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UK had the most unhinged work drinking culture I had ever seen.
by not-kinsale-joe 2mo ago
UK had the most unhinged work drinking culture I had ever seen.
- gadders 2mo agoIt's dropped off now. It was better in the 90s.
- dmos62 2mo agoCoxnfused. Was it more unhinged in the 90s or less compared to now?
- c0n5pir4cy 2mo agoMore unhinged - but a lot of people preferred it that way. To be really clear it's still pretty unhinged and even a decade ago it was much more unhinged.
- alibarber 2mo agoBeing from the UK I’m pretty sure they mean more unhinged. To be fair I did enjoy the ‘unhingedness’ but I’m also appreciating that being at least a decade younger was also great.
- ownagefool 2mo agoThere was more drinking in the 90s. You can decide whether that was better or worse.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- gadders 2mo agoMore unhinged and better, especially in banks. I had one senior stakeholder that would come back from the Pub on a Friday and complete change all his previous decisions. I think my lunchtime record was 4 1/2 pints. Another IT guy on the same session had keys to the building's small data room so let himself in and had a kip.
- fakedang 2mo agoWhen I joined the UK division of a bank, back in 2016, we had the help staff wheel drinks carts around the house evey Friday at tea time. Adding Bombay Sapphire to your tea was pretty much the norm. Didn't stay long because I got a PE offer at an American firm in their London office very quickly, and the culture there was so staid and lonely in comparison. Part of the reason why we have an office bar with a bartender too set up at my current office. I don't drink, but nothing like drinks to help with bringing people together right after work.
- gadders 2mo agoI remember one head of trading had a fridge in his office and various bottles of whiskey for a cheeky drink.
- dmos62 2mo agoI doubt I could walk properly after having 4+ pints in a 1-2 hour window. Presuming it's 4%+ alcohol. You either need to be pretty young or have a pretty accustomed liver, or is it just me?
- gadders 2mo agoI would have been mid to late 20s. I can't swear I was very productive afterwards. Sleeping in a toilet cubicle was also a thing. University in the UK is (or was) a great training ground for livers.
- rwmj 2mo agoIt was pretty mad in the 90s, but I don't recall anyone ever being forced into it at companies I worked for. A company mandated "alcohol bus" sounds ridiculous then and now.
- psd1 2mo agoAmen. I only got my first job in tech because i put away 6 pints in the pub after the interview. We conducted interviews after lunch, for this exact purpose. I saw good candidates interview but decline the pub afterwards - they did not get offers. That company had at least two pub sessions a week, typically running to six rounds or more. We hit our medically-recommended maximum weekly intake by Tuesday; Fridays were carnage.
- 72deluxe 2mo agoThis sounds like hell. At one place I worked, they had free pizza on Fridays so the developers could sit around and socialise. If only they realised that socialising was the last thing the developers wanted to do (many of us on the spectrum) and awkwardly standing around chewing whilst avoiding eye contact; I wonder if they still do it? Pubs sound even worse.
- alibarber 2mo agoI know this sounds awful - but perhaps hiring people that would turn their workplace into what you just described was exactly what they (as an organisation, not necessarily individually) wanted to avoid, just, perhaps not by overtly saying it.
- 72deluxe 2mo agoPerhaps, but if they wanted any of their 6 million lines of COM-laden C++ to continue working into the future, they'd need those sort of people.
- piguin 2mo agoNo, that's a bit reverse prejudice and also a bit wrong on assumptions. If you bring in people who are levels above they aren't inherently on the spectrum and it's once you bring them in that you have a dependence on finding more instead of working at a complexity and expertise level that might be more maintainable.
- thom 2mo agoMy first job out of university was with a large local news organization. It's the only place I've worked that had beer on tap in its cafeteria (from 11am). You haven't seen workplace alcoholism until you've worked with a county cricket correspondent.
- regexorcist 2mo agoIndeed, and I kinda miss it. My first couple IT jobs were right in Central London and we would all religiously meet at the pub after work, along with hundreds from other companies of all kinds. The banter was glorious.
- alibarber 2mo agoSame - in Soho on a nice (or even not that nice) Friday (or Monday, or Thursday) the whole place would just be one big open air pub. You'd meet so many great people - the atmosphere was just wonderful. Then COVID came around and I also moved to Finland where that sort of thing is just unheard of.
- jamesfmilne 2mo agoYeah, I worked in Soho for about 14 years and most Thursdays were out at the Pillars of Hercules or Dog & Duck. Fridays are for the out-of-towners. The company has moved to Bermondsey now, and to be fair the drinks-after-work culture seems to still going fairly strong around this part of town. The biggest spanner in the works has been my cohort all having kids and not having the spare time to socialise after work. Definitely miss all that. My liver & pancreas don't miss it though, so it's probably for the best.
- nickkell 2mo agoSimilarly I moved to Germany. The office here is mostly deserted by 16:00. In a way I respect their ability to completely split their work and social lives, but it's not particularly fun for me - especially starting from scratch in a new city.
- Earw0rm 2mo agoMostly in the past tense now, for better or worse.
- ajb 2mo agoWhile the alcohol consumption can be a bit nuts, the UK has a relatively strong cultural tradition that what happens in the pub stays in the pub. That makes it a useful low-risk way to air work issues that would not be raised in a work meeting, either because criticism would be taken as an offense, or just because the person raising them would not get to speak to the person that needs to hear. Of course, there's nothing enforcing that managers respect it. The main mechanism is that many managers realise it's in their interests to be able to hear unvarnished truths, and for their team to be able to relieve their feelings outside work instead of inside. And for them to be able to get to know their team better. But not all have the integrity or humility to do so.
- stasomatic 2mo agoI was in London a couple of months ago. That day there were 2 (or demonstrations), something to do with Palestine and the other with internal UK politics, around the Big Ben / Buckingham palace. Ended up dragged into to the current of the latter on, could basically body surf If I had an inclination. It seemed everyone was drunk, women / men, old/ young. I didn't know you get so drunk on beer. Also, was the first time I've ever seen portable open urinals, where grown man took out their Johnsons in public and released the beer back into the wild.
- GJim 2mo ago> UK had the most unhinged work drinking culture I had ever seen I prefer the term 'enlightened'. Here in Blighty, if somebody got rat-arsed at an office party, photocopied their arse and puked in the Yucca plant, they would be regarded as an absolute legend (providing they didn't make a habit of it).
- galangalalgol 2mo agoHave the recent studies indicating just how dangerous alcohol consumption is made any impact. Losing a few neurons was one thing but some of the studies don't put it as much less dangerous than tobacco. New guidance in the US is there is no safe quantity and no one should have more than one serving a day. I know a lot of younger sw devs in the US that simply do not drink ever. I once would have said that was a little unusual, but now it is the norm. I suspect it will be stigmatized akin to smoking not that far into the future.
- butlike 2mo agoEverything kills you. At least alcohol feels good.
- galangalalgol 2mo agoYeah, but its always a trade right? Heroin would kill me too fast for the upside. The trade on alcohol wasn't what I thought it was. I think there are better options. Says I as I lift a cider.