“Fancy a drink after work?” There is no better criterion against which you can assess your career decisions than your first response when this question is asked. In some jobs, the thought of imbibing with colleagues is a pleasant one; round after round of free drinks, amusing office gossip, potential tongue sandwiches with the bird from accounts, and everyone has the courtesy to remember to forget to remember the night’s events by 9.00am the following day.
In other jobs, the offer of a drink (often of the enforced variety) arouses altogether different emotions; round after round of expensive drinks, repellent office gossip, potential snog with the ugly bird from accounts, and everyone has the perfidy to forget to remember to forget the night’s occurrences.
If you concerned about the quality of your after-work drinking, rate your job using the scenarios below.
GOOD – you have an overpaid and generous boss
BAD – you have a badly paid boss. Or you are the boss.
GOOD – You work with people of broadly similar interests (e.g. children’s television of the 1980s, pop music etc)
BAD – You work with the elderly or soap addicts. Or in IT.
GOOD – You work in a large team and go to the pub in a group
BAD – You work in a large team and go to the pub as a group, then they all piss off and leave you with Gary the Geek.
When you are in a job interview and they ask “do you have any questions you would like to ask”, the most pertinent response is “where is your local?” A visit to this pub will then determine whether you should take the job. If it is a Wetherspoons, it’s time to find another recruitment consultant.