Blame it on the Beer
By Antony  Rajkumar

At a crowded pub amid the din of music, I managed to overhear a conversation at a nearby table. It wasn’t entirely surprising that the guys were from the advertising fraternity, what with the pub’s extended happy hours generously serving up pints to drown the sorrows of our corporate life. One was saying why he wanted to leave his job and his friend was explaining why he had left so many.

Eavesdropping can sometimes be very amusing - almost akin to a naughty peep through the keyhole. Combined with the disadvantages of wine, it made me mistake words for thought! But I did leave the place musing on the similarities between why people hop pubs and jobs and to put them in words. Here are some reasons you might have used and some more that can come in handy one day!

The Pub Hopper
Some just have non-stick bottoms. Nomadic by nature, their CVs run into several pages - not necessarily with achievements but with a list of agencies that can give a directory a serious complex. You are what you are. Keep it going. Until the day one of the global holding companies acquires every single company and makes it a rule never to rehire, one can enjoy the scenery. Go ahead - the list is long and everybody needs somebody.

No More Happy Hours
When a corporate environment resembles a pub during happy hours, it is very accommodating of all kinds. But business challenges can bring happy hours to an end faster than you can say “another pint please,” leaving the revellers to slowly fade away into the night. Many companies have seen it happen, some more often than others. Conventionally the smaller/ niche set-ups clamp up quickly, but then again, I may be wrong.

On the other hand, when the going gets tough, even the larger ones start looking at their resources more carefully and evaluate performance more strictly. It can get difficult for the ones who stay in the game mainly for the free drinks. Find your happy hour someplace else mate!

The Dance Floor is Too Small
And then there are times when you feel that you are not getting enough of the action. You feel stifled, like the backstage person who is often denied his 10 seconds of fame. The music could be good, but you can’t put your foot on the dance floor because there already so many others dirty dancing on it. If you are in the mood to move and shake it, you move on to where you can do it!

The Music is Bad
You cannot be blamed if the pub is playing really bad music. In the corporate scene, it is the culture that may be to blame. Let’s face it, businesses come and go, but the culture of a place is stickier and if that fails to glue us to it and create the magic that we get out of bed for, it’s time to go.

Can’t Stand this Crowd
You may, at some point, have walked out of a pub on finding the crowd distasteful. Don Marquis, a man who performed many roles with the pen, once famously wrote, “I drink only to make my friends seem interesting.” Sadly, that’s not a viable option and not one that one’s liver will normally agree with. And quite frankly, people don’t change overnight unless you work with a bunch of schizophrenics.
The worst moments pass if you are part of a good team and the best are barely tolerable if you are in a disagreeable crowd. Business is all about people, but even a handful of deadbeats can make it a bad crowd. If you are not playing together, you are in the wrong game. As Pepsi puts it, you need to change the game.

That One's Got Booze
There are better things in life than a job, but a job makes up for not having them! Face it, some organisations can just run out of steam. The business is changing so much that sometimes you wonder whether you had signed up for the wrong thing. Some of us are better off with apple pies than pie charts. The litany of sorrows can go on. But perhaps there are some places where a company is still your idea of what it should be. If you find one, walk across and sign up!

The Legacy Bar
Some pubs have a rich history and vintage appeal, and we often enjoy spending an evening or two basking in their glory. But a workplace is an entirely different matter if it starts resembling an archaeological site crowded with fossils (i.e., people who are long past their sell by date but linger on because no one knows how to get them off the rack!). You can’t get past them with your ideas or with your career. So you keep moving till you become one!

I’d Better Walk Before I Crawl
In the beginning of one’s career, one does a lot of things in the same position (read designation), and as time passes by, one does pretty much the same thing, but in different positions (again read designations). When realisation dawns, they become people who drink to drown their sorrows! But when better or bitter senses prevail, they are like the ones who have been told that sorrows know how to swim!

Fortunately the business is evolving, changing, growing and taking new shapes. When you’ve had one too many, you say goodbye to Captain Morgan and find dry land close by for another shot. The trick is to stay high if you want to stay in the business.

The Bouncer is Getting Me Fresh Air
Well okay, you don’t always leave a pub of your own free will. Sometimes you are taken out and not going to be let back in anytime soon, if ever. This one needs no explanation. Whatever may be the reasons you were shown the door, you are at least very clear that you have to find another one someplace else that will let you in. Happy hunting, and hey, mind the bouncer!

I’d Rather Have Coffee (Smell the Coffee Beans)
“Alcohol is necessary for a man so that he can have a good opinion of himself, undisturbed by the facts.” You’ll find many who don’t know this line but live by it sitting pretty on bar stools. Sometimes corporate life too in many ways creates such illusions that get us hooked. Business can bring to mind the line from “Hotel California”: ”You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.” No, not true for everybody though. Some just call it a day after a long night and move on to more mundane, less frenzied occupations, ranging from professional wrestling to shrimp farming to running a resort in Ranthambore…

So there you have your reasons. Don’t worry about how it looks to someone else. Remember beauty is in the eyes of the beer holder!