31–40 of 85 posts
As someone who regularly works 10-12 hours a day, shifting the end of the work day a further 1.5hrs sounds like a special kind of hell. I'll be sticking to my hasty desk-lunch thank you very much.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
IMO the bulk of this is due to workplace culture, not being remote. Naturally being at home adds some logistical flexibility, but the bulk of the gap is between companies who treat their employees like toddlers and those who actually respect them as adults (see also: dress code for non-customer-facing work, overly-fixed hours, etc). You can see this distinction in the slow creep of employee-monitoring software over t…
Disagree on that law treating employee as children. It treats employers as such. « Oh really company? you can’t have some common sense decency in regard to lunch? Alright, I will spell it out for you » From the worker side, nobody will come to say anything if you decide to put grease on your keyboard and stain your shirt during lunch time. You are free to do so.
They can't have "common sense".
People with misophonia will attest that other people eating at their neighborhoods desks is extremely distracting and annoying (and not only because of noises - but smells as well) So, I'm with France on this
Ninety minutes, free-flowing conversation, perhaps a glass of wine Yuck. Of course it creates more productivity, they're sucking free time out of my evening and injecting into my work day. Screw that. I'm eating a sandwich at my desk in peace and then I'm going home an hour earlier than these shmucks.
France is more productive per capita (edit: the reference I found was from 2009, France is currently slightly less productive than the US per capita[1]) and has a higher quality of life than the US. Consider improving your mental model and recognizing you are not as well off and productive as you believe. Japanese workers spend a lot of time at their desks too, but not that productive! Data > emotions, work to live d…
Ninety minutes, free-flowing conversation, perhaps a glass of wine Yuck. Of course it creates more productivity, they're sucking free time out of my evening and injecting into my work day. Screw that. I'm eating a sandwich at my desk in peace and then I'm going home an hour earlier than these shmucks.
PS I'm in Spain not France but similar culture. But here you can eat at the desk if you really want to.
Also I go to France regularly and people do eat at their desks there. Some people just like to or they're forced to because of cross-timezone meetings. Like most of these protectionist laws (like not being allowed to email out of work hours) they're only for show and not actually enforced. France is a bit weird like that.
We need more of this in America. Perhaps we just need to take the time ourselves and leave no apologies. Too many meetings get scheduled over lunch and people lose their windows of opportunity. This has somewhat shifted with remote work too and when one decides to take their lunch. I’ve started to do that at the beginning or end of the day because I know I won’t have a chance midday.
I have 12-1 blocked on my calendar every day. I will take the rare meeting in that slot (just like I'd take the rare "sit and eat with a colleague on a scheduled rather than ad-hoc basis" while we were in the office), but most days that's a meeting-free hour where I can go make lunch, walk the dog, listen to some music, or whatever suits me. Blocking your calendar is low-effort and will likely be high-payoff.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
France is more productive per capita (edit: the reference I found was from 2009, France is currently slightly less productive than the US per capita[1]) and has a higher quality of life than the US. Consider improving your mental model and recognizing you are not as well off and productive as you believe. Japanese workers spend a lot of time at their desks too, but not that productive! Data > emotions, work to live d…
Consider that aggregates may not scale down to every individual. Data > Statistics
If you want to eat at your desk while I have a 90 minute lunch with wine and good company, that’s okay, life is about choices. We are optimizing differently.
It adds variety to the day and I feel more connected with everybody.
If I have a string of days with lunchtime calls and I have to eat something at my desk, I'm definitely starting to feel out of sync with the company and this weird feeling of anxiety starts to set in until I'm back in the usual groove.
Ninety minutes, free-flowing conversation, perhaps a glass of wine Yuck. Of course it creates more productivity, they're sucking free time out of my evening and injecting into my work day. Screw that. I'm eating a sandwich at my desk in peace and then I'm going home an hour earlier than these shmucks.
Frenchman here. I leave the office at 6pm at the latest, and I take 2 hour lunch breaks everyday. :)