[camelNotation]

I work through lunch, eating at my desk. I prefer to do this over wasting time away from the office. 1 hour is not enough for me to go home and see my kids or work on my house or do anything legitimately useful or meaningful. Instead, I find myself being forced to fill it with something I wouldn't otherwise want to do. Therefore, I just grab a sandwich and eat while working. Officially, we aren't supposed to do this. Unofficially, no one has stopped me yet.

[mk89]

In my experience, lunch with your colleagues is one of the indicators of a healthy work environment. When this doesn't happen, for whatever reason you may have, I have always found the team to be unhealthy. How is it for you?

[nommm-nommm]

I don't do lunch with my colleagues because I don't eat lunch. Even if I did eat lunch I don't want to waste more time at work than I have to so I would nibble at my desk while coding. Our team is perfectly healthy.

I can't imagine lunch taking a full hour, seems like a waste of time to me though I know other people have different opinions on this, it's individual preference.

Do you have mandatory lunch times and locations? Doesn't anyone ever want to spend their lunch break exercising or taking a walk? Or even going home to eat with their families? These are all common in my office. What if you hired a Muslim who fasted for Ramadan? Will you force them to watch everyone else eat?

[mk89]

> Do you have mandatory lunch times and locations?

No. In some offices there is a canteen where you can sit down and have a lunch with your colleagues, though.

Times and locations are most of the time decided by people. For example, you might decide to go to a restaurant/pizzeria with 2-3 colleagues, or just one, or more people from different departments, etc.

> Doesn't anyone ever want to spend their lunch break exercising or taking a walk?

Normally, people here in Europe tend to eat at the same time - let's say 12:30, or 13:00, or 13.30 - depending on the country.

> Or even going home to eat with their families?

This is almost never the case - as far as I know.

> What if you hired a Muslim who fasted for Ramadan?

I had a Muslim colleague once, and while he was fasting, he just didn't join, which is fine. However, before/after he was always part of the group.

Mine was not a criticism, just an observation, because that's what I have noticed during the years. It doesn't imply anything, just that under the following circumstances:

- in a country where people tend to eat at the same time on average ( let's say at 12.30),

- there is a canteen/kitchen in the office, or restaurants nearby,

- nobody goes to see the family during lunch,

- nobody goes for a walk during lunch, except for reaching the restaurant, or in the case everyone in the group (that doesn't have to be the whole team/company) is willing to.

Then, I have noticed that when people don't sit at the same table (it doesn't have to be the whole company simultaneously), there are issues in the teams. As I said, this is a personal observation, and I want to thank you for answering because your response offered me different insights and points of view (like: exercising, going for a walk, eating with family, etc).

[nommm-nommm]

Oh OK I thought that there was mandatory lunch time for teambuilding.

Elective lunches and socialization is certainly a thing at my office too. It's just there is such a variety of lunch activities in my office and it's never been a hinderence to the team dynamics.

There's also some people with strong opinions on your relationship with your co-workers should be business-only and others who have met their best friend or even spouse at work.

None of this has ever hurt team dynamics though.

My office skews older though.

[TeMPOraL]

I have similar approach. I like to eat lunch at my desk - even if my hands are full so I am not coding on the work project per se, I can at least be reading something. I have plenty of opportunities to talk to my teammates during the rest of the day anyway.

As for hour+-long lunches, I don't get it either. I guess some people like it - in the same way in which I like to come home and work on my own projects. Everyone wants to allocate time on stuff they like. I don't particularly fancy eating with people.

[epalmer]

I'm 62 and find my head hurts if I code all morning and then eat at my desk and get right back at it. So 1 to 2 times a week I eat in the cafeteria. I take a full hour and that helps. 3 days a week I take a power nap in my office even if my lunch was an hour. I used to feel guilty doing so. No longer. My productivity is high and my bosses count me as exceeding expectations.

I am lucky I don't have a micromanager as a boss.

[nommm-nommm]

Oh wow I am the exact opposite. If I take breaks I have a very hard time getting back to work. I like to get in the zone and stay there.

[epalmer]

When I was much younger that was my prefered mode. Not sure what age has to do with it but I allow myself to try new approaches from time to time to see if old assumptions still hold true.

[camelNotation]

I think we have a healthy work environment. No major conflicts or issues. I think the idea of lunch together as a team is nice, but not practical in my organization since we all run different projects and have conflicting schedules. We do try to do a monthly team lunch, where we go out to a local restaurant to eat together, but even those do not always happen due to scheduling conflicts.

[mk89]

I have seen places where people don't have any reason except for "naaa, I don't wanna spend my time with them, I prefer to spend it alone".

When there is a justification that goes beyond that, for me it's okay - actually, I am okay with every decision.

However, I have seen places where people create real factions during lunch time, or they just tend to be alone, because of the reason mentioned above.

No criticism, just an observation, which is wrong apparently, if not all factors (different schedules, etc.) are taken into account. :)

[greenshackle]

Our team has lunch together every week or so. I wouldn't be happy with the norm of having lunch together all the time. I like to get out of the office and play stupid games on my tablet over lunch. Doing that around people is seen as antisocial so I prefer going off on my own.

[protomok]

In my team we usually eat lunch at our cubes while being stuck on conference calls with folks from our local office, California, and Europe. Not sure if this counts as having lunch with colleagues :)

[wojt_eu]

Then I believe such a "team building" activity should count towards working hours total.

[projektir]

That may be true in general, but some of us just don't enjoy going out for lunch that much. I've always eaten at my desk with a few exceptions when I do want to go to lunch with coworkers.

[mk89]

Thank you both for your answers! ;)