Posted on: Monday, August 18, 2003

AT WORK
Getting out of the office for lunch can give your productivity a boost

By Dawn Sagario
Des Moines Register

Cyndi Cotton sat eating the last of her nectarine while rolling up the sleeves of her red shirt.

Clad in sandals and sunglasses, she spent the final minutes of her lunch break working on her tan while relaxing at a plaza in downtown Des Moines, Iowa.

The tax specialist said that during the summer, she rarely eats lunch in the office. Cotton either spends her midday break lounging by the plaza's fountain, or she shops.

"I enjoy people, but if I don't get my time to regenerate, I get really frazzled," said Cotton, who works at the Internal Revenue Service taxpayer assistance center.

Notes from a saxophone player wafted through the lunchtime crowd.

"It's really nice to just be sitting outside," she said.

Her sun worshiping was contagious. I bought a bratwurst from one of the food carts, plopped down on a bench, took off my slippers and sunned my feet.

I should definitely do this more often, I thought.

Most times, lunch is a dash to get carryout that I end up eating at my desk — while I answer the phone. And reply to e-mail. And catch up on reading.

With a desk that doubles as a buffet line, I've also had to do my share of blowing out bread crumbs trapped in my computer keyboard and wiping up sticky caramel rings left by my Starbucks cup.

One recent survey found that one-third of U.S. adults most often eat lunch at their offices, with half eating at their desks and the other half eating in workplace cafeterias.

Three out of four workers who break for lunch take less than an hour, according to the survey conducted by Uncle Ben's. One in 10 takes no break at all.

While meeting deadlines inevitably means occasional long hours and combining work and meals at your desk, that needs to be balanced by regular breaks, said Dr. Donald Kaesser of Central Iowa Psychological Services in West Des Moines.

Kaesser said the constant grind can be counterproductive.

"The belief that you need to work 110 percent all the time is the American myth," he said. "If the efforts to do your work, in the long run, cause you a loss of productivity or satisfaction, then it's not functional."

A survey of chief financial officers found that on average, the higher-ups worked through lunch three days a week.

When executives set that kind of example, employees might be expected to do the same, said Kristina Sickels, division director in Des Moines for Robert Half Management Resources, which developed the survey.

Being bound to your desk during the noon hour could lead to decreased morale and productivity, Sickels said.

Getting away from the office — for a lunch with a client or a networking event — can help clear your head, she said. You are not only in a more relaxed setting but also the different surroundings could hold the solution to a problem at work.

Sickels said if you cannot leave for lunch, make a point of doing things like taking a short walk or going over to someone to relay a message instead of using e-mail.

"A change of scenery does a lot to recharge your batteries," she said.

If you are still doggedly holding onto the idea of your work station doubling as your feeding area, a study of office spaces released last year by Charles Gerba, a professor of microbiology at the University of Arizona, could change your mind.

Gerba found that the average desk harbors 400 times more bacteria than the average toilet seat.

Yeah, the toilet seat.

The study showed that a desk has nearly 21,000 germs per square inch. That compares to 49 per square inch found on the toilet.

The only item more germ-infested than the desk surface was the phone — about 25,000 germs per square inch.

I packed my chopsticks and beef teriyaki and headed to the break room.