How to eat at your desk without being a jerk
Follow these tips to avoid co-workers labelling you as inconsiderate
More and more people dining at their desks, running the risk of annoying co-workers.
“When meeting tight deadlines it’s sometimes unavoidable,” says Haydee Antezana, founder of Professional Impressions, a California-based “personal branding and impression management” firm, who shares her thoughts about how to avoid causing office-eating offence.
“I’ve walked through many offices during lunch breaks, and more often than not I observe individuals eating food and slurping drinks and they’re not even paying attention to their screens,” she says.
If you simply have to eat at your desk — consider the following:
Avoid eating strong smelly foods. Try brush your teeth after lunch, or the smell will linger on.
In the office kitchen or pantry, people have all types of pet hates and personal cleanliness habits — these will clash if there aren’t any kitchen etiquette rules. For instance: There is nothing more unpleasant than having to endure offensive food smells. I had a colleague who would eat sardine-and-onion sandwiches every other day. Your office colleagues may be too polite to mention the smell of the food you’re bringing in could be making them nauseous, they might just start labelling you as inconsiderate.
Avoid eating at your desk — your eating “noises” and the food smells could be a distraction for colleagues.
Pick up signs — your co-worker gives you a wild stare — and stop what you are doing, as it’s annoying them. Petty annoyances come in all forms.
If someone brings in freshly baked brownies or homemade cookies — please take one and not a handful.
If the office manager has mentioned you can help yourself to after-party leftovers, don’t start filling up three Tupperware containers — make sure everyone has had their share.
The office kitchen: If you have one, abide by these “commandments”:
If you used the last coffee in the brewing pot, be considerate and refill it.
Don’t microwave smelly foods — the smell lingers forever, including in the microwave.
Cover your food. If your spaghetti sauce splatters all over the microwave, make sure you clean it up before the next person has to use it.
Same goes for the toaster — make sure it’s clean of your bread crumbs.
Respect the communal fridge “real estate” — don’t stack a dozen waters in there.
Don’t leave perishable foods hanging around in the fridge. You should only put something in the fridge for that day.
Don’t put smelly food like fish in the fridge — no one wants their fruit salad smelling fishy.
If someone’s got their name on a milk bottle, it belongs to them. Label any items you don’t want to go “missing.”
So you might be on a new healthy eating plan, but you can’t take over the entire kitchen counter to assemble your salad/smoothie during peak times.
At the end of the day when observing kitchen etiquette the golden rule is treating others with the same respect you would like to be treated.
And get out of the building if at all possible — get some fresh air. Move around — this is your recess time, Antezana says.
Nearly 86 per cent of Americans sit for the majority of their workday, a level of inactivity that a growing amount of research finds detrimental to our health.
This is a time you can use to socialize with colleagues, build relationships and in so doing decrease stress levels.
“Human beings are not designed to sit down for large periods of time, science has shown that your brain works better if you stand up and move around,” Antezana says.
“By activating your body you get fresh oxygenated blood to the brain which stimulates the nerve cells to multiply, and strengthens their interconnections.”