How? What is required to make that so?
The “Not your business. Ignore it and eventually he will get fired” crowd blow me away. Putting aside the harm he is doing and may do to the business, this person personally needs HELP. Whether you take it to an administrator or the owner or talk to the co-worker directly, he needs to know his actions are noticed. It may wake him up to make changes or seek help.
The words are SMELLING STRONGLY OF ALCOHOL.
Consolation- If the workplace is aware that the employee is drinking while on the job, and sends him merrily on to the highway, the employer will be brought into any case resulting from an accident. There are numerous cases about happy hours, work retirement parties, Christmas parties etc where there were accidents on the way home.
My company’s policy is mandatory rehab - walked out of the building right into a cab. I am curious as to how many times the same person can get sent there.
The policy at every company I’ve ever worked for is employer-provided transportation after holiday parties.
I own a business. Maybe the owner knows and is working on it (or not), and maybe they don’t know. What the owner should be worried about is that this is the perception of this employee, and your opinion of the company where you work is so bad you don’t think they value you and your coworkers enough to address it.
I really hate it when too far after something is going on I hear employees say they knew but didn’t say anything. I don’t have eyes in back of my head. And sometimes I am working on something with an employee and all I would say back is thank you for alerting me, it is being addressed.
I say address the boss privately.
Most of the workplaces I’ve worked had had a strong zero-tolerance for drinking during working hours.
If I had encountered a co-worker like this, I’d be required to report him/her to HR and my immediate supervisor per firm policy.
If there’s a firm party, one wasn’t allowed to return straight back to work* after attending and transportation home was arranged via car service afterwards.
One reason why many firms are less tolerant of drinking during working hours is precisely because alcohol tolerance could vary greatly by individual due to genetics and other factors.
For instance, one younger post-college friend could seriously be wobbly and on the floor from merely drinking half a can of bud-light whereas the rest of his family…including his grandmothers could each drink 3 6 packs of strong IPAs of 10% alcohol content or greater and still be practically stone-cold sober.
Much easier for a firm to handle this by barring drinking during working hours.
- This policy was emphasized when I worked for a biglaw firm as there's a tendency for some attorneys/paralegals to return to the office from office parties to continue working.
My law firm had limos hired to drive everyone home from the annual New Year’s Eve bash they threw. They let all attendees know and urged everyone to get dropped off for the party so they could have s nice limo ride home. They’d drive guests wherever they were scheduled to be next. They drive me over an hour to get to my sister’ place and then I went home from her party with H and the kids, who met me at that 2nd party. I had no alcohol but enjoyed the limo ride anyway.
There is “dramshop liability” if one serves or permits alcohol on premises and then the person leaves the premises impaired and injures anyone or anything.
Every law firm I’ve ever worked at has done the same. The large law firms often loosely coordinate dates so there won’t be a shortage of cars available on a particular night.
Well, this is additional discovery. New evidence, as it were. Still, from the business’ perspective how much is someone drinking?
The guy could be a functional alcoholic. Not good for the person or someone who may be driving around him.
I have no problem with someone drinking as long as they are not impaired. Hard to judge based on the evidence. Current employer does not allow return to office after drinking. I don’t drink much myself, so that was never an issue. I have had other jobs where it was not unusual for the boss to buy drinks at lunch and still go back to work.
Big difference between drinking and drunk. Enforcement really depends on the rules of the organization. If you think he is endangering people on the road, address it with law enforcement.
Sorry I see this as classic CYA actions.
Years ago I had a coworker pass out drunk in the restroom at work and suffer a severe head injury. Afterward, the director threw up his hands and said, “Why didn’t anyone tell me he had a problem?”
Well because the director was at the same events and meetings with the disturbing behavior and did nothing about it.
OP; You should do nothing and stop talking about with your coworkers. Nothing good will come of it.
That’s a ridiculous comment, Mater S. No, our CEO (large Fortune 500 company) was not aware that this man had a drinking problem to this extent. Frankly, it was an industry known for some heavy drinking. It was frustration that the situation escalated because no one addressed it sooner. Not at all CYA. Maybe you should believe my account of it since I was actually involved and you were not. Just a suggestion… And people wonder why there are problems in corporate America. (see post 49)
I do not think the CEOs of many large co’s are aware of what even the members of the higher management are doing, especially if the co has more than one location and more than a handful of employees at each location.
ETA - cross-posted with MOfWC.
Missed that the OP said “strong” smell of alcohol. Given that, it makes no sense that the smell is gone five minutes later. It just doesn’t, from a physiological point of view.
There needs to be some way to make sure that the accusation is true and not acted upon as though it’s true. In nursing, we absolutely are required to report any suspicion of impairment. But the nurse in question is immediately tested because the ramifications of an untrue report of impairment, even if with good intentions, are devastating to that nurse’s career. The employee should have some way to prove his innocence if he is indeed innocent, and the employer should be able to state with confidence that he is under the influence if that is the case so the employer is protected as well.
BTW, many (if not most) mouthwashes will show up as a high level of alcohol on the standard breathalyzer tests for quite a while after rinsing. There would need to be a foolproof method of getting the BAC.
I googled and found that mouthwash is not the only thing that can register on a breathalyzer.
http://www.lacriminaldefensepartners.com/mouth-alcohol-and-dui/
Solution seems to be at least a 15 minute waiting period after making the determination that a test needs to be done.
This is one reason bosses exist. Tell the boss in person or report your concerns anonymously.
So, one choice is to go to your boss or HR with your concerns, either individually or as a group with your other coworkers.
What you can’t/shouldn’t do is continue to gossip about it amongst yourselves now that you’ve compared your observations and are in concurrence.
If you are unwilling to speak up, singularly or collectively, you need to let it go. It’s not fair to the coworker who is being talked about or to the destructive effects on departmental productivity and morale to keep discussing this unless you are willing to deal with it.
My guess is it will continue to bother you so the only option is to say something and then let others in a position to do so handle it.
Sorry I don’t know how many levels of management the individual you referenced was below the CEO. I can only say in my case we were upbraided for something that management knew about. I was just giving a different point of view. I was not trying to say anything more.
I worked as an engineer for 20+ years. You never snitched on a coworker. It was career suicide. That was the corporate culture. Definitely the old boy’s network. I also worked in companies where you could only report incidents to your immediate supervisor, never to HR or your bosses boss.
Certainly the culture of GM is very different than that of Google or a family business. The CEOs of young dynamic companies are probably more in touch with many levels of employees than those old dinosaur companies.
BTW my OG husband is working at a tech start-up with micro-brews on tap. Maybe drinking is making a comeback.
I don’t really see it as snitching. In this day of substance abuse and more recognition of the perils of addiction, I see it as doing the employee a favor.
@doschicos I wouldn’t call it “gossiping” to talk to one other person who is observing the same thing, in order to corroborate what could be an accusation with significant consequences.
@fendrock That is why I wrote “now that you’ve compared your observations and are in concurrence.” I agree that it is good and helpful to corroborate observations. However, I personally feel that if you do nothing and continue to talk about it, it then does become gossip. That is the point I am trying to make.
Very surprised by the number of people saying MYOB. I would report to his supervisor.