The majority of companies serve alcohol at holiday parties and events. At the same time, many expect their employees to live up to a standard of behavior that is above reproach. I don't hear many stories these days about employees overinbibing at company parties, but the stories I do hear, are doozies - so I'm sure it still happens. Unfortunately, it's a safety hazard and drinking too much could ruin your career depending upon whom you offend.
In a parallel universe – it must be a parallel universe because it can’t happen here – right? A reader wrote to tell me about a company executive who stripped naked and climbed a local tower to entertain the employees at the holiday party. He put on this display after imbibing a large number of martinis. This is the most career busting story I have ever heard about alcohol. Have you seen worse behavior?
In this instance coworkers wanted to know what the company should do. And, they wondered how they'd ever respect him on Monday morning. Me? I wonder if he ever showed up at work again.
For certain, behaving badly after drinking too much at a company event makes coworkers wary about your common sense and whether they can trust you. Losing your inhibitions could result in a sexual harassment charge, too.
You don't ever want to wake up in the morning and wonder what you did at the holiday party, or wonder what people are saying about you at work the next day. So, plan your evening carefully, eat the appetizers and, if you're an employer, these steps are recommended about alcohol at company events to keep your employees safe.
Image Copyright Ekaterina Monakhova
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This incident was an unfortunate career buster, but it’s a good validation of not drinking too much, or at all, even at unofficial company functions.
One of our employees, when I was an HR Manager, went to a holiday party at a co-worker’s house. He drank too much, hit a telephone pole, and totaled the company car he wasn’t supposed to be driving other than for work.
He was a really nice young man, an exemplary employee with 5+ years on the job, and with a toddler and a new baby to support, but that doesn’t count much when you have not one, but, two serious violations of company policy, one with legal consequences.
He was fired the next morning, which happened to be Christmas Eve.
When I was HR Director, two young women (one of whom was the designated driver) downed shots at the holiday party until one fell, splitting her head open. It was a medical group, so two ER docs and two ER nurses spent most of their party prepping her for the paramedics. The group HR manager, her supervisor and I spent the night with her at the local ER while she had a CAT scan and sobered up(from a 0.2 blood alcohol level)enough to determine there was no subdural hematoma. Not only was there fallout at work, her husband – whom she did not invite to the party – was livid. Now that I don’t have to, I don’t attend work holiday parties!
My advice as far as drinking at company parties is to follow the boss’s lead. If he or she is having a glass of wine, do the same, or have a beer or a light mixed drink if that is your preferred alcholic beverage.
Secondly, don’t change your normal habits, a slight exception to the first paragraph. If you are a nondrinker, either by choice or because you are a recovering alcoholic, don’t drink. As the night wears on, no one will notice if you’re drinking soda pop or booze. If you will be driving yourself home, or if you are a designated driver, don’t drink any alcohol.
Thirdly, as most have mentioned, if you are a drinker, limit yourself to no more than two drinks, and remember a 4 oz. glass of wine, a shot of hard liquor and a 12 oz. beer with normal alcohol content are essentially the same. Don’t fool yourself with the “it’s only beer” canard. Also remember that some states and Canadian provinces allow the sale of high-alcohol beer, up to 10 percent or more. That isn’t the same as a can or bottle of Bud Light or Miller Light.