Unusual Office Carry

E

ErikD

Joined
Dec 5, 2000
Messages
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To set the scene a bit I currently work for a company that develops and supports trading software for the finance industry. I work in an office with casual dress code.

I have been carrying a pocket knife with me pretty much non stop since I was in high school (technically illegal at the time, but not very much enforced). I have been working for the same company for about 6 years, and my EDC has shifted around a bit during the time. Pretty much run the gamut from Queen to Emerson.

So this morning I wake up and decide to carry a custom Emerson Commander, something I have done many times before. Toward the end of the day (Friday and end of a long hard week) a bunch of us are sitting around chatting. A coworker looks at me and asks "Hey, is that a knife in your pocket?", to which I respond "yup". We go back and forth for a bit, after which my boss just interjects with something along "dude, he has it every day you just noticed?". Nothing went in a negative direction, or made anyone have any cause for concern, but to be honest I keep a 50 cal round on my desk just cause they are so cool. A couple of others in ear shot made smart ass comments (funny ones too if you ask me), and then we all shared a drink for happy hour. I think my work environment is probably a bit unique.

Mental sticky for me - just cause nobody says something doesn't mean people don't notice.

My question to everyone else is what (if) anything does everyone else carry which would probably be considered out of place to the office? What is your experience?
 
I have carried all kinda of folders in my office from the small Shirogoroc NeOn to the larger Direware SOLO V5.
My office is small (7 people total) and no one cares. I get knives shipped there all the time and one of my coworkers (the only female there actually) knows that I am into knives and buy/sell them frequently, so whenever I get a package, she asks to see what knife I got in.
It also helps that she is the only other person who carrys a knife at my office, and her husband works for 5.11 Tactical.

I carried knives in my other jobs too (larger offices) and no one seems to really care.
 
Maybe or maybe not a stun gun, a knife from the collection, and a pistol.
If I do or do not have such things on my person, no one would EVER notice.
And that would be by design, not happenstance.
 
My daily AA meetings are as close as I get to office but I have been told that if I DIDN'T have a large fighter on my hip, they would think something was wrong.
 
Last year my client followed me into my home office as I removed my concealed pistol and put it on my flat file. (Flat file contains firearms and knives, not blueprints, because everything is in the computer nowadays.)
Him, known to me as a gun owner: I didn't know you carried.
Me, casually: Sure, doesn't everybody?
Him: I could do that.
Yesterday he told me he signed up for the required CCW classes.
 
ErikD said:
My question to everyone else is what (if) anything does everyone else carry which would probably be considered out of place to the office? What is your experience?
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I work in a small law office ("high-conflict" family law) for an attorney who is also a family member. This technically affords me the latitude to carry almost any (folding) knife, but I choose only to carry what I need for office chores and typically something that looks 'professional' or non-threatening--e.g. a Benchmade 940-1, Spyderco Dragonfly, or something in-between. (Also, all of the people who've worked in the office since I started 6 years ago have been women at least ~25 years older than me, so it's not exactly a show-and-tell situation when it comes to pocketknives, or weaponry.)
So no great stories yet, unfortunately. I try to be discrete.
 
I work in management in a blue collar industry and it's not unusual for guys in my position to have some holdover style from the days they worked in the field -- jeans, boots, knives, multi-tools, etc. HOWEVER, I do show my secretary all of my new knives. She thinks I am a loveable maniac.
 
Back when I worked as a programmer at a major computer manufacturer in Austin, the PTB frowned on carrying anything that could be a weapon. I also happened to be on the corporate first response team (EMS for the company).

I used the same duty belt for responding with my VFD and for the CRT. On the belt, I carried a pair of fixed blade Kabar shorties, a pair of trauma shears, a 4 lb radio, glucometer kit, and pocket mask (for CPR). My personal BP cuff, stethoscope, pulse oximetry unit were in a small back pack and I had a company provided specially constructed gear bag with a D cylinder of O2 and administration equipment, a defibrillator, and assorted bandages/etc. I would wear the belt and carry the back pack in from my vehicle every day and where ever I went during the work day (meetings, computer test labs, factory assembly lines), I packed along both the back pack and the O2/Defib/Trauma bag. I responded to 9 separate buildings in the complex.

I would set off every metal detector I went through. :D I caught a little grief at the beginning because of the FBs but I just told them

"You want a full-up EMT on the team? Then I carry the equipment I want to use. I'm not having a separate set-up for on/off work. Take it or leave it."

They then said

"Can't you just leave it at your desk and go get it if you need it?"

I said "You mean my desk in 5, when I go to a meeting in C, and have to run 200 yards back to 5, past E and then come back to E in the event someone has a heart attack? Are you some kind of stupid?"

Fortunately, the top dog in my area was a retired Marine Colonel and he was the one whose decision mattered and he saw it my way. They chose to take it and let me do it my way. Still got a bitching about my gear from all kinds of people. Until the day one of the admin assistants for one of the senior management people dropped in the lobby with a heart attack. I happened to be at a meeting in the building and was on scene in less than 2 minutes. She was one of my 5 "saves" (where we get a heart beat back AND the patient walks out of the hospital).

Never heard another single complaint about "Why do you drag all that equipment around?" or "Do you REALLY need all that stuff?"
 
My financial adviser/planner wears a suit everyday and carries a ZT0301. He bought it from me years ago and shows it off to all of his clients. Every once in a while he tells me about scaring the snot out of a client as they just don't expect that knife to come out of a suit pocket in an office environment. For the most part his clients are rednecks like me and love it!
 
Right now the biggest knife I carry to the office is a ZT 0452CF, and that's because I usually don't like to EDC larger folders. But the ZT 0452CF certainly isn't a small knife. I work as a programmer in one of the largest tech companies in the world, and my office is in San Francisco. I don't flaunt the knife around, but I also don't try to hide it much. Most of my coworkers know I have a folder and several others EDC something of their own.

One of my coworkers very recently had someone make a comment about how they thought it was inappropriate that he had a folder. But he's extra open about carrying. He uses it to open people's beers, and he very openly uses it to open packages. I don't think we have any official rules against it, so I plan on continuing to EDC in the office. It seems to me that a bigger factor in determining if a knife is "inappropriate" will be about how one uses it.

Not too long ago I had a couple of RMJ hawks delivered to the office. One of my coworkers asked me to take them out of the box. That, I wasn't comfortable doing. My department would have been excited to see them, but I just don't know how other people would react. Busting out a tomahawk without testing the waters first in an office environment is more often than not, probably not work appropriate (photo not taken in office).

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Typical carry for me is a stout folder - a ZT or spydie. Recently I have started carrying a small fixed blade, a JOSH Gallardo custom in a slip sheath. Even more recently I lashed a CPK EDC in a kydex sheath to my backpack. To my surprise, several guys and even a couple of the women in the office have identified that they are also interested in knives. One project manager who works for me is a genuine knife nut and it's a usual topic of conversation.

About 2 months ago I learned from the owner of the company (family run business, his wife and daughters run the place as 2nd and 3rd generation) that CC was ok with them. Now my edc rotation includes my VBob commander 1911.
 
I'm in a small art room in semi-rural Florida. My co-worker likes Spydercos; I like non-Spydercos and carry larger 3.75" to 4.5" blades, everything from a ZT 452, BM 701 or Crooked River, Pro-tech Godfather, Brous Vendetta or VR-71, or CRKT Otanoshi Noh-Ken. I use them fairly often since much of the stock is roll-fed and slitting paper with a knife is a lot faster than hacking it with a scissor. The only remark I've gotten from a non-knife person was from one of the secretaries. I needed a ream paper and had to cut the strap on a new box. I had switched my EDC that day to a small Kershaw Kuro which is assisted open. She heard the click and looked over and got this shocked look on her face as I stuck it back in my pocket. "Oh my God! You carry a knife?" So I had to explain I didn't like cutting apples and pears with rusty box cutters and she got the idea, but I'm still careful around her now.
 
When I was growing up during the 1960s every boy in my rural elementary school carried a folding pocket knife and used them to sharpen pencils, carve sticks, open tins and milk cartons and play 'stretch' at recess. I graduated to a SAK Spartan in around 1965 (found one in the grass at a park and promptly threw out my clunky Boy Scout folder) and have carried a SAK in my pants pocket ever since. All knives are verboten in schools nowadays and I became a 7/8 Science teacher at one point some 15 years ago. The Principal noticed I was using it to sharpen pencils in the detention hall and exclaimed that knives were absolutely forbidden. I mentioned that I had always carried one because they're so immensely useful whereupon he said it wasn't me he was worried about but what if a student got hold of it. To which I replied that child would have bigger problems because he'd have had to forcefully take it from me. Long story short I hung my car and school keys on the knife ring that evening and referred to the whole works as a keychain after that. The Principal never bugged me anymore either and even borrowed it once in awhile. Perception is often quite different from reality!
 
I once worked in an office that forbade the carry of knives and carried one daily. Same sort of EDC rotation I had now. No one ever said anything.

After being there a couple of years I was teaching a training class and whipped out my knife to open a box and one of my students asked about it because they, like everyone else, had been told they couldn't bring them in.

I responded that we're not allowed to have them, but I've chosen to bring one anyway. I can't tell you that you're allowed to have one, as you're not and may be written up or termed if you're found with it, but no one has ever said a word about mine. Just don't be a jackass and you'll probably be fine.

I later asked our department head, who'd actually borrowed my knife from time to time, why he never mentioned anything about my obvious violation. His response was priceless. "Sometimes I need to cut shit. You're a lot easier to track down in here than a pair of scissors."
 
I'm in middle management at the fortune 10 company. Typical cube farm office environment. I don't carry anything with an exposed clip but do EDC a small folder every day. It's a no weapons policy work place but my argument would always be it's a tool not a weapon. I didn't say I would win the argument
 
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