Discussion on:

10 things you should do (and not do) at your company's holiday party

Comments

Add Your Opinion

Join the conversation!

Follow via:: RSS; Email Alert

Community Preferences

View:

Please Select

Show:

Please Select

0 Votes

+ -

to like or not to like

jck Updated - 17th Dec 2008

Yeah well, I have seen far more upper level people act in appropriately where I worked. Lower level people were too scared with management around.

Besides, I don't care if they don't like it. They can get rid of me for that, just like I can get rid of them for being uptight idiots.

Like I said, I can understand if you do something illegal. But if I don't do anything morally wrong and I have some drinks and have a good laugh with co-workers, no one should be able to tell me I was "too unprofessional".

I can understand being harsh to the extremes...someone sexually harassing a co-worker...someone damaging facility items...etc...should be punished. That's illegal.

However if I'm on my own time and not serving in a professional capacity, how should me doing something considered "inappropriate for the workplace" (like telling a dirty joke) be considered inappropriate for an extracirricular activity?

Just because the company pays for the drinks doesn't determine they can dictate how I behave on my own time.

Unless of course, I agree to a morals clause wink

0 Votes

+ -

Judgement

JamesRL 17th Dec 2008

If you tell a dirty joke at a company event, and I overhear it, I have to think. 'Does he act that way in the office?'

I've seen and heard things and company parties that I let slide. But if you sexually harass someone, get to drunk to walk, etc., I"m going to wonder about your judgement.

You wanna let loose on your own dime at a non company function, feel free. There is a fine line between having a good time and overdoing it. The former is fine, overdoing it is poor judgement. You can have a good laugh without dirty jokes.

James

0 Votes

+ -

Well said James

Michael Jay 17th Dec 2008

It is just as important to look good on the job as off the job.

0 Votes

+ -

and hence...

jck Updated - 18th Dec 2008

Why I tend not to go to a company function usually.

As for telling a dirty joke: If you worry about what I do outside of the office away from my role as an employee for you, then you have too much free time as my manager and need more on your plate.

A party is a social environment, not a venue of professional conduct and an absolute measure of moral and ethical conduct in the workplace.

I can understand if it is a party thrown for clients and where they would be at it. That would be a place where you are representing your firm and representing the company in a professional environment.

However, no one owns me for 3 free drinks in a 3 hour period. That's why whenever I was a contractor and we had a "working lunch", I did not eat the food. Why should I work an hour for $3 in pizza and soda? Compensation is compensation. And, offering me 2 slices of pizza and a 6 oz glass of diet coke as 1 hour of pay is a slap in the face. But, that's typical corporate mentality.

BTW, I've never gotten sloshed at a company function. But, I have told dirty jokes. However, I always told them to other people I knew were of the same mindset.

But if someone "overheard" it by chance, then that's their issue. They didn't have to listen to me. If I wasn't directing my jokes to them, then it was their own fault for listening to my conversations with someone else.

And, yeah I can have a good laugh without dirty jokes. But, I also have freedom of speech. And if I want to tell a dirty joke and direct it to someone else I know will enjoy it, I'm going to do it. So long as I am outside of the professional environment where I'm being paid to perform my profession, I am not on the company time or dole or responsible to them...again, so long as I don't have a morals clause.

But, I choose to exercise my freedom of speech here in America. So if I wanna tell a joke I heard Dave Attell tell, I will tell it. If someone gets all worked up about it at a party, they need to lighten up and get the politically correct/religious goody-two-shoes stick out of their arse.

0 Votes

+ -

Sorry 'bout your luck

kama410@... 13th Jan 2009

Apparently you never worked in the IT dept. of a certain prestigious consulting firm with offices in Cleveland's Skylight Office Tower.

While I was there we had, not a party, but a weekend seminar. Open bar. Eventually they served appetizers. After everyone was hammered. I think if they had found anyone insufficiently intoxicated they would have been held down and fed beer. Work was not discussed.

Professional? Uhm. No. Fun? As the Enron executives said, "I'm sorry, I do not recall the events in question."