Would you have a drink at lunch and then go back to work?
Would you have a drink at lunch and then go back to work?
What would be the acceptability of this in your workplace? For context, which country and industry are you in?
I guess I'm mainly thinking about professional jobs, but interested to hear from. I think in France it would be quite common to have a glass of wine, even at a work canteen or so. But in the UK it seems like people would think that was a problem, and in a lot of cases you'd be in violation of something at work.
Canadian IT worker.
I refuse to drink at work parties. Everyone else does and I get some peer pressure to drink but I don't care. Its normal to see people get super drunk and embarrass themselves which is why I don't even start.
Specifically at lunch, if I'm not driving and others are having a beer I will but only one. If I'm driving, it depends on how I'm feeling.
Working from home I've been known to have a beer or two on a Friday afternoon by my self.
When I left my last job we had a meeting at the end of the day with the guys I got along with and anyone they wanted to invite. There was about 15 people from different departments with their cameras on having a drink or smoking (pot) if they didn't drink as a goodbye. Was a nice goodbye. Lol
US/Engineer
At my first job, a fairly large firm with a few hundred people, I remember the furtive glances around the table as everyone didn't want to be the first one to order a beer. Once a single person ordered one, several others would too. The boss was fine with it, but nobody did it in front of the boss's boss. We never had more than one, though.
At my second job, a small, new company with 12ish people, it was pretty common. Sometimes someone would bring a six pack to share into the office on a Friday afternoon. Usually, the owners would join in.
At my current job in the public sector, the culture just isn't there. Nobody drinks at all during work hours. I don't drink as much anymore, anyway.
Switzerland, IT
Depends on the team. It's not that uncommon in some occasions, for example on a friday, to have a beer when eating lunch in a restaurant.
Very common is the "Apero"-culture. Small festivities after work to celebrate something. Snacks, beer and wine are part of it. Sometimes this can also be during the day and people will continue to work after.
Bartender. I don't get a lunch break so I just drink on the clock.
I am a winemaker in the Pacific Northwest. I sample wines a lot throughout the day but mostly I spit, I still catch a bit of a buzz sometimes though. Sometimes during harvest when we're working long days outside I'll have a beer or two. We celebrate the start and end of harvest with champagne. When I work wine tasting events I look forward to trying wines from other local wineries, I usually have a fair number of tastes throughout the event. I think I actually drink more at work than I do at home.
UK IT dev here. When I started working in the field back in 2000ish it was perfectly fine for IT staff to pop to the pub. Did for many years. Then in my 20s it became normal to have drinks after work rather than during work. Then when marriage etc came along, it became neither.
I see no problem with a single drink at lunch, specially with your team. It helps you relax and build rapport imo.
At my previous job, my manager would take our 5-6 people team out for lunch and a beer for anyone's birthday and at the end of the year. I miss that.
My current job doesn't allow it, so going out for lunch with co workers is a little more stiff, and so is my relationship with my manager.
Last christmas I had to work during the break with only 1 co-worker, we snuck out and had pizza with a berr. It was great.
Sure, if I'm meeting a vendor for lunch it would be normal. If I'm just sitting at my desk working through lunch like I typically do, it would be really strange to have a drink and I'd probably be reprimanded.
USA, IT worker
I used to think it was unprofessional. But once I had a few jobs where employees were treated like crap, I changed my mind.
US IT. They provide us with drinks at lunch anytime there’s a company wide meeting.
I'm in the UK. I worked at a couple of places in the '90s - sysadmin and IT trainer - where this was considered perfectly acceptable at the time, but I definitely wouldn't now. I'm no longer in IT at all, but I don't think that it is seen as acceptable very widely anywhere now.
I work in manufacturing in America. There's NO FUCKING WAY. You'd be fired immediately if caught. I don't even think the union would try to back you up. It's simply too dangerous of an environment. However, reeking of booze from the night before? Apparently totally fine.
When I worked in kitchens and bars? Regularly
Now, driving a forklift and using a nail gun every day.. I’ll wait till I get home
Used to work for a company that started out as a US startup for IT Services, later it was purchased by a large German company.
During its startup days, you did not dare drink alcohol at lunch time.
After being bought by the German company, you did not dare NOT to drink alcohol at lunch time. Especially if someone from Germany was visiting. They viewed it odd that we had an aversion to drinking beer at lunch.
If my boss gets a drink and I want a drink, it's fair game. Otherwise no.
IT related to ships and geophysical surveys.
For larger projects, as long as the heavy duty work is out of the way, grabbing a beer or two with the meal is pretty common.
Related story:
We were mobilizing for a project, and I had a real headscratcher of a problem. Work day was over, and we all headed back to the hotel for the evening. We all met at dinner, and I called it "a night" early as I excused myself after a few beers to head back ip to my room.Project manager, who knew of the issues I was having with the system said something along the lines of the issues being serious when it caused me to be the first to leave the bar. "Nah, I'm gonna VPN in and try something I just thought of"
Yup, turns out it was abgood idea: Misconfigured soanning tree was the root cause, and the fix took 5 minutes. It was fun rejoining the others and Announce that the system would be ready the next day after some cleanup, and all that was missing was a few beers. The Ballmer Peak is real.
I worked in 3 different European countries, in both academia and industry,
While not being common, it's not that rare to take a glass of wine or beer when doing a real-restaurant for lunch break at work. At least for people working in office.
US, audit & tax
Once in a blue moon, on a really nice day, we would get a patio table and have a margarita with lunch. Only if it was a slow work day, like with nothing but webinars scheduled for the afternoon (as attendees, not presenters).
It was not uncommon to see beer in the office fridge during tax season because those folks would be pulling 15+ hour days for pretty much 3 months straight.
IT worker in system analysis and design in the public service in Canberra, Australia.
There's no official policy though many of my co workers believe a lunch time drink is not allowed. I have often enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine or a beer at lunch, have never made a secret of it, and have never been told off or warned by anyone above me
No. Work is giant liability now days.
Alcohol is bad for you health. Workplaces should be better so folks don’t feel the need to injest poison to tolerate it.
I'm currently in a production support role in the US, and I'd never consider it: I work too closely with production operatives that they'd smell it on me. My last couple of role involved programming automated forklifts, so it was strictly forbidden.
Ten years ago I was doing an internship an engineering firm in the UK, and a few times we went out for a beer with lunch. It wasn't exactly common, but it did happen.
Most places have an alcohol restriction on premises. But lunch time is your own time. Bars near the auto plants used to have 30+ beers already opened so the workers could come in slap their money down and get right to drinking at 12:05. I worked at one place where boss bought beer and pizza for the whole company for doing well that week. I think shop guys had 1 beer restrictions, for "safety". Us office guys could have more. 2 beer and pizza makes it hard to stay awake at the computer though.
Where I work, it's a non issue. As long as it doesn't impact your work and nobody notices it (foul odor or behaviour), nobody could care less.
In my previous job I had to travel very often to customer's sites or or other offices
The ones in Germany drank regularly during lunch time. I never felt comfortable to do it since my job was very technical. In one office they even had a fridge full of beers and wines that you could grab freely. I never saw anybody drinking at the office tho
Depends on what the boss does, but if I'm the most senior person, and especially if it's a conference or lunch meeting with someone I know well, and the itemized bill isn't required for reimbursement, sure thing. Have many times.
Some older companies have policies in place that define appropriate circumstances under which staff can have 1 drink during duty hours and it not be an actionable offense.
Don't drink.
Sometimes the colleagues crack open a cold one near the end on a Friday or we chill in an office corner as a sort of after-work "party"Used to work in marketing, UK. There was a frew beer fridge, with instructions to only help yourselves after 1630 on a Friday. Beers at lunch were fairly standard on a Friday, less so on other days but not unheard of.
Lol, no. I don't drink at all anymore considering how bad it is for your health, but having a drink before returning to work seems like an insanely bad idea.
Since I work from home... this is totally acceptable.
I had a bottle of hot saki at a restaurant that we walked to last month.
In the US at a white collar job. 1 (2 max) drinks every once in a long while for a work lunch is acceptable. Depends on how comfortable you are with your coworkers and if anyone else seems willing to drink a beer or two.
I personally don't drink, but my team is all WFH, so I don't doubt at all that there are some that have a beer or two with lunch. Or a glass of wine.
When we have in person events, there's a pretty strict no drinking culture, but once the event is over, usually people will shuffle off to the nearest pub or bar or we've done a board game cafe with booze before.
In my past life, I worked as Data Manager in a movie, at the lunch break, everyone would smoke pot as if nothing. I couldn't do it because I can't use computers while high.
At a professional office in the American South, I wouldn't drink alcohol for lunch, but if a coworker brought some into the office, I'd have some.
I've had white collar jobs where champagne breakfast was a thing, and blue collar jobs with heavy equipment where driving with any degree of intoxication had serious consequences but, surprisingly enough, not necessarily dismissal.
Also, decades ago, I worked with skilled laborers who would have a beer over lunch, and with concrete finishers who would drink a case of beer between 2 or 3 people while working. I feel like concrete finishers used to work for a flat dollar rate plus beer. If there was enough beer, they would stay all night long.
Forbidden by company policy. Zero tolerance for drugs or alcohol. Federally regulated manufacturing in the US.
I have worked in 6 different manufacturing companies in the US and none of them allow it. Must be a safety and liability thing.
Years ago, I was working on a house where there were several nests of these wicked looking red wasps. I had been working around them all morning quite safely. At lunch, I drank half a beer, and was almost immediately stung twice when I went back to work. I don't know if it affected my timing or my scent, or something else.
My current job is WFH, so no one would know or care. But I previously had a safety sensitive job that held us to either the same or higher standards as the federal Dept of Transportation. They were so strict that we had posters advising against drinking kombucha at lunch or using pure CBD products at all. My SO at the time had a CBD balm that I would put gloves on to help apply because I didn't want to risk it. The company said that while these products were likely fine, if an accident or something happened and we had to then take a drug test, any registerable amount would be grounds for immediate dismissal with no recourse.
Product designer/engineer in the US
If the team is going out to lunch to celebrate a special occasion, then a single drink has always been fine in the teams I worked with. I don't partake anymore because it makes me really sleepy in the afternoon.
I worked at one company that hosted a weekly happy hour. I was one of the employees who took turns setting up the kegs in the common room, and pouring drinks during the event. That was a fun place. The extra social time really improved some working relationships. And we got a surprising amount of productive work done just by talking for an hour or two while standing around sipping microbrews and wine.
US Freelance Video Editor. Extremely common, some of us even had mini bars in their offices. WFH changed all that though.
When I worked for a startup we'd sometimes go out for lunch and everyone would have a drink or two. We also kept beer in the office fridge but that was reserved for more Friday afternoons.
We have alcohol at my workplace so this happens sometimes. Just be responsible.
no.
No. My job depends on results. Alcohol affects my production. Therefore, drinking on workdays is a very dumb thing for me to do.
Edit: Downvoted because alcohol gives me terrible brain fog and I want to keep my job? Alrighty then…
Just one?
Chef/owner & I've stayed away from the 'glass of wine when you cook' because I have grown attached to my fingers. I like to relax when I drink, so it's either when I'm off or after we shut down.
Currently in Spain, probably going to end my career here and drinking is very different from where I grew up.
Lunch is at 9am, and it's common to see people having a beer (followed by coffee)
People tend to nurse drinks, it's a more social thing, and if they get buzzed it's usually low key and don't get too sloppy- however I've seen holiday parties for businesses get everyone wasted....and fiestas all bets are off, lol.
I love it here.