Some few years back, when working in the third level of hell, my boss and HR / Office manager thought it would be a great idea if several of us from the office got together and celebrated Halloween. She set the time and place for us to meet and told us we all had to dress in costume and head to one of the local bars in town.
We all thought that rallying the troupes and trying to create some kind of camaraderie in and out of the workplace would be a great idea, at the time.
So there was a buzz of excitement for the next few weeks throughout the office talking about our costumes and how much fun we were going to have at the party. We talked of what we would sing at karaoke, who we were bringing to accompany us, it was going to be “the shiznik.” We also discussed how we were not going to drink that much because we all knew that was never a good idea, and to act civilized which we all agreed was crucial being out with our supervisors and coworkers – God only knows what would happen if we didn’t. We laughed at that thought, and all agreed.
Time came and we all met up in our lovely costumes as we congregated outside the local pub awaiting our perfectly planned evening.
And then things changed………….
Once we walked through the doors, somehow that plan we had conjured up of not drinking too much and maintaining some sort of self-control went to #$%@. People were drinking more than their body weight, dirty dancing on the floor with their boss, and some things I saw reminded me of an episode of “Girls Gone Wild.”
What happened to the plan? We seemed to have good intentions to begin with but with all the Halloween hooplah, something happened.
Guess what happened on Monday morning? People were walking in the doors with their eyes towards the floor in embarrassment. They had behaved so badly that they couldn’t look any of their co-workers in the eye. They had lost the respect of those around them, and might I add – we all lost respect for our HR manager.
How does one recover from these kinds of things? You don’t.
Since then, when someone mentions going out and drinking or Halloween office parties – I run. Yes, in the opposite direction.
You can plan all you want until your heart’s content to behave, not overdo it on your alcohol consumption or whatever but unless you stand by that, you’re just asking for trouble at Halloween parties or any other kind of office party involving alcohol and crazy co-workers.