When In Rome...

I never had any idea how diverse different regions of the US could be in terms of employment environments. After we moved to Austin I worked in customer care for a short time, and my first week there I was shocked to find out that the company had a happy hour every other Friday in the office during work hours. It was apparently totally normal to have an alcoholic beverage at your desk before leaving on a Friday. People would bring in beer to share, and on special occasions we would sometimes make mixed drinks or frozen beverages. This blew my mind!

At Bentley I had attended on-campus seminars that taught you how to dress for success, eat politely at fancy business dinners, and conduct yourself in an office with professionalism. All of that seemed to go out the window when my first week on the job I found myself sipping a pink mixed drink of some sort out of a solo cup at my small cluttered desk. In fact, when it had been offered to me at first I thought it was a joke. But it wasn't- this was part of the company culture. It felt really wrong to be drinking at work. I suddenly was stricken with fear and conspiracy theories- maybe this was an elaborate plot to fire me (give me a drink and convince me that it's normal to drink at work and then fire me for doing so), or maybe I was on Candid Camera!

The happy hour was carefully planned- no employee could have more than one drink, and it had to be at least an hour before that employee left for the day. It was responsibly handled and it served the company in the same way that any other employee perk does- make the employees happy and they will provide a better experience for your customers.

In the following weeks I came to understand that this happy hour tradition was totally normal. For two weeks we would all work really hard dealing with belligerent/confused/unhappy customers and then we would get a happy hour as a reward. It was actually more strange at the company NOT to partake of the happy hour than it was to do so. Moral of the story: When in Rome do as the Romans do!