s slice window opens soon.
9 a.m.: With a pounding head and bloated face, you wake up looking like the love child of singers Meat Loaf and Mama Cass.
A paper plate from the previous night's pizza is stuck to your back. Panic ensues as last night's memories return.
10 a.m.: Denial.
You couldn't have kissed your cubicle mate. (Yeah, the married one.) You never tried to light your gin and tonic on fire. You also didn't show how to remove your pants without pulling down the zipper.
Oh, but you did, and on Monday you will pay.
For too many offices, this behavior — or something like it — is normal.
Fresh out of college at age 22 a couple of years ago, Des Moines native Cara Conrad took her first job at a Chicago consulting firm, whose bosses prided themselves on workers who partied.
"With a lot of Big Five consulting firms, it's considered standard to go out and get really drunk and then be at work the next day being productive," said Conrad, who has since moved back to Des Moines. "If you could do that, it was almost considered a badge of honor."
Young workers who want to be social have choices when it comes to having a drink with the boss, said Dee Hurst, director of human resources for the University of Iowa's Henry B. Tippe College of Business.
Each semester, Hurst holds an etiquette dinner designed to teach students how to navigate the business world's social side.
If you've performed a drunken hula in your boxers, formulate a Monday-morning game plan. Tell co-workers you don't normally behave that way and move on.
If you need to apologize to the boss, do so. Explain that it was unusual behavior, it won't happen again and then don't mention it again, Hurst advises.
Repeat: Don't bring it up again. Get back to work.
