Tis the season to be jolly

15 December 2009

As the Christmas office party season gets into full swing, for many this is a time to eat drink and be merry.  However for employers it is a sobering thought that recent research puts the cost to British firms of over indulgence in the festive season at around £100 million, as a result of low productivity and time off over this period.
Of course, this year over indulgence may not be such an issue, as businesses are feeling the squeeze, and increasingly the result seems to be that the poor unsuspecting Christmas party is the next victim of the credit crunch.

Instead of dwelling on all this doom and gloom, and just in case this year does not provide enough office party tales of woe for our amusement, the employment team at Warners thought sharing some past classics would provide a better read than another run down on how to conduct a redundancy procedure!

Probably the most memorable case we came across was one where an employee was returning to the dinner table with a tray of vodka shots, but having already had one too many she tripped as she approached the table spilling the tray of vodka shots over her boss and the candles that were on the table.  Not too bad you may think, except that the combination of these events at once set her boss on fire, singeing his eyebrows and reducing her bonus all in one fell swoop. Owch!

Then there is the case where after a few too many drinks (again!), a guy fell off the table he was dancing on and while apparently fine for the rest of the party, the next day he couldn’t move and was signed off work for two weeks with whiplash.  Now you start to see how that hundred million pounds is calculated.

The MD failed to see the funny side at a Christmas party that took place in a Greek restaurant.  Unfortunately the HR Manager had not realised when seeing plates smashed in the show, that you are supposed to use specially supplied plates for this, and proceeded to smash the MD on the head with a proper dinner plate, causing cuts and quite a large headache.

What most employees have to hope for is that it is the boss who embarrasses himself, like the one who performed the ‘Right Said Fred’ stripping routine at the office party.  No doubt it was refreshing for his office the following day when he was the one acting sheepish rather than them.

Finally a story which always produces a smile is the office party where a rather large gentleman decided to photocopy his backside.  What started as a quick laugh descended into pain as he heard an almightily crack and realised the glass cover had broken, trapping inside the photocopier with shards of glass sticking into him.  While undoubtedly there were grounds for a disciplinary in this case having broken such an expensive piece of machinery, the laughs which he gave the entire office while they waited for the ambulance to arrive and remove him fortunately saved his job.  

So, before you go to your office party, if you don’t want to end up being one of the statistics make sure that you are sensible and remember “everything in moderation”.  Or of course, you could just let your hair down and go for it!