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You have a very narrow view of "the workplace". I used to work for a large well respected software company. On Fridays, after work, there was a subsidized bar

You have a very narrow view of "the workplace". I used to work for a large well respected software company. On Fridays, after work, there was a subsidized bar where we could have a beer or two and discuss work or non-work things in a more relaxed atmosphere. Would you ban that? If I go to a conference and we have an official conference social meet-up should I be prohibited from consuming alcohol? I have my own straw man. You say: > they should be presenting to work fit & as prepared as possible to do it I propose that we ban coffee in the workplace because we should all be at 100% all the time and coffee obviously shows you aren't turning up ready to work.

roenxi 8y ago
> You have a very narrow view of "the workplace". On the contrary, I have a very broad view of the workplace. Yes to all your questions. I don't work in tech, and there are no subsidised bars or alcohol at conferences. We got subsidised gym memberships and tea at the conferences I'm used to. If you want to drink, your money, your time, after work. If you want to get tipsy with colleagues in your own time, it is not in any way endorsed by the company. My personal guess is the tech industry _will_ eventually ban alcohol at all such things as the link between drinking, uninhibited men and sexual harassment is bought up again and again. The bad apples will spoil the whole barrel. > I propose that we ban coffee in the workplace because we should all be at 100% all the time and coffee obviously shows you aren't turning up ready to work. Well, I don't agree with you. But if you have evidence, sure. My understanding is coffee is a mild stimulant, so it should be linked to a very mild improvement in work performance - so I doubt you have evidence. People do turn up to work unprepared. We can't really stop that - maybe they just get a bad nights sleep. But alcohol is going to have a pretty strictly negative effect, so employees shouldn't be drinking it in company hours or before work.
- lovich 8y ago
  Can we ban companies from encroaching on ever more of our lives then? It's already a baseline to have it be one third of the working week, but many of these social events are "optional" as in it's optional to continue in your career. By suggesting that companies ban taking part in that activity, but not preventing them from taking an ever increasing part of our lives through long hours and after work events, you are effectively advocating that we ban the activity in it's entirety
- afandian 8y ago
  Both of my examples were after work. So we're not talking about being at your desk answering support tickets and calculating bridge loading equations. My point about taking a narrow view is that "the workplace" is not only at-your-desk time. Its geographic-but-after-hours, related but off-site social events. On a related note, a lot of the discussions around software project codes of conduct are based on the fact that software projects fundamentally are human endeavours. It's not just about the code you churn out. If you want to employ humans you have to let them be human. That means some degree of socializing. If you want to employ machines you have to maintain them too. My coffee counterexample was to illustrate that your approach seems to be binary, zero tolerance. With humans involved, I think it's just not that simple.
  - roenxi 8y ago
    :P I don't understand why you are insisting that I have a narrow view of the workplace, I've read what you've written and agree. I can tell that your examples are after work, we're not talking about sitting at your desk. I'm talking about geographic-but-after-hours and related but off-site social events too. > a subsidized bar And if an employee does something stupid after being in that bar, it requires an absolute contortion of language to say that maybe the presence and cheapness of the grog wasn't a contributing factor. Say in a bad case a male employee sexually harasses some female coworker - the woman involved (and, I suspect, a judge) might well question why the company was enabling this. I personally think that the company should be held responsible as much as the drunk employee. It is simply too easy to link subsidised alcohol to someone acting inappropriately due to alcohol. > official conference social meet-up Ditto. If the meetup is official, there should be no alcohol. Learn to socialise over a lemonade. I've seen a very large number of professionals who, somehow, manage to do just that. > My coffee counterexample was to illustrate that your approach seems to be binary, zero tolerance. With humans involved, I think it's just not that simple. If I, in a capacity as an employer, am going to have some responsibility for some employees actions then that employee, whilst I am responsible for them, is not going to be drinking alcohol. There risk far outweighs the hypothetical employee who can only socialise with a glass in hand. I'm not even making that decision on any specific risk factor - alcohol leads to worse decisions, in a way that coffee does not. We live in an age where companies are often responsible for outcomes in a _very broad_ definition of "workplace". If the company might be responsible, then employees have a responsibility to be making their best decisions. If you want to drink with your workmates the process should be organise it unofficially, go find a bar and don't wear a hat with a corporate logo on it. It isn't hard to do. If drinking is mandatory to having a career then that is the problem, not my hardline approach to alcohol.
- umanwizard 8y ago
  "Company hours" is meaningless for a salaried employee with a flexible schedule. If I leave at 5 PM and go to a bar, how is that meaningfully different from staying in the office and starting to drink at 5?

roenxi 8y ago

> You have a very narrow view of "the workplace". On the contrary, I have a very broad view of the workplace. Yes to all your questions. I don't work in tech, and there are no subsidised bars or alcohol at conferences. We got subsidised gym memberships and tea at the conferences I'm used to. If you want to drink, your money, your time, after work. If you want to get tipsy with colleagues in your own time, it is not in any way endorsed by the company. My personal guess is the tech industry _will_ eventually ban alcohol at all such things as the link between drinking, uninhibited men and sexual harassment is bought up again and again. The bad apples will spoil the whole barrel. > I propose that we ban coffee in the workplace because we should all be at 100% all the time and coffee obviously shows you aren't turning up ready to work. Well, I don't agree with you. But if you have evidence, sure. My understanding is coffee is a mild stimulant, so it should be linked to a very mild improvement in work performance - so I doubt you have evidence. People do turn up to work unprepared. We can't really stop that - maybe they just get a bad nights sleep. But alcohol is going to have a pretty strictly negative effect, so employees shouldn't be drinking it in company hours or before work.

lovich 8y ago
Can we ban companies from encroaching on ever more of our lives then? It's already a baseline to have it be one third of the working week, but many of these social events are "optional" as in it's optional to continue in your career. By suggesting that companies ban taking part in that activity, but not preventing them from taking an ever increasing part of our lives through long hours and after work events, you are effectively advocating that we ban the activity in it's entirety
afandian 8y ago
Both of my examples were after work. So we're not talking about being at your desk answering support tickets and calculating bridge loading equations. My point about taking a narrow view is that "the workplace" is not only at-your-desk time. Its geographic-but-after-hours, related but off-site social events. On a related note, a lot of the discussions around software project codes of conduct are based on the fact that software projects fundamentally are human endeavours. It's not just about the code you churn out. If you want to employ humans you have to let them be human. That means some degree of socializing. If you want to employ machines you have to maintain them too. My coffee counterexample was to illustrate that your approach seems to be binary, zero tolerance. With humans involved, I think it's just not that simple.
- roenxi 8y ago
  :P I don't understand why you are insisting that I have a narrow view of the workplace, I've read what you've written and agree. I can tell that your examples are after work, we're not talking about sitting at your desk. I'm talking about geographic-but-after-hours and related but off-site social events too. > a subsidized bar And if an employee does something stupid after being in that bar, it requires an absolute contortion of language to say that maybe the presence and cheapness of the grog wasn't a contributing factor. Say in a bad case a male employee sexually harasses some female coworker - the woman involved (and, I suspect, a judge) might well question why the company was enabling this. I personally think that the company should be held responsible as much as the drunk employee. It is simply too easy to link subsidised alcohol to someone acting inappropriately due to alcohol. > official conference social meet-up Ditto. If the meetup is official, there should be no alcohol. Learn to socialise over a lemonade. I've seen a very large number of professionals who, somehow, manage to do just that. > My coffee counterexample was to illustrate that your approach seems to be binary, zero tolerance. With humans involved, I think it's just not that simple. If I, in a capacity as an employer, am going to have some responsibility for some employees actions then that employee, whilst I am responsible for them, is not going to be drinking alcohol. There risk far outweighs the hypothetical employee who can only socialise with a glass in hand. I'm not even making that decision on any specific risk factor - alcohol leads to worse decisions, in a way that coffee does not. We live in an age where companies are often responsible for outcomes in a _very broad_ definition of "workplace". If the company might be responsible, then employees have a responsibility to be making their best decisions. If you want to drink with your workmates the process should be organise it unofficially, go find a bar and don't wear a hat with a corporate logo on it. It isn't hard to do. If drinking is mandatory to having a career then that is the problem, not my hardline approach to alcohol.
umanwizard 8y ago
"Company hours" is meaningless for a salaried employee with a flexible schedule. If I leave at 5 PM and go to a bar, how is that meaningfully different from staying in the office and starting to drink at 5?