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(Catherine Lamy, Buzz illustrator)

If you are job searching, or interested in looking good at fancy dinners, it is essential to know proper dining etiquette.

Beth Reutter, a Corporate Etiquette Consultant, gave a tutorial on proper business dining etiquette at a four-course dinner held by the University of Illinois held at the Alice Campbell Alumni Center on November 8, 2007. The event was sponsored by the university’s Alumni Association and the Career Center in order to arm students searching for jobs with the appropriate tools necessary for landing any position.

Dining etiquette in the business world starts even before you arrive at an event, so it is important to arrive early to every event you attend.

This etiquette is also different from social etiquette. In social etiquette, males hold the door open for ladies and seat them. In business etiquette, there is no such thing as gender. Ladies may seat themselves and hold the door open for males.

Upon entering an event, there is proper etiquette in seating. Both sitting on and leaving a chair occur on the right side of the chair. Purses should be placed under your chair while briefcases should be under the table.

After sitting down, nothing on the table should be touched or rearranged except for your napkin. Your napkin should be placed on your lap, folded in half, with the fold facing you. You should also leave a one inch fold facing away from you. This one inch fold is the area used to wipe your hands and mouth so that your clothes do not get stained.

Once you start eating, stick with one style of eating. There are two main styles of eating, American, and Continental or European. In the American style, the knife is used in the right hand for cutting, and the fork is used in the left for holding food. The knife is put down after cutting, and the fork is switched to the right hand for eating. Reutter referred to this as a zig-zag pattern, moving the fork from right to left.

In the Continental style, the knife is placed in the right hand for cutting, and the fork is placed in the left hand for both holding and eating the food. In addition, the fork faces down at all time, whether holding or eating food.

Communication with waiters is also a part of etiquette. When eating, the utensils are used to indicate whether you are finished with your meal or simply resting for a moment.

In the American style, the plate is treated like a clock and the knife if laid across the top of the plate while the fork is situated so that if the plate were a clock it would read 10:20. This position indicates that you are resting from your meal, but are not finished with it. The fork tines point toward the ten and the end of the fork goes on the four. To indicate that you are finished, the knife and fork are placed parallel to each other in the 10:20 position, knife on top and fork tines up.

In the Continental style, resting position is an inverted v. The knife and the fork are placed on the sides of the plate at an angle to form an inverted v. To indicate that you are finished, the knife and fork are placed in the 10:20 position, as in the American style, but the fork tines face down. In both styles, the blade of the knife should face you.

Stefani Alexander, a senior in nursing at the University of Illinois, attended the event and enjoyed the silent signaling involved.

“If you don’t want coffee, you use your hands to signal (by placing your fingertips on the rim of the cup),” she said.

For senior in nursing, Feben Woldemarian, the dinner was more than just about learning proper eating.

“Recruiters are finding new ways of finding new employees, and I’m sure (the dinner and proper etiquette) will be helpful in the future,” she said.

Alexander felt the same, saying, “(The dinner) will help me socially, if not with friends or family, in leadership positions.”

There is more to eating than just putting food into your mouth. Proper dining involves using certain methods in eating, as well as manners, and using silent communication to signal waiters.