Prior to the party, says David Barron, labor and employment attorney at Cozen O'Connor, you should:

review your policies prohibiting drug and alcohol abuse, harassment, dating, fighting, weapons, and other misconduct;
educate supervisors and employees about the no-harassment, no-retaliation and EEO policies and the procedures for reporting and responding to harassment, discrimination or retaliation claims;
make sure you have consistently disciplined violators of policies;
foster a work environment free of harassment, discrimination, or retaliation; and
consider whether a private binding arbitration program for resolving employee claims is right for your organization.

When putting together the event itself, consider the following:

Make sure everyone knows what the expected party behavior is.
Emphasize that attendance is voluntary.
Choose a weekday for the event — people tend to indulge less, especially if the next day is a workday. Start it early in the day, when people tend not to drink as much.
Pick an offsite location that provides professional bartenders who don't want a drunken driving rap to come back to them.
Have designated drivers sign up ahead of time.
Subsidize or pay for cabs, or rent a party bus. They cost a lot less than a lawsuit.
Give people drink tickets — no bottomless glass opportunities.
Limit the time for the party, and close the bar an hour before the celebration ends.
Don't serve punch or other concoctions that can be spiked.
Provide food that inhibits drunkenness — high protein, carbs, rather than salty, greasy fare.
If you have underage employees, don't let them drink.
Provide entertainment — a musician, a juggler, a comic, a magician — to draw employee attention aware from the bar or from one another.
Don't hang mistletoe.

If you do have the party in your office, experts say that you should hire a professional bartender, have someone designated to be in charge of security, keep it short, keep everyone in the same room for the entire event, and definitely limit the amount of alcohol available on a per person basis.

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Oh no, not the office party again!

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