The Coffee Trap – by Daniel Dumée
- Kim Leighton
- Oct 11, 2022
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 11, 2022
Asking for a coffee meeting is quite easy and in most cases, quite difficult to turn down... giving people room to be creative and allowing them to focus on issues that cannot be resolved in a conference room.
The opinions other people have about you is their problem, not yours. The less you worry about what they think of you, the less complicated your project issues become. For example:
Employment Relations Authority (ERA)
On a cursory search of the ERA case section we find over a 127 cases involve an unjustified dismissal or other termination or mistreatment of employment happening during a coffee meeting, with the most recent being Hines v KNCC (2022), leading to a finding of unjustified dismissal by Member Sarah Blick.
[33] On Thursday 11 March 2021, Mr McLaren invited Mr Hines to a café to have a coffee with him. Mr Hines says after they arrived at the café, Mr McLaren told him he had some bad news for him – that the Chairman had said he would have to be “let go”...
Coffee meetings may entail:
Privacy risk, intimidation, and shunned behaviour with no paper trail
The inability for many to say no,which may avoid due process
Being in public and outside of work as a method of escaping responsibility.
Coffee, a beverage that has sparked great innovation and bowel movements throughout history. So no wonder people as early as the 1600s were meeting up for a coffee to discuss ideas, from mathematics to revolutions, these beans fueled innovations and business like no other. Big business has even started using coffee as a method of meeting employees, and making decisions, with many even creating videos on coffee meeting etiquette.
A simple coffee between boss and employee then may seem like nothing to be afraid of; some pleasant conversation over a cup of your favourite beany concoction. It’s not, it’s a TRAP. This is your employer's favourite office and he will make full use of it to exploit you. So take my advice and say NO to coffee!
With over 127 ERA cases recorded from 2004 onwards involving the use of a coffee meeting in relation to dismissal or redundancy, the threat that use of coffee shops pose to employees is not one to be taken lightly.
Employers use coffee meetings for three main reasons:
The first is that of formality. Unlike an office where formal meetings must be scheduled, minutes taken (meeting notes), hours paid, cafe meetings need none of these.
The second is the interrogation aspect. Regardless of the intentions of your employer, employees will have to watch themselves during these meetings or risk their future employment.
Thirdly and most importantly, is the issue of being laid off. While the chances are low, many employers will use this neutral territory to pass on bad news. By being outside of an office, certain procedures and records of these events will often not be taken, depriving employees of evidence to demandtheir statutory rights.
To begin, let's further discuss formality. As mentioned above the lack of formality when attending a coffee meeting is highly desirable. Saving cost, time, and paperwork. This is the first trap. Due to no records being kept, your boss may question you or say things that in an office setting may be akin to harassment or bullying. Without the formal context, you are more vulnerable than you would ever be in an office setting.
Secondly interrogation. For many employees that have little to no communication with their boss, a sudden coffee meeting should be a red flag. This is because as mentioned above bosses may use this setting to say, question, or interrogate you in an unrecorded manner. The worst part is as an employee, it's very hard to say no to your boss's request for coffee. Leading to many unfavourable meetings that could be avoided by saying no and asking for an in-office meeting during working hours. For many employees, they will assume this meeti-”cough” interrogation (while horrible to endure) is completely ok. It's NOT! The worst part, if in their eyes you slip up and say something objectionable, you risk being mistreated and not recognised in the future, perhaps jeopardising what was a great position and benefits.
Lastly, coffee meetings as a method of laying off employees. Many employers will use coffee meetings as a place to inform employees of their redundancies and dismissals from their roles. They do this because just as per Hines v KNCC, they avoid records or a meeting to point to as the meeting where they were laid off. Added benefits for employers include the employee not immediately informing other office staff, getting advice from co-workers, and leading to a quiet exit.
All of these factors make coffee the premiere setting for these conversations. However, in a legal context, these meetings also provide an advantage, as even if the employee is in the right, if the only records of the employee state otherwise, judges will find in favour of the employer, a travesty of justice.
Conclusion
Never.... And I mean never, unless you are the one scheduling the meeting, agree to a coffee with your boss. You as an employee have so little to gain from an outside-of-office meeting with your boss. Why disadvantage yourself more than the system already does by saying yes, when saying no, while it might be hard for those agreeable among us, will always be the better option. Because you deserve a fair process, so don't let your boss bully you into thinking otherwise.
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