Cogressman to Visit My Office

[Magyar]

Well, I guess my first question is - Could there BE a legitimate reason for a politician to come to your work place? Like is your employer involved in trying to with a contract or get serious funding for something or other. While I have issues with all of that, as our system is, this is a legitimate thing for a business to do and in this situation they want to put their best foot forward.


Now you may not be privy to such going on in the company depending on your position there. But given the policies spelled out in your HR handbook ( you do have this right?)
regarding dress and politics it is a valid question you can address with HR. If you KNOW that this not that case with 100% certainty well, most cell phones have video now as well as just audio recordning capabilities and such things speak volumes in a law suit.

Unfortunatly though, I think that this is one of those situations where the only way you can come out of this without any potential ramifications is to shut up and take it.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Any suggestions for how I should handle this visit.

Point and laugh.

 

[cwalner]

Well, I guess my first question is - Could there BE a legitimate reason for a politician to come to your work place? Like is your employer involved in trying to with a contract or get serious funding for something or other. While I have issues with all of that, as our system is, this is a legitimate thing for a business to do and in this situation they want to put their best foot forward.

Yes and no. Our office is an account services center. we handle existing accounts, and are not involved with the contracting of new accounts. My company does contract with various levels of government, but our office does not handle any accounts contracted with the federal government (but we do handle many state and local government accounts)

The best guess that somebody has posited is that they are planning on transferring a group from an office in Colorado to us. The congressman may be pimping this as creating jobs in in district (leaving out that they are not new jobs only jobs taken from somebody else's district). Also the high estimate that I have heard is 40 positions, so not that big of item (IMO).

Because of all this, it would make much more sense if we had a visit from a state legislator or even our governor, but not a US congressman.

 

[332nd]

Any suggestions for how I should handle this visit.

Just before he comes to the area where you work, get everyone in your area to do the Safety Dance. Try to time it so he comes in on...

We can dance! We can... "Oh... Hi..."

(Granted you will need a lil person for the full effect.)

 

[jayh]

While there are lots of fun suggestions here.. I hope you have the good sense to just keep your mouth shut. This is not a free speech venue, you're not there on your own or representing yourself. It's not like you went to a public forum and chose to challenge him there. You are on your employer's turf, and you are representing (unwillingly, perhaps) your company and co-workers.

There are times to speak out, and times not to.

 

[Spindrift]

Due to the visit, we will be required to dress buisness professional (shirt and tie for men) despite typically having business casual dress code. This is the first time this has happened in my 12 years with the company, and I no longer own a dress shirt (that fits) or tie and will have to buy them just to go to work this day.

Buy the ugliest and cheapest tie you can find. Try Goodwill. Or go with a clip on.

Perhaps someone in management is a big donor, that could be the reason.

Wasn't Indiana run by the KKK in the 1920 or 30's?

 

[Fishstick]

Serve sushi. Point out the sushi contained more mercury than all of the vaccines combined.

 

[Lurker]

Ok, I'm daft, but with the recent spate of gubanatorial scandals, I thought most managed to resign before actually being charged with a crime. the two that come to the formemost of my mind are NY and NJ, but as I said, I thought both resigned before they got formally charged.

OH I Only said what as a leading statement. No insult intended about the TDaft part.

 

[Lurker]

While there are lots of fun suggestions here.. I hope you have the good sense to just keep your mouth shut. This is not a free speech venue, you're not there on your own or representing yourself. It's not like you went to a public forum and chose to challenge him there. You are on your employer's turf, and you are representing (unwillingly, perhaps) your company and co-workers.

There are times to speak out, and times not to.

Totally agree, but a tip to the newspaper is fine as they would not use your name. But I would imagine this sort of question editing at corporate events is par for the course.

 

[cwalner]

While there are lots of fun suggestions here.. I hope you have the good sense to just keep your mouth shut. This is not a free speech venue, you're not there on your own or representing yourself. It's not like you went to a public forum and chose to challenge him there. You are on your employer's turf, and you are representing (unwillingly, perhaps) your company and co-workers.

There are times to speak out, and times not to.

Agreed. I am staying silent (not hard, since already close to lunchtime here and I have not seen him come around yet).

I just felt frustrated about it and needed to vent so posted here for some release/sympathy.

 

[cwalner]

OH I Only said what as a leading statement. No insult intended about the TDaft part.

ok, I really am being daft. I completely misread your earlier post as 'OH' being an interjection not the abbreviation of Ohio

 

[cwalner]

Buy the ugliest and cheapest tie you can find. Try Goodwill. Or go with a clip on.

Perhaps someone in management is a big donor, that could be the reason.

Wasn't Indiana run by the KKK in the 1920 or 30's?

I got a shirt and tie for about $30 (Burlington Coat Factory). not bad, should I actually need to wear it again sometime soon.

I doubt that's the issue. And I would be really pissed to find out if the company gave any money to any political campaign as a corporate donation, seeing has they did not have enough money to grant cost of living increases for the last two years.

I don't know about it being run by the Klan, but they did have a strong presence here, and in some communities still do. I even stopped doing business with a local game store because the owner was overtly racist.

 

[cwalner]

Well,

The congressman has come and gone, and most of us did not even get a chance to see him. Apparantly, he came in for a lunch with the managers and left. According to one manager, who was at the meeting, he pretty much talked about how much the HCR bill will cost us and that they should vote for him.

Now this upsets me for a couple of reasons.

1) I had to shell out $30 and dress up for a guest that never even toured the facility.

2) It was clearly part of his mid-term re-election campaign despite a very clear 'no politics' policy at the office.

The fact that he expressed his opinion regarding HCR, which differs from mine, does not in itself bother me except as it fits into item 2 above. I am also beginning to rethink my previous response to Spindrift, regarding one of our managers being a donor. The way this was handled seems to be more of a 'thank you' for a donation than a true campaign event (small private lunch rather than addressing a large number of constituents)