You forgot one qualification. Workers are allowed to eat if they aren’t on the clock, and they’re even allowed to eat on the clock provided it doesn’t interfere with their work and it doesn’t bother others at their work.
So, if someone is supposed to be working from 8:30 AM to 5 PM (assuming a half hour unpaid lunch here), and this someone rolls in at 8:25 with coffee and a donut, then that person has five minutes to finish the coffee and donut. S/he needs to start work at 8:30, not use the breakfast as an excuse to read personal email, etc. Now, if s/he can take care of company email or voicemail while eating and drinking, that’s fine. But I’ve seen too many people who will take care of personal business first, and then company business if they can manage to get around to it. This isn’t a perk, it’s stealing from the company. As a general rule, if someone is on the clock, the company does not want him/her playing games, or eating or drinking, or doing anything else, until all of the company business is taken care of. Why is this difficult to understand? It’s one thing if someone grabs a soda when there’s nothing to do. It’s quite another to grab a soda and kick back when other members of the team are doing YOUR work in addition to their own.
Finishing coffee and a doughnut or sandwich can be done while starting your workday. Start up the computer, check voicemail and email, grab the paperwork you were doing at yesterday’s end and give it a once-over review before getting back into it… all of that can be done while sipping coffee and finishing the last few bites of whatever. A drink and a sandwich is not a 4 course meal, 5 or 10 minutes should be plenty. Have napkins and/or wipes handy, and you are re-fueled and ready to continue productively.
I arrive at my desk with donut or breakfast sandwich (on days when I do that). I fire up my PC while I go get some ice (I don’t drink coffee), then come back, pour my Cherry Coke Free, drink it and eat my breakfast while firing up the 8-10 different programs and windows I need for the day’s work, checking my multiple inboxes and bringing up the group(team) chat to say good morning.
I can do all of that just fine with a breakfast sandwich shoved in my mouth or while drinking my coke, because none of it involves talking.
People who would wait until after they eat to do that (while on the clock) are just lazy bastards making excuses for not doing their work.
There’s a big difference between multitasking and using the food and drink as an excuse to procrastinate. I have no problem with multitaskers, as I do it myself. I’ve seen other people multitask, and I’ve seen other people who have perfected the art of procrastination while keeping up an appearance of being busy at work. I prefer to work with the multitaskers.
The basic question is, is the work getting done? Or is the employee just putting in time at his/her desk/site? Now, most jobs will have some down time. But if one worker is consistently not getting work done, because of poor time management, and other workers are having to pick up the slack, that’s a guaranteed recipe for resentment on the part of other workers. I spoke earlier of having to work with a woman who was well known for her habit of taking smoke breaks when the place was busy. I wasn’t the only one who eventually refused to work in the deli while she ran the register (the deli person was a backup cashier). NOBODY could get all the deli work done if she was on the register, and nobody liked to work in the deli on the shift after hers, either, because she left so much undone. We were supposed to make the various salads (potato and egg and macaroni and such) and prepare sandwiches ahead of time, plus of course keep the place clean. Smoking Bitch placed smoking and other breaks as her first priority, over actually getting the work done. Anyone who worked in the deli after her would find that the supply of salads was not replenished, and most of the premade sandwiches were either down to one or two sandwiches or completely out. Most of the other workers at that particular place were smokers, but they managed to get their smoke breaks in while the place wasn’t busy.
I’ve also worked with people who weren’t smokers, but who clearly thought that as long as they showed up, that counted as working. I mean, remember **flatlined’s **Shredder Guy? He was a champion procrastinator, and all around slacker off, as well as being a thief of material goods.
Again and again and again, it comes down to whether or not someone is getting his/her work done as well as getting a bite to eat.
Man, I love the SDMB. Someone makes a facetious comment about carrying an armadillo at work, and in rolls someone who actually does carry an armadillo at work.
This. Once they’ve looked at you, they feel the need to say something - anything, no matter how meaningless - and your food just seems like an easy target. If you had come in out of the rain, they’d say “Oh, look, you’re all wet.”
When I was in the hospital, in labor, some years ago, there was a …I guess you’d call it a central (unenclosed) nursing station right outside of all of the rooms. I remember having labor pains, and hearing screaming :eek: from some woman coming from another room, all this accompanied by the smell of toast, tuna fish, and coffee as the nurses and doctors made themselves lunch. (though it was late shift lunch, being 2 or 3 a.m.). I wonder if they still do that.
Maybe I’m old fashioned? While I would never publicly decry anyone for such, I always have had reservations about coworkers who arrive right at the beginning of the working day, and then proceed to purchase or make breakfast for themselves during working time. I don’t mean a 30 second jaunt to the coffee bar, but a 10 minute walk to the canteen or a 10 minute process of making and eating oatmeal and their own French press coffee.
Granted, most of us arrive early and stay late. But there’s always the clock watcher, and it’s the clock-watcher who does this that frustrates me. But again, unless I’m supervising you, I won’t call you out on it.
(I want too much Drag Race.)