Workday is over, so your behavior is your business, right? Wrong.

Publication: The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.) (via Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service)

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COPYRIGHT 2004 The Orange County Register

Byline: Harry Wessel

Most workers have a good idea of what is acceptable on-the-job behavior and what isn't.

Knock back a beer in your cubicle? Never.

Perform a striptease in the cafeteria? No way.

Yell obscenities at co-workers? Absolutely not.

But what happens when workers are off the clock? Is it OK to let your hair down on the weekend and not face repercussions when you return to work on Monday?

That depends on where and for whom you work.

"What gets you in trouble in Orlando may not get you in trouble in San Francisco or Boston," said Marshall Schminke, a professor of management at the University of Central Florida. "The higher you go in an organization, the blurrier the line becomes between a professional right to privacy and a personal right to privacy."

Schminke, who specializes in business ethics, views company attitudes toward off-duty behavior as a balancing act. Companies want to ensure their reputations are not sullied by...

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