I’m getting married in 70 some odd days and our invitations are going out this week. Do we invite our respective boss’? We both work for the same company in Boston. My wife and I are actually pretty high up the totem poll and we tend to keep our private affairs private. As we work in a professional environment it is the way to go. Most people know we are engaged, but my boss - if you can call him that, he’s more of a section head - is not the greatest pickle in the patch. He’s nice when he wants to be but a veritable pig when he doesn’t want to be.
As an experimental archaeologist, I am on travel quite often. I don’t have very many good aquaintences at work. Most of the people I deal with on a day to day basis are engineer’s geologists and architects. And most are not in house most are onsite somewhere or at their own facilities.
I’m really not too sure about this. I have a coworker - our project leader - who I am close to but thats it. And I would hate to have he and his wife come and the section head and others not even get an invite. But then again it’s my wedding and I can invite anyone I please. On the other hand I work with these people everyday!
Do you want your boss at your wedding? Invite him.
Would you rather your boss was not at your wedding? Don’t invite him.
Nobody is “owed” an invitation to anything, including a wedding. But if you feel you absolutely must invite him, invite him to the wedding but not the reception.
Personally, I think work life should be separate from personal life. If you were good friends with your boss, I’d say go for it. But in this case, don’t bother. Weddings should be celebrated by those close to you, not by everyone in your acquaintance.
I wasn’t invited to any of my coworker’s weddings, nor did I expect to be. And when we did our reaffirmation of vows some years back, the only coworkers we invited were those we considered to be friends. Just don’t make a big deal about it in the office.
The best part is I am not in the office very much. My job by it’s very nature is quite mobile. I can take a bicker from someone if they thought they were going to be invited but weren’t. I don’t think I am going to invite him. It’s just our way to separate work and private life. And if I go independant someday I’m not going to care anyway…
It’s your wedding, invite who you want to invite, you’ll be hapier in the long run that way. Many wedding traditions have been thrown out the window. I know at my wedding, I knew every person there and I loved each of them (except I didn’t know the two women my cousins brought as dates, with my invitation to do so of course) and we had a blast, the best party I’ve ever been to. So my advice is to make yourself happy, don’t worry about manners or what people will think.
A freind of mine used the rule, “if we have been to their house or they to ours in the last year they get an invite.”
That said if it will ruin your special day to have him there don’t invite him.
BUT, if it will ruin your workplace environment for the forseeable future, do do do invite him. Intergity is great but office politics is also very important.
I really struggled with this for my wedding several years ago, I worked in a fairly ‘social’ office/academic work place. After discussing it with some people at work and some elsewhere, we decided that our wedding was really about family: creating our new family and joining our existing ones.
So, the work people who were really friends got invites and the others didn’t. It really wasn’t a problem. The only difference was that I didn’t get a wedding shower at work - the person who usually organized them was not a good friend and wasn’t invited. My work friends came to a different wedding shower, and I went to the shower that my husband’s office threw for us.
A friend of mine had a very different experience. His wife’s father was paying for the wedding, in a small town where he ran a business. They invited many, many work friends of the father, because it was expected in that generation and in that town that that’s how it would work. It seemed to be well understood as a social obligation. They got lots of china.
So, think about what the purpose of the gathering is. It can be many things, all of which are ok. Then do what fits in best with that.
If you’re inviting everyone else in the office, then it would probably be bad form to not invite your boss. If you’re not inviting everyone else, then an invitation is not necessary.