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Why You Should
Never Eat Lunch at Your Desk
Lisa Evans
We know eating a nutritious lunch can improve our health
and productivity, but it turns out
how, where and with whom we eat our midday meal is just
as important as what we eat.
While you may think you’re being more productive by
eating lunch at your desk,
taking your lunch elsewhere may be the best thing
you can do for your own health
and the health of your business.
John Trougakos, Associate Professor of Organizational
Behavior & HR Management
at the University of Toronto recently published a study
on lunch break patterns in office workers
and says the absence of a proper lunch break can cause
greater fatigue and lower productivity.
Here's why you should never eat lunch at your desk,
and how to foster a more break-friendly culture:
1. Give your brain
a break.
"We really only have so much psychological energy that we can use on any given day.
"We really only have so much psychological energy that we can use on any given day.
All efforts to control behavior, to perform and to focus
draw on that pool of psychological energy. Once that energy source is depleted,
we become less effective at everything we do,"
says Trougakos. The mid-day
meal provides a perfect opportunity to detach ourselves
from the source of that energy drain and recharge our
resources.
2. Boost cognitive
abilities by taking your lunch to the park.
While simply changing your environment can help to stimulate new ideas,
While simply changing your environment can help to stimulate new ideas,
a 2013 study by researchers at Heriot-Watt University and
the University of Edinburgh
showed sitting in green spaces and even viewing a park
from an office window
had restorative effects and helped improve attention fatigue
and quicken stress recovery.
3. Create a
"break" culture.
Trougakos says too often employees feel pressured to eat lunch at their desks
Trougakos says too often employees feel pressured to eat lunch at their desks
because they’re afraid of appearing lazy by taking a
proper lunch break.
When Trougakos studied office workers’ lunch break
patterns, however,
he found employees who felt pressured to work through
their lunch experienced greater fatigue. “Fatigue is related to decrements in
efficiency, productivity and accuracy of work,” he says.
Setting up a proper break room signifies to employees
that the company culture
values break times, resulting in less fatigue and more
a more productive workforce.
4. Avoid
business lunches.
A business lunch can have the same fatiguing effects as eating lunch
A business lunch can have the same fatiguing effects as eating lunch
while
working at your desk. "It doesn't provide you with the chance to
recover," says Trougakos.
Although we may assume lunchtime socializing can help us
to relax,
Trougakos says that wasn't the case for the employees in
his study
if they were forced to socialize with co-workers and if
the talk centered on work. "You’re hanging out with people who you can't
necessarily kick back and be yourself with," says Trougakos.
While socializing with co-workers led to higher levels of
fatigue,
talking on the phone with a friend, on the other hand, resulted in
lower levels of fatigue.
If you do schedule a business lunch,
take a break before heading back to the office to go for
a walk
or do an activity you find enjoyable such as listening to
music or talking to a friend
– anything that allows you to detach for a few moments.
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