Let’s face it: we love to eat. We love it so much that when we engage in this scrumptious, feel-good hobby of ours, we rarely pause and think: how do I look right now? When it comes to food, we transform from poised, study-hard students into graceless, animalistic cavemen. We gobble, slurp, and swallow until every last morsel of food is down our throats or on our faces.
I’m the last to judge. Of all my friends, I’m always the one with leftover food smudged on my face. Rather than waiting for my food to come to me, I hunch over and graciously meet it halfway. Oh, and I’ll almost always steal off your plate.
But how we conduct ourselves over a meal is more important than we might think. It’s common for prospective employers to take a job candidate out for lunch--not explicitly to analyze fork and knife positions, but to get a feel for the person over what’s “supposed” to be a relaxed, out-of-the-work-zone environment. For quasi-animalistic eaters like me, this screams help. The gargly slurping, loud sipping, cow chewing of our natural habitats transferred to the critical eyes of our next boss? I think not.
1. Buttering the bread: oh, such a thorny one. When I see fresh, hot rolls plopped on a table, my first instinct is to grab one, slab on mounds of butter, and devour it in three bites. Tempting? Yes. Attractive to an employer? Not quite. To master the messy realms of the bread roll, break it apart in small pieces, butter ONLY one piece at a time, and eat slowly and in small bites. Also--a tidbit I didn’t know. When you pick up the bread-basket, the polite thing to do is offer it to your dining companion before you lunge for it yourself.
2. Never tell a host you’re not a fan of the food, even if you consider it borderline inedible. The purpose of the meal isn’t to soothe your taste palette, but to exchange conversation and impress with your words. So, if possible, try to hide your squeamish face and make a dent in the icky muck. Hey, from an etiquette patrol’s point of view, at least not-so-good food means not-so-big bites.
3. Don’t accept cocktail offers, however tempting it might be to join your prospective boss in a loopy daze. Rather than loose, impressive answers, the more likely scenario is silly blunders and awkward post-dinner stumbles. So save the champagne for the celebratory toast after you get the job. It’ll taste even better then.
4. Eat in small pieces! This may seem like an obvious one, but come that to-die-for steak and before long we’re engaged in a self-competition to the finish line. App
roach your food slowly, and stick to the small, easy-to-swallow pieces. You’ll achieve fluid conversation without having to awkwardly motion “one-second” with your fingers.
5. Order a meal that is easy to eat--no matter how tempting other menu descriptions may be. We all love sauce-soaked chicken wings and stuffed-to-the-brim turkey clubs, but even the most ladylike of the pack can’t approach these savory wonders without a whole lotta mess. So unless you’ve mastered the art of the messy food, it’s probably best to save all that greasy, sloppy stuff for later.
6. Probably Jean’s most important piece of advice, underlying everything else she so expertly passed along: It’s not about the food! The point of elegantly dining with your prospective boss isn’t to restaurant hop and food explore, but to communicate and genuinely c
onnect in conversation. Dining, and the oh-so-yummy food that comes with it, is the mere backdrop in which the employer-employee interaction transpires. No matter your locale, the aim is always the same: to position yourself as an impressive and likeable candidate for the job. It’s an opportunity to give your employer a feel for you: how you’ll contribute to the field, yes, but also what you’re like---how your persona will mesh into the job’s social and professional dynamics.
But how we conduct ourselves over a meal is more important than we might think. It’s common for prospective employers to take a job candidate out for lunch--not explicitly to analyze fork and knife positions, but to get a feel for the person over what’s “supposed” to be a relaxed, out-of-the-work-zone environment. For quasi-animalistic eaters like me, this screams help. The gargly slurping, loud sipping, cow chewing of our natural habitats transferred to the critical eyes of our next boss? I think not.That’s where Dining with Confidence comes in, a Career-Services sponsored program dedicated to reforming, and yes humanizing, our dining behavior. The vision of refined, lady-like eating herself, etiquette expert (and Career Services Director) Jean Papalia headed the event. She imparted her wise, worldly words of advice over a delicious four-course meal: butternut squash soup, salad, chicken, and a heavenly chocolate cake.
Jean started the program with true and false quiz, complete with clickers and fancy graphs detailing the room’s results. Then we applied our newly acquired etiquette techniques to the food itself. Here are some dining tidbits I learned throughout the afternoon:
Jean started the program with true and false quiz, complete with clickers and fancy graphs detailing the room’s results. Then we applied our newly acquired etiquette techniques to the food itself. Here are some dining tidbits I learned throughout the afternoon:
1. Buttering the bread: oh, such a thorny one. When I see fresh, hot rolls plopped on a table, my first instinct is to grab one, slab on mounds of butter, and devour it in three bites. Tempting? Yes. Attractive to an employer? Not quite. To master the messy realms of the bread roll, break it apart in small pieces, butter ONLY one piece at a time, and eat slowly and in small bites. Also--a tidbit I didn’t know. When you pick up the bread-basket, the polite thing to do is offer it to your dining companion before you lunge for it yourself.2. Never tell a host you’re not a fan of the food, even if you consider it borderline inedible. The purpose of the meal isn’t to soothe your taste palette, but to exchange conversation and impress with your words. So, if possible, try to hide your squeamish face and make a dent in the icky muck. Hey, from an etiquette patrol’s point of view, at least not-so-good food means not-so-big bites.
3. Don’t accept cocktail offers, however tempting it might be to join your prospective boss in a loopy daze. Rather than loose, impressive answers, the more likely scenario is silly blunders and awkward post-dinner stumbles. So save the champagne for the celebratory toast after you get the job. It’ll taste even better then.
4. Eat in small pieces! This may seem like an obvious one, but come that to-die-for steak and before long we’re engaged in a self-competition to the finish line. App
roach your food slowly, and stick to the small, easy-to-swallow pieces. You’ll achieve fluid conversation without having to awkwardly motion “one-second” with your fingers.5. Order a meal that is easy to eat--no matter how tempting other menu descriptions may be. We all love sauce-soaked chicken wings and stuffed-to-the-brim turkey clubs, but even the most ladylike of the pack can’t approach these savory wonders without a whole lotta mess. So unless you’ve mastered the art of the messy food, it’s probably best to save all that greasy, sloppy stuff for later.
6. Probably Jean’s most important piece of advice, underlying everything else she so expertly passed along: It’s not about the food! The point of elegantly dining with your prospective boss isn’t to restaurant hop and food explore, but to communicate and genuinely c
onnect in conversation. Dining, and the oh-so-yummy food that comes with it, is the mere backdrop in which the employer-employee interaction transpires. No matter your locale, the aim is always the same: to position yourself as an impressive and likeable candidate for the job. It’s an opportunity to give your employer a feel for you: how you’ll contribute to the field, yes, but also what you’re like---how your persona will mesh into the job’s social and professional dynamics.After two hours of etiquette training, I can’t exactly say I’m the world’s most delicate eater. But the dining tidbits I gathered will certainly help when the not-so-far-off time comes to start job hunting and impressing employers. And maybe after enough professional dining, we’ll come to apply some newfound grace and charm to our own everyday eating. That might take more time though…
Missed this semester's Dining with Confidence program? Be on the lookout for future opportunities to master the art of professional dining, small talk and more!
Missed this semester's Dining with Confidence program? Be on the lookout for future opportunities to master the art of professional dining, small talk and more!
