[notaustinpowers]

Typically not, but they absolutely feed into the higher-ups perception of you. I worked at a company an hour away from my home. So anytime we had our monthly post-work happy hour, I'd politely decline and go home. Especially as I know they'll be out until 10pm.

During one of my reviews it was mentioned that it's disappointing I don't attend the happy hours as that's when the team is able to connect and strengthen our bonds with each other.

Wasn't surprised I was let go just a few weeks later after I declined the next happy hour.

[Brusco_RF]

Look I'm not saying you need to stay out drinking until 10pm but team-building is important to any job, especially if you're a leader, and much of that team cohesiveness happens outside of work hours.

It's not too surprising if skipping all team-building events results in... not being a part of the team

[aae42]

> much of that team cohesiveness happens outside of work hours

whaaaa?

is this a common view? doing team building on personal time seems... off. To me.

remember taking my small IT team out for lunches on the company dime, and even to the movies... we even went to an escape room once... but this was all during the work day...

[JohnFen]

I think there's a large cultural component here. I've never worked at a place where any significant "team building" took place outside of work hours, but I know many devs (mostly outside the US) who told me that it does.

[Brusco_RF]

I've always had these events outside work hours. We get paid to work. After work, the company is buying us drinks but not paying us to drink them. Where's the problem?

[aae42]

Well I mean earlier in the thread they're describing issues on performance reviews due to not attending these, so I'd say that's a big problem.

I mean, I have a feeling there may have been other things at work there, but I guess I feel like you can team build without having to do it outside of work hours. If you are not being paid, I don't really see how that's legal to be required to do anything. It seems to me that if one could prove that, it could warrant some legal action as well.

[intothemild]

The problem is socializing, costs some of us a lot of energy, and anxiety.

Alcohol only increases that anxiety, and what makes it worse, is knowing that I HAVE to go to a couple to seem like a "team player".

I'll let you know what it's like, for at least 2 days leading up to the event, I'm constantly practicing things to say, then trying to figure out all dialogue trees, and what my replies should be. I will practice and practice, and the amount of stress that causes, the lack of sleep, staying up late constantly trying to figure out what to say, worrying about what someone might say back.

Running past things they have said to me, trying to categorize and itemize all the things in their lives that they have so that I can seem like I am a normal person.. just to fit into their world.

Now, you're also saying that there's going to be alcohol, which means that I will most definitely say something dumb, or slip up.. people will look at me differently, and I will get the distinct feeling that people are talking about me behind my back, and I'm being excluded from things.

Then the event happens, and I try my best to say absolutely nothing, and stick to my script... someone says something totally random to me, and I have not prepared for this, I say something back... this one interaction, one of many, will be the thing that I am now constantly beating myself up about for days if not years later. I have no idea if people hated me because I didn't reply with the correct words in the right order, with the right facial expressions... all things that I do not understand.

And on top of this... I'm expected to do this every now and then because without doing it, I'm going to be silently punished by a group of managers who cannot fathom what this is like. Or colleagues like you who think "hey, it's cool, we're getting beers!"

Sorry, but no.

I NEED my downtime, I need my time to not have to deal with all of that. YOU don't need me there.

Where's the problem?

[JohnFen]

The issue is if the company is requiring me to spend time doing company things, then I'm working and should be paid for it. If it's actually optional, then there is no problem.

Buying drinks or not doesn't really enter into it, particularly for people who don't drink.

[notaustinpowers]

1: I attended every department team building meeting we hosted every weekday morning.

2: I hosted every company-wide team building meeting every Tuesday morning.

3: I attended every quarterly week-long retreat for department team building.

I have no reason, desire, or requirement to explain to management why a recovering alcoholic might not be the best person to attend what boils down to a 5-hour-long bar crawl.

[Brusco_RF]

I'm just making a general point, I obviously know nothing about your specific situation

[notaustinpowers]

I know, no worries. Just pointing out how absurd their statement of "not meshing with the team" was their excuse for letting me go, lol. Just another tick in the box of why I steer away from any business that says "we're a family".

[JohnFen]

> much of that team cohesiveness happens outside of work hours.

How is that not unpaid labor?

[Brusco_RF]

Because it's voluntary and they're buying your food/drinks?

[JohnFen]

If it's voluntary then there is no problem.

"Voluntary" means that there will be no adverse effect on your employment if you decline to participate. Your characterization of the activity strongly implies that not participating will come with consequences to your job.

[Brusco_RF]

The opposite. Participating benefits your career.

Curious what you think about this: Say there's no company sponsorship or involvement. You get invited to happy hour or a round of golf with the higher-ups completely on your own dime. Its obviously beneficial to pal around with your superiors. Is that a problem?

[ath3nd]

> Participating benefits your career.

That means NOT participating hurts your career, or at least doesn't further it, which is the same thing. Career outlook should be dependent only on your performance at work, and requiring to do extra unpaid stuff after work is simply a form of silent exploitation, favoring young people (mostly men, as women getting wasted with their superiors might be considered unprofessional) with no dependents (e.g children).

Push that to the extreme, and you have an extremely bro-hierarchical culture like Japan, where guys are expected to spend their (unpaid) time with their superiors at karaoke bars at late parts of the night, while not doing so puts their career prospects at risk.

All kinds of these silent expectations (but not demands) achieve is form a power imbalance where the ones not wanting to participate (in senseless drinking, or idiotic child games of team building) are pushed to the fringe and not considered "team players". This, naturally, creates a culture of fear that you might miss some of those unspoken rules of the workplace, and also a form of competition of who will simp more to their boss by letting them win at laser tag. Grown up people have families to be with, old parents to take care of, hobbies to do, errands to run, so in a culture of drinking/hanging out after office hours, they often have to choose between possible career prospects or family, and that's always a hard choice.

[stemlord]

I couldn't disagree with you more. That employees must work (yes, this is work by your own admission) outside working hours is at the very least ironic. It's an insidious form of exploitation.

Team building happens by relying on each other while doing your actual jobs. That is the extent of a relationship needed among colleagues in a professional context.