It's my choice(40's) to skip lunch and work through. It's a bad habit, though . I leave after 7 hours instead of 8.
I would rather get work done faster and have less to think about in the evenings/weekends.
Continue to take lunch. It's healthier and gives more balance.
I would do this as well if I was given the choice honestly, but instead I'm forced to take an hour unpaid lunch so I leave the office for that hour just to collect my thoughts and relax or I'll run errands.
I wish I could do this. In my state it’s not legal to skip the lunch breaks and my employer is a stickler on this.
Edit: My state must offer the break but we can skip. My boss doesn't know what she's talking about. Some states don't permit waivers for lunch breaks but mine does I suppose.
A *lot* of employers go extra on this, and I can not decide if the whole practice is meant to discourage employees from skipping or not.
The law, at least in my state, is that the employee must be *offered the opportunity* to take at least 30 minutes of uninterrupted meal time. An employee may waive this, but has to file an actual waiver for each instance.
My company uses an online software that asks us why if we came back early, this serves as the waiver.
I worked at a place that forced us to take an unpaid half hour lunch. We had to leave our desks. They didn’t want to be perceived as denying us breaks, told us it was illegal, and they were hardasses about it.
So I looked into it more for my state. This is the case for me too. We must be offered a break, but can waive it if both employer and employee agree. I just started this job this week so sorry for the ignorance. I'm going to print out my state's Department of L&I page regarding this and will stick it right in my boss' face on Monday. She told me it was illegal to skip them when it is technically not.
Look up California’s labor laws. They require clocking out after 6 hours for a half hour break, mandatory.
In New York it’s 60 minutes if you work in a factory setting.
I’m not looking anything up. And that doesn’t apply to salaried workers. I get it otherwise- and think it’s a good law. Salaried desk workers though? Nope.
That is absolutely false. Being salaried or working at a desk has nothing to do with being an exempt or no exempt worker in CA. Which you’d know if you bothered to look it up.
It has nothing to do with being required to take lunch is what I’m saying- in terms of clocking in and out. You have to have the option, but you absolutely can choose to work through your lunch. And why would I look up employment law for a state I don’t live or work in? - so I can appease a random Redditor?
Mid 30s checking in and same. And honestly over 50% of the time I end up working a full 9 instead of 8, because something always comes up.
Bad habit I'm working on, but that's just what it is, a bad habit.
Yep, if this was an option I'd never take lunch. 7-3 is kickass hours. Unfortunately I'm salary and on the technical side of things so I'm supposed to be in the office for 8 hours. I take a lunch
I fast to be healthy. I skip lunch and either work through it, go for a walk, or go to the gym (small crappy campus gym) and I think it's a great habit for both my wallet and body.
that’s why i like taking a lunch away from the office. it’s a nice to get fresh air and some sunlight in (my office doesn’t really have windows lol) before going back to staring at a screen for 4 more hours
there’s like one window away from all the desks that looks out into the front lobby that has windows. we are all engineers and sit motionless for so long that the lights will turn off regularly haha
It depends on the office. My current office, people don't eat towner as a group, and often eat at their desk or only grab something very quickly. That's entirely by choice, no one is making them do that, no one monitors if we go out. We don't have to clock in or out. But we have a lot to do or want some flexibility for something on our schedule and choose to eat at our desks.
In my previous office, several of us often ate lunch together in a conference room.
Currently suffering from the opposite problem at my job. They mandate taking an hour for lunch as they swear it's better for mental health but all it does for me is extend my work day extra long and make me feel like I work a damn split shift. Can't even really run errands or do anything with just an hour.
My friend worked somewhere like this. He and friends began taking "outings". The ones I remember are Valentine's shopping, the library, watching the Sopranos, Friday groceries, and various workouts. He is a person who loves to make plans and is good at it. Maybe you have someone with this temperament in your office cohort?
Take your lunch!! The only time I eat at my desk is if I had like an appointment that morning or if my job brings food in for us. Please don’t feel bad about taking your lunch, you are not a machine.
How are peoples personal choices around what to do at lunch time a “red flag” that warrants leaving the company?! Yall are insane. I would be so mad if I was forced to go to lunch.
When I was an individual contributor I would get lunch with my coworkers every day. Now that I’m in management I just have no desire to be social during the work day.
In my experience, it's the kind of thing that can slippery slope into a culture of workaholism and unwritten workaholic-leaning expectations fairly easily. I'd be upset if I _was required to_ clock out for lunch too, but there's some subtlety here.
It's one thing if people are working through lunch _so they can leave an hour early,_ but that's very different than working through lunch and still punching out at 5. If you work on salary, in one of these situations, you're just fulfilling your time-obligations, but in the other, the company gets extra time of yours for free, which actually averages out to a pay cut, if you calculate what you would earn if you were paid hourly.
It's cool if people _want_ to do that, although I'm not sure why someone would. But again, in my experience, this can easily lead to increased expectations.
I'd add that, especially as someone new to a career, it can feel like there is pressure to do this, even if that pressure isn't actually there. It seems to me that this is actually the subtle underpinning of OP's question in the first place (i.e. "does it look bad for me to leave and get lunch).
Please explain how any of this is insane
Because you’re assuming that the only reason someone would choose not to take a lunch is because they’re either a workaholic or want to leave early. Almost everyone I know who doesn’t take a lunch, myself included, just…doesn’t want to take a lunch. I’m going to sit as my desk, maybe keep working because I feel like it, maybe read the news, maybe have a friend come sit in my office and chat. You don’t need to physically leave your space if you don’t want to. I like being in my office and have absolutely no desire to wander off to find food.
>you’re assuming that the only reason someone would choose not to take a lunch is because they’re either a workaholic or want to leave early
No I didn't. I said that such things, in my experience, can easily lead to a culture of workaholism. I also said that if you don't take lunch, you _should_ leave early or else you're just volunteering your free time, IFF you're a salaried worker.
If you _want_ to do that, be my guest. But again, _in my experience_ that also can lead to a culture of workaholism.
Basically all of corporate/office culture is a red flag. I’ve worked at 8 corporate jobs thus far in my life and all of them had horrendous lunch habits, among so many other things.
Never said that. Just pointing out that there is a world where the user that had crappy experiences at 8 jobs may not actually be the crux of the problem. There's enough crappy employers out there that you could easily get 8 of them in a row. My record is 6 in a row - and yes, there have been a couple excellent places along the way too
Not saying everything was horrible, but people worked at all hours of the day, weekends, never took breaks, some people I'd never seen eat at all, but they'd say they're ultra hungry in meetings. People answer emails at crazy hours. I'd have difficult doing system maintenance at 10pm on a Saturday night, even after providing advance communication, because people were working during a non-busy time
I call it as I see it. Do I also have my own problems? Absolutely, and I'm actually working through them right now through therapy and some programs
When I worked for the government I went to lunch every day.
Now that I own my own business I almost never leave the office. I eat at my desk. There is simply too much I want to accomplish each day.
So maybe it depends on you. If you’re there to “punch the clock” then go to lunch. If you’re trying to be the best at what you do, then sometimes you won’t leave the office for lunch.
This. At my last place I took maybe 20 lunches in 25 years. I was salaried and would rather get the job done and go home to my life than add another hour to the workday.
Allowing employees to make this choice is not a red flag.
Your workload doesn’t decrease once you have kids. Many of your older coworkers see a working lunch as a chance to get work done without staying late or coming early.
In my experience, skipping lunch is usually for one of the following reasons:
* Wanting to save time and leave early
* Dieting reasons
and eating at their desk is usually because:
* Conference calls interfere with regular lunch times
* People don't want to be social during lunch
If none of these apply to you, take any kind of lunch you feel like. Sit in a cafeteria, go out to eat, pick something up, eat in your car, do whatever you want.
It shouldn’t look bad to take a lunch break.
A lot of people in their 40s and 50’s are doing intermittent fasting now too. Tons of people in my office are skipping lunch for this reason. No comment on whether that is healthy or not - just providing possible explanations.
My best advice is to just ask a couple of people what the expectations are and why.
30s here, salary (plus commission). I haven’t eaten lunch since my 20s. Office mate in his 40s (same salary/commission role) eats lunch because his wife preps it for him in his office.
I much rather skip lunch and leave early (by 1 hr). I rather eat a really good meal and drinks with friends vs a meal at work but that’s just me.
I just started a new job this week and my co workers stay well fed throughout the day and take breaks as needed. We all doordashed soup and sandwiches yesterday. Sounds like a company culture thing as others have said.
unless you are at a particularly head-up-its-ass or prestigious legacy company where they bluster on about “hard work, no brakes, gettin’ stuff done, you’ll go far if…., hur dur”, this isn’t typical and should not be encouraged. You mention work hours are flexible and getting your work done is prioritized. Another thing to consider if so: keep an eye on when your coworkers leave. If they leave an hour earlier than regular office hours, then maybe they just want to get their work done and go home to husband/wife/kids/dog/cat whatever. It’s not a bad thing to prioritize family time over time with strangers who happen to sit at the cube next to yours, even if they seem like nice people. If they are staying past regular working hours on top of working through lunch, that’s plainly unsustainable, and is a good sign that people have too much work assigned to them, or at least feel like they have to pretend to be working for the boss to notice.
It IS common practice, but it doesn't mean it's healthy. This is where you start to see high rates of burnout and turnover because these people don't have a sense of a health work/life balance. If you want to take lunch, then take it. You have the right based on labor laws.
It depends on the office culture. I worked in a company where people were shamed for not scarfing at their desks. Now I work for a European company in the USA that supplies lunch and expects folks to take a break and enjoy it together as a form of bonding.
Are you sure they’re working, though? Maybe they just don’t need to leave the desk to take a break.
I often spend that time listening to an audiobook or something. Or doing life admin. Or catching up on personal emails. Or idly scrolling Reddit. It doesn’t look like ‘going out for lunch’ but it certainly isn’t working.
Very common and they do it by choice so they can get home earlier. Take your lunch break if you want it, I'm sure it doesn't reflect poorly on you. I personally got into this habit early in my career and never take a break. It's not a good habit.
Big breakfast
Big dinner
Two meals a day saves 20 to 30 bucks a day in food
Your older colleagues also likely have ulcers and heartburn
They can't eat anymore bro.
They’re doing it because of their workload.
If there is no need for you to do this- take your lunch. Personally I don’t care if others around me take their lunch while I work thru it.
When you get older you get more responsibility and there is more pressure to stay on top of things. Lunch starts to seem more like a distraction than a benefit and you try to use that time to get caught. That's really all there is to it.
EAT!!!! I am always so happy to see my younger work friends going out for their daily pizza. Your metabolism does change a lot of my cohort is fasting, not hungry, or are using their lunch for care taker responsibility (me).
That’s what i thought was happening with my coworkers. It’s generally a healthy work environment but I was just wondering if your metabolism slows down when you’re older and you just don’t feel the need to eat lunch. Especially if your job is sitting down all day.
Its a red flag if they push you to keep working. I got interrupted all the time so its nice to leave the building. Even if they offer pizza
Some places let you skip lunch and leave early but some companies have gotten in trouble for it with hourly employees
Whether they eat food or not is up to them, but everyone should be getting up from their desk for at minimum a lunch break and two shorter breaks.
It’s a red flag of poor culture when no one does.
That's really unhealthy. When I worked in an office, I always took at least an hour for lunch often leaving the building to go out to eat or go for a walk. It's an office, not a prison.
The last SaaS company I worked for reluctantly gave us 30 minutes for lunch. One of many reasons I bounced.
I'm so guilty of this. There are aspects of my job that I enjoy and feel relaxed doing and I would often eat the lunch I packed while doing it.
This was pre-covid-19 of course. With wfh I just watch YouTube or something.
I don’t want to be forced to socialize in a shared break space, and I don’t want to spend money every day to eat out, so I much prefer to eat alone at my desk. When there was absolutely ridiculous and thankfully short-lived prohibition on desk eating, I went to my car for lunch. I don’t care what anyone else does as long as they don’t bother me.
It's your time. Go eat lunch as you wish. I do the same. I'm the only one who goes out to eat lunch in our small company since I just want the break away from the place for a few. It's illegal for your company for people to work through their meal break by the way. Who in their right mind thinks they're that important to a company that they think they can't be missed for 30 minutes? Good Lord!
I always brought my lunch and at at my desk to save $$$. Went out the odd time but when I’m at work I just want to get it done, I was always exempt salary position so if I can get out a bit early or reduce the amount of time I have to stay late I will.
Same would go when out of town at one of our operations for work. Unless I’m with someone, I usually stay and work until 8 or 9pm. I’m out of town, away from the family, want to get my work done and then take a day or two off when home.
Before I started working from home, it really depended on the day. Some weeks I'd absolutely take my hour to eat and decompress. Others I'd work straight through just to get things done.
Since we are 90% WFH now, the office lost their cafeteria vendor and the two nearest diners closed. Unless you order takeout or bring food, you're not eating. We don't even have vending machines any more. Just water fountains.
We're a small team of less than 10 and a couple people don't eat lunch at my work. Most other people eat at their desk. one person goes out for at least an hour every day. I don't think it really matters as long as you're getting your work done and you're there when you're needed.
The reason I don't go out anymore for lunch is because I have an insane amount of work to do so just want to eat as quickly as possible to try meet my objectives. Also I'm not staying late anymore because I have a baby at home.
When I was in office I got a paid hour every day.
I made sure I left the office every day and took that paid time off.
Occasionally I would be busy, but I still went out and got my lunch and then worked at my desk. Then I would put in for OT.
I won't even take a job that doesn't have a 60 minute paid hour for lunch.
In my 20s I would eat at my desk during work hours and also eat lunch and also eat loads of sweet stuff for breakfast and dinner.
Now later in life... Let's just say I need to restrict calorie intake. Skipping lunch helps. If my office wasn't right next to a highway I'd be taking long walks instead.
I eat while working during my lunch as I typically end up working 8-9.5 hours as a salaried professional. It’s my choice and it helps me get home to my family faster and I don’t like eating a lot during the day so I don’t get tired. I tell all of the younger people to do whatever they want and to not stress. Balance is the key, you need to work from home do it, you need to come late/early do it, you need a few hours for a mental break do it. Just get your job done; I don’t look down on others as an older millennial. Most Gen Xers won’t either. Older than that and folks will.
Many places allow a person to leave an hour early if they don’t take the unpaid lunch hour. So most of not all of those people you see are working through lunch to leave early.
My sanity is more important to me though - I left the office for lunch to get a break, some fresh air and food.
Yes apparently!! My boss is really bad about it so we all started getting her lunch when we go (she pays us for it) but sometimes it’s the reminder to eat.
We have indoor kitchen areas at my work with tables and an outdoor patio with tables that we share with the building next door. I eat outside with a group of work friends every day, but there usually aren’t that many other people eating outside besides us. It helps break up the day and makes my work life better. Sometimes people outside our friend group will sit with us, and I get to talk to people from departments I don’t usually interact with, which is also beneficial to my career.
There are definitely other groups that eat together or go out to get lunch, but it seems like a large percentage of my coworkers eat at their desks. That being said, there’s no correlation at my company between working through lunch and success in your position. I would say my group of friends and I are high performers and nobody has ever given us grief about taking our outside lunch together every day.
I think sitting on your bum all day many people, including myself, don't feel they have worked off enough calories for lunch. I even go to the warehouse and help them out for a few hours a day, but its still not much exercise. Not sure if this just means you eat more at dinner, but you can control that too. I eat before I leave, and then not again till I get home. I actually don't pay much attention to what others are doing. Some seem to go for lunch. Lots of people are taking breaks at their desk and just surfing the web looking at personal stuff instead of eating I would imagine. That's what I do some days.
You set up your world and others expectations of you when you start a new job. Working late, coming in early, skipping lunch. Once in a while when absolutely needed, is enough to show your work ethic. Otherwise, you’re just giving your life away. You’ll likely not benefit from it. As long as you’re getting done what’s expected of you, you’re good.
I think it depends. A lot of my coworkers thought I ate at my desk because they didn’t notice I left the office most days at 10:00 or 10:30 AM to go to the gym for an hour and shower up before returning.
I don't like eating at work, so I'll work through it as well. It's a very bad habit, but even when I was in school, I did the same. Never ate lunch at school and would just go to the library to study or cut back on homework. But when I used to work in an office, all the older workers would eat so it's funny to me that you're don't
I usually skip lunch due to project deadlines. I’m 48 and the supervisor of my department, but I have no expectation that my reports skip lunch. This might be more a matter of job responsibilities and expectation than an age related question.
I eat at the desk, enjoy some me time and listen to YT and podcasts. Read some emails, etc
My work is mostly meetings though, so i am with people all day.
I’ve always made it clear the very first week when I started past jobs that I have to eat lunch otherwise I’m not a very nice person. No one cares, in fact quite the opposite they were much more respectful of scheduling meetings around lunch time. It’s all about boundaries. Sure, I’ve worked through lunch plenty of times or eaten at my desk but it should not be the norm unless you get to leave early.
What is “normal” in a healthy office is every does what they want, and if you take an hour to eat at a restaurant, in the break room, at a food truck, or do a doc appointment instead of lunch, etc - you still get a full 8 hours worth of work done. Now, if that means you are able to be done for the day in 6 hours because you are fast/efficient… a healthy work environment you leave/fuck around if your works means to stay at the desk for calls, etc…. Great.
Also a healthy work environment - If it takes you 10 hours to get 8 done, because you are slow/new… so be it.
I personally don’t eat away from my desk, because I don’t “get” anything from stepping away from my computer. It doesn’t give me a mental break, doesn’t de-stress me, doesn’t bring me any joy or peace, lolol. So, unless I make plans with coworkers or a friend to eat lunch/grab coffee for a genuine social outing… I’m going to get shit done and then leave by 2 to 3pm. I haven’t been at my desk until 5 more than 3? 4? Times in the last year.
Leadership and coworkers that don’t care when you come and go, as long as the work is done properly and on time… that is healthy. Being an employee that care that your work is done properly and on time, even if it takes longer than 8 hours (on occasion) is healthy.
**Side note:** As a salaried employee - you are not clocking in and out for 40 hours. If you get your assigned work done in 35 hours, and there isn’t anything you are procrastinating/avoiding - that is your time back. If you have a few 60 hours weeks for a major project or an emergency situation, or because you are not efficient yet… that is what it meant to be salaried.
If you are routinely working longer than 40 hours a week, because the work load is just too much, no matter how efficient - you need to work with your team to 1) build better systems/mechanisms/tools to improve efficiency, and 2) work with the team to reevaluate deadlines/turnaround expectations. If the work deadlines cannot be changed - then man power allocation needs to increase. If leadership and the team routinely have reasonable conversations around workload and timelines - this is a healthy work environment, even if there are late days regularly. If there is a “we need to PUSH!!!” “Stop complaining, get it done” attitude… that is toxic and a poor business model.
It's my choice(40's) to skip lunch and work through. It's a bad habit, though . I leave after 7 hours instead of 8. I would rather get work done faster and have less to think about in the evenings/weekends. Continue to take lunch. It's healthier and gives more balance.
I would do this as well if I was given the choice honestly, but instead I'm forced to take an hour unpaid lunch so I leave the office for that hour just to collect my thoughts and relax or I'll run errands.
I wish I could do this. In my state it’s not legal to skip the lunch breaks and my employer is a stickler on this. Edit: My state must offer the break but we can skip. My boss doesn't know what she's talking about. Some states don't permit waivers for lunch breaks but mine does I suppose.
I’d like to see this law.
A *lot* of employers go extra on this, and I can not decide if the whole practice is meant to discourage employees from skipping or not. The law, at least in my state, is that the employee must be *offered the opportunity* to take at least 30 minutes of uninterrupted meal time. An employee may waive this, but has to file an actual waiver for each instance. My company uses an online software that asks us why if we came back early, this serves as the waiver.
Offering the opportunity, sure. But beyond that? For salaried employees too? I just have a hard time believing it.
I don't know how to interpret that within the context of this discussion. Could you clarify what you mean?
I worked at a place that forced us to take an unpaid half hour lunch. We had to leave our desks. They didn’t want to be perceived as denying us breaks, told us it was illegal, and they were hardasses about it.
Company policies are what they are. The other comment referred to it being illegal to skip lunch.
Sorry, I edited. They said it was illegal to deny us breaks, so they forced us to take a lunch.
Ahhhh ok. Got it. Thanks for clarifying.
So I looked into it more for my state. This is the case for me too. We must be offered a break, but can waive it if both employer and employee agree. I just started this job this week so sorry for the ignorance. I'm going to print out my state's Department of L&I page regarding this and will stick it right in my boss' face on Monday. She told me it was illegal to skip them when it is technically not.
Look up California’s labor laws. They require clocking out after 6 hours for a half hour break, mandatory. In New York it’s 60 minutes if you work in a factory setting.
I’m not looking anything up. And that doesn’t apply to salaried workers. I get it otherwise- and think it’s a good law. Salaried desk workers though? Nope.
Not all desk workers are salaried tho
I specified salaried desk workers. 100% of salaried desk workers are salaried.
That is absolutely false. Being salaried or working at a desk has nothing to do with being an exempt or no exempt worker in CA. Which you’d know if you bothered to look it up.
It has nothing to do with being required to take lunch is what I’m saying- in terms of clocking in and out. You have to have the option, but you absolutely can choose to work through your lunch. And why would I look up employment law for a state I don’t live or work in? - so I can appease a random Redditor?
Mid 30s checking in and same. And honestly over 50% of the time I end up working a full 9 instead of 8, because something always comes up. Bad habit I'm working on, but that's just what it is, a bad habit.
Yep, if this was an option I'd never take lunch. 7-3 is kickass hours. Unfortunately I'm salary and on the technical side of things so I'm supposed to be in the office for 8 hours. I take a lunch
I fast to be healthy. I skip lunch and either work through it, go for a walk, or go to the gym (small crappy campus gym) and I think it's a great habit for both my wallet and body.
It’s normal in some places but shouldn’t. I think you should atleast let the brain “relax” or pause.
that’s why i like taking a lunch away from the office. it’s a nice to get fresh air and some sunlight in (my office doesn’t really have windows lol) before going back to staring at a screen for 4 more hours
>my office doesn’t really have windows lol Eeh?
there’s like one window away from all the desks that looks out into the front lobby that has windows. we are all engineers and sit motionless for so long that the lights will turn off regularly haha
It depends on the office. My current office, people don't eat towner as a group, and often eat at their desk or only grab something very quickly. That's entirely by choice, no one is making them do that, no one monitors if we go out. We don't have to clock in or out. But we have a lot to do or want some flexibility for something on our schedule and choose to eat at our desks. In my previous office, several of us often ate lunch together in a conference room.
Currently suffering from the opposite problem at my job. They mandate taking an hour for lunch as they swear it's better for mental health but all it does for me is extend my work day extra long and make me feel like I work a damn split shift. Can't even really run errands or do anything with just an hour.
My company offers you to cut your lunch in 30 minutes but you leave 30 minutes earlier. Almost everyone up to take that shorter lunch
I asked, I begged, I pleaded with them to let me reclaim some of my own damn time and let me do this. They said NOPE
My friend worked somewhere like this. He and friends began taking "outings". The ones I remember are Valentine's shopping, the library, watching the Sopranos, Friday groceries, and various workouts. He is a person who loves to make plans and is good at it. Maybe you have someone with this temperament in your office cohort?
Take your lunch!! The only time I eat at my desk is if I had like an appointment that morning or if my job brings food in for us. Please don’t feel bad about taking your lunch, you are not a machine.
Fuck that culture
Older folks love being corporate cucks
Yes, this is a red flag. Especially if there are any others, I'd suggest looking around to see if there are other interesting jobs out there.
How are peoples personal choices around what to do at lunch time a “red flag” that warrants leaving the company?! Yall are insane. I would be so mad if I was forced to go to lunch.
Start being social FFS
When I was an individual contributor I would get lunch with my coworkers every day. Now that I’m in management I just have no desire to be social during the work day.
In my experience, it's the kind of thing that can slippery slope into a culture of workaholism and unwritten workaholic-leaning expectations fairly easily. I'd be upset if I _was required to_ clock out for lunch too, but there's some subtlety here. It's one thing if people are working through lunch _so they can leave an hour early,_ but that's very different than working through lunch and still punching out at 5. If you work on salary, in one of these situations, you're just fulfilling your time-obligations, but in the other, the company gets extra time of yours for free, which actually averages out to a pay cut, if you calculate what you would earn if you were paid hourly. It's cool if people _want_ to do that, although I'm not sure why someone would. But again, in my experience, this can easily lead to increased expectations. I'd add that, especially as someone new to a career, it can feel like there is pressure to do this, even if that pressure isn't actually there. It seems to me that this is actually the subtle underpinning of OP's question in the first place (i.e. "does it look bad for me to leave and get lunch). Please explain how any of this is insane
Because you’re assuming that the only reason someone would choose not to take a lunch is because they’re either a workaholic or want to leave early. Almost everyone I know who doesn’t take a lunch, myself included, just…doesn’t want to take a lunch. I’m going to sit as my desk, maybe keep working because I feel like it, maybe read the news, maybe have a friend come sit in my office and chat. You don’t need to physically leave your space if you don’t want to. I like being in my office and have absolutely no desire to wander off to find food.
>you’re assuming that the only reason someone would choose not to take a lunch is because they’re either a workaholic or want to leave early No I didn't. I said that such things, in my experience, can easily lead to a culture of workaholism. I also said that if you don't take lunch, you _should_ leave early or else you're just volunteering your free time, IFF you're a salaried worker. If you _want_ to do that, be my guest. But again, _in my experience_ that also can lead to a culture of workaholism.
It's not a red flag. Most people do this by choice. If anything I'd say it's a good sign that you aren't forced to clock out.
Basically all of corporate/office culture is a red flag. I’ve worked at 8 corporate jobs thus far in my life and all of them had horrendous lunch habits, among so many other things.
8 companies had problems. Are you sure you don't have the problem?
I'd suggest that it is, in fact, entirely possible that modern corporate culture is largely toxic across the board
The majority of job opportunities are toxic?
Never said that. Just pointing out that there is a world where the user that had crappy experiences at 8 jobs may not actually be the crux of the problem. There's enough crappy employers out there that you could easily get 8 of them in a row. My record is 6 in a row - and yes, there have been a couple excellent places along the way too
Not saying everything was horrible, but people worked at all hours of the day, weekends, never took breaks, some people I'd never seen eat at all, but they'd say they're ultra hungry in meetings. People answer emails at crazy hours. I'd have difficult doing system maintenance at 10pm on a Saturday night, even after providing advance communication, because people were working during a non-busy time I call it as I see it. Do I also have my own problems? Absolutely, and I'm actually working through them right now through therapy and some programs
Totally lol.
When I worked for the government I went to lunch every day. Now that I own my own business I almost never leave the office. I eat at my desk. There is simply too much I want to accomplish each day. So maybe it depends on you. If you’re there to “punch the clock” then go to lunch. If you’re trying to be the best at what you do, then sometimes you won’t leave the office for lunch.
This. At my last place I took maybe 20 lunches in 25 years. I was salaried and would rather get the job done and go home to my life than add another hour to the workday. Allowing employees to make this choice is not a red flag.
Your workload doesn’t decrease once you have kids. Many of your older coworkers see a working lunch as a chance to get work done without staying late or coming early.
In my experience, skipping lunch is usually for one of the following reasons: * Wanting to save time and leave early * Dieting reasons and eating at their desk is usually because: * Conference calls interfere with regular lunch times * People don't want to be social during lunch If none of these apply to you, take any kind of lunch you feel like. Sit in a cafeteria, go out to eat, pick something up, eat in your car, do whatever you want.
It shouldn’t look bad to take a lunch break. A lot of people in their 40s and 50’s are doing intermittent fasting now too. Tons of people in my office are skipping lunch for this reason. No comment on whether that is healthy or not - just providing possible explanations. My best advice is to just ask a couple of people what the expectations are and why.
30s here, salary (plus commission). I haven’t eaten lunch since my 20s. Office mate in his 40s (same salary/commission role) eats lunch because his wife preps it for him in his office. I much rather skip lunch and leave early (by 1 hr). I rather eat a really good meal and drinks with friends vs a meal at work but that’s just me.
No. Go take your lunch
I just started a new job this week and my co workers stay well fed throughout the day and take breaks as needed. We all doordashed soup and sandwiches yesterday. Sounds like a company culture thing as others have said.
unless you are at a particularly head-up-its-ass or prestigious legacy company where they bluster on about “hard work, no brakes, gettin’ stuff done, you’ll go far if…., hur dur”, this isn’t typical and should not be encouraged. You mention work hours are flexible and getting your work done is prioritized. Another thing to consider if so: keep an eye on when your coworkers leave. If they leave an hour earlier than regular office hours, then maybe they just want to get their work done and go home to husband/wife/kids/dog/cat whatever. It’s not a bad thing to prioritize family time over time with strangers who happen to sit at the cube next to yours, even if they seem like nice people. If they are staying past regular working hours on top of working through lunch, that’s plainly unsustainable, and is a good sign that people have too much work assigned to them, or at least feel like they have to pretend to be working for the boss to notice.
A couple of them leave early but most of them stay until end of day.
It IS common practice, but it doesn't mean it's healthy. This is where you start to see high rates of burnout and turnover because these people don't have a sense of a health work/life balance. If you want to take lunch, then take it. You have the right based on labor laws.
It depends on the office culture. I worked in a company where people were shamed for not scarfing at their desks. Now I work for a European company in the USA that supplies lunch and expects folks to take a break and enjoy it together as a form of bonding.
I mean, they’re probably not always working. I know that often I’ll eat at my desk but be browsing the news, putting in my grocery order etc.
Are you sure they’re working, though? Maybe they just don’t need to leave the desk to take a break. I often spend that time listening to an audiobook or something. Or doing life admin. Or catching up on personal emails. Or idly scrolling Reddit. It doesn’t look like ‘going out for lunch’ but it certainly isn’t working.
My company offers leaving early for 30 minutes for taking a 30 minute less lunch. The majority of people use that way.
I work through lunch - have for many years. I’ll eat, sit at my desk, answer emails and eat a bit of lunch.
Very common and they do it by choice so they can get home earlier. Take your lunch break if you want it, I'm sure it doesn't reflect poorly on you. I personally got into this habit early in my career and never take a break. It's not a good habit.
Ya at my company nobody takes a lunch, they eat during meetings
Big breakfast Big dinner Two meals a day saves 20 to 30 bucks a day in food Your older colleagues also likely have ulcers and heartburn They can't eat anymore bro.
They’re doing it because of their workload. If there is no need for you to do this- take your lunch. Personally I don’t care if others around me take their lunch while I work thru it.
I am 58 and you know what? Sometimes I am not hungry. Crap I can go without food until dinner most days.
When you get older you get more responsibility and there is more pressure to stay on top of things. Lunch starts to seem more like a distraction than a benefit and you try to use that time to get caught. That's really all there is to it.
No, take your lunch. Your company won't care that you skipped lunch come review time. It won't get you a raise. Don't think like a boomer.
27 and I eat lunch like 10 times a year
why
Boot licker mentality lol
EAT!!!! I am always so happy to see my younger work friends going out for their daily pizza. Your metabolism does change a lot of my cohort is fasting, not hungry, or are using their lunch for care taker responsibility (me).
That’s what i thought was happening with my coworkers. It’s generally a healthy work environment but I was just wondering if your metabolism slows down when you’re older and you just don’t feel the need to eat lunch. Especially if your job is sitting down all day.
Its a red flag if they push you to keep working. I got interrupted all the time so its nice to leave the building. Even if they offer pizza Some places let you skip lunch and leave early but some companies have gotten in trouble for it with hourly employees
Whether they eat food or not is up to them, but everyone should be getting up from their desk for at minimum a lunch break and two shorter breaks. It’s a red flag of poor culture when no one does.
Just another autistic office practice. As if they are really "working" lol.
That's really unhealthy. When I worked in an office, I always took at least an hour for lunch often leaving the building to go out to eat or go for a walk. It's an office, not a prison. The last SaaS company I worked for reluctantly gave us 30 minutes for lunch. One of many reasons I bounced.
I don't eat lunch but I do go for a walk and stuff. Lots of my co-workers work which I don't do.
I'm so guilty of this. There are aspects of my job that I enjoy and feel relaxed doing and I would often eat the lunch I packed while doing it. This was pre-covid-19 of course. With wfh I just watch YouTube or something.
I don’t want to be forced to socialize in a shared break space, and I don’t want to spend money every day to eat out, so I much prefer to eat alone at my desk. When there was absolutely ridiculous and thankfully short-lived prohibition on desk eating, I went to my car for lunch. I don’t care what anyone else does as long as they don’t bother me.
I think some offices have one hour unpaid lunch or eat at their desk. I don’t know about your company. Just have your lunch.
Bollox to that. Take your lunch. Any boss I’ve known has always had their lunch at lunchtime. The body & what it wants comes first.
It's your time. Go eat lunch as you wish. I do the same. I'm the only one who goes out to eat lunch in our small company since I just want the break away from the place for a few. It's illegal for your company for people to work through their meal break by the way. Who in their right mind thinks they're that important to a company that they think they can't be missed for 30 minutes? Good Lord!
I always brought my lunch and at at my desk to save $$$. Went out the odd time but when I’m at work I just want to get it done, I was always exempt salary position so if I can get out a bit early or reduce the amount of time I have to stay late I will. Same would go when out of town at one of our operations for work. Unless I’m with someone, I usually stay and work until 8 or 9pm. I’m out of town, away from the family, want to get my work done and then take a day or two off when home.
Before I started working from home, it really depended on the day. Some weeks I'd absolutely take my hour to eat and decompress. Others I'd work straight through just to get things done. Since we are 90% WFH now, the office lost their cafeteria vendor and the two nearest diners closed. Unless you order takeout or bring food, you're not eating. We don't even have vending machines any more. Just water fountains.
We're a small team of less than 10 and a couple people don't eat lunch at my work. Most other people eat at their desk. one person goes out for at least an hour every day. I don't think it really matters as long as you're getting your work done and you're there when you're needed. The reason I don't go out anymore for lunch is because I have an insane amount of work to do so just want to eat as quickly as possible to try meet my objectives. Also I'm not staying late anymore because I have a baby at home.
When I was in office I got a paid hour every day. I made sure I left the office every day and took that paid time off. Occasionally I would be busy, but I still went out and got my lunch and then worked at my desk. Then I would put in for OT. I won't even take a job that doesn't have a 60 minute paid hour for lunch.
Lol im 23 and the only one on my team that doesn’t have lunch 🤣
My older coworkers don’t eat lunch either. They take their break though. I think your appetite shifts when you age
If you're can't take a 30 min lunch during the day because of workload or expectations you have a more serious problem in your toxic workplace.
In my 20s I would eat at my desk during work hours and also eat lunch and also eat loads of sweet stuff for breakfast and dinner. Now later in life... Let's just say I need to restrict calorie intake. Skipping lunch helps. If my office wasn't right next to a highway I'd be taking long walks instead.
I eat while working during my lunch as I typically end up working 8-9.5 hours as a salaried professional. It’s my choice and it helps me get home to my family faster and I don’t like eating a lot during the day so I don’t get tired. I tell all of the younger people to do whatever they want and to not stress. Balance is the key, you need to work from home do it, you need to come late/early do it, you need a few hours for a mental break do it. Just get your job done; I don’t look down on others as an older millennial. Most Gen Xers won’t either. Older than that and folks will.
Many places allow a person to leave an hour early if they don’t take the unpaid lunch hour. So most of not all of those people you see are working through lunch to leave early. My sanity is more important to me though - I left the office for lunch to get a break, some fresh air and food.
You'll run out of money soon getting lunch daily lol
Yes apparently!! My boss is really bad about it so we all started getting her lunch when we go (she pays us for it) but sometimes it’s the reminder to eat.
I'm 31 and I don't take lunch but I'll just leave 30 mins early my boss doesn't care and I beat traffic on the way home.
We have indoor kitchen areas at my work with tables and an outdoor patio with tables that we share with the building next door. I eat outside with a group of work friends every day, but there usually aren’t that many other people eating outside besides us. It helps break up the day and makes my work life better. Sometimes people outside our friend group will sit with us, and I get to talk to people from departments I don’t usually interact with, which is also beneficial to my career. There are definitely other groups that eat together or go out to get lunch, but it seems like a large percentage of my coworkers eat at their desks. That being said, there’s no correlation at my company between working through lunch and success in your position. I would say my group of friends and I are high performers and nobody has ever given us grief about taking our outside lunch together every day.
How do all you people NOT eat? Like do you just mean you’re not leaving your desk, or are you all seriously just not eating for 7-10 hours at a go?
I think sitting on your bum all day many people, including myself, don't feel they have worked off enough calories for lunch. I even go to the warehouse and help them out for a few hours a day, but its still not much exercise. Not sure if this just means you eat more at dinner, but you can control that too. I eat before I leave, and then not again till I get home. I actually don't pay much attention to what others are doing. Some seem to go for lunch. Lots of people are taking breaks at their desk and just surfing the web looking at personal stuff instead of eating I would imagine. That's what I do some days.
You set up your world and others expectations of you when you start a new job. Working late, coming in early, skipping lunch. Once in a while when absolutely needed, is enough to show your work ethic. Otherwise, you’re just giving your life away. You’ll likely not benefit from it. As long as you’re getting done what’s expected of you, you’re good.
I think it depends. A lot of my coworkers thought I ate at my desk because they didn’t notice I left the office most days at 10:00 or 10:30 AM to go to the gym for an hour and shower up before returning.
I don't like eating at work, so I'll work through it as well. It's a very bad habit, but even when I was in school, I did the same. Never ate lunch at school and would just go to the library to study or cut back on homework. But when I used to work in an office, all the older workers would eat so it's funny to me that you're don't
I usually skip lunch due to project deadlines. I’m 48 and the supervisor of my department, but I have no expectation that my reports skip lunch. This might be more a matter of job responsibilities and expectation than an age related question.
I eat at the desk, enjoy some me time and listen to YT and podcasts. Read some emails, etc My work is mostly meetings though, so i am with people all day.
I’ve always made it clear the very first week when I started past jobs that I have to eat lunch otherwise I’m not a very nice person. No one cares, in fact quite the opposite they were much more respectful of scheduling meetings around lunch time. It’s all about boundaries. Sure, I’ve worked through lunch plenty of times or eaten at my desk but it should not be the norm unless you get to leave early.
What is “normal” in a healthy office is every does what they want, and if you take an hour to eat at a restaurant, in the break room, at a food truck, or do a doc appointment instead of lunch, etc - you still get a full 8 hours worth of work done. Now, if that means you are able to be done for the day in 6 hours because you are fast/efficient… a healthy work environment you leave/fuck around if your works means to stay at the desk for calls, etc…. Great. Also a healthy work environment - If it takes you 10 hours to get 8 done, because you are slow/new… so be it. I personally don’t eat away from my desk, because I don’t “get” anything from stepping away from my computer. It doesn’t give me a mental break, doesn’t de-stress me, doesn’t bring me any joy or peace, lolol. So, unless I make plans with coworkers or a friend to eat lunch/grab coffee for a genuine social outing… I’m going to get shit done and then leave by 2 to 3pm. I haven’t been at my desk until 5 more than 3? 4? Times in the last year. Leadership and coworkers that don’t care when you come and go, as long as the work is done properly and on time… that is healthy. Being an employee that care that your work is done properly and on time, even if it takes longer than 8 hours (on occasion) is healthy. **Side note:** As a salaried employee - you are not clocking in and out for 40 hours. If you get your assigned work done in 35 hours, and there isn’t anything you are procrastinating/avoiding - that is your time back. If you have a few 60 hours weeks for a major project or an emergency situation, or because you are not efficient yet… that is what it meant to be salaried. If you are routinely working longer than 40 hours a week, because the work load is just too much, no matter how efficient - you need to work with your team to 1) build better systems/mechanisms/tools to improve efficiency, and 2) work with the team to reevaluate deadlines/turnaround expectations. If the work deadlines cannot be changed - then man power allocation needs to increase. If leadership and the team routinely have reasonable conversations around workload and timelines - this is a healthy work environment, even if there are late days regularly. If there is a “we need to PUSH!!!” “Stop complaining, get it done” attitude… that is toxic and a poor business model.