Eat to Nourish Your Brain (at Work)

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No matter how hard we try to convince ourselves otherwise, eating a bag of chips at our desk does not count as lunch. Unfortunately, professionals often find themselves struggling with a heavy workload, and lunchtime can be the first thing to go. As a culture, we need to stop seeing a solid, well-balanced lunch as a luxury, and see it as more of a necessity. After all, food has a direct impact on our cognitive function, and eating the wrong meal—or failing to eat at all—can derail our work performance. So what can we do?

Plan Your Lunches

Plan for a lunch that will actually recharge you during your workday. Salads, wraps, and sandwiches are simple main courses, and you can supplement with small, nourishing snacks such as fruit, nuts and vegetables. Try planning out your lunches for the week (and doing the shopping) on Sunday, so you’re not scrambling the morning-of for something to bring to work.

Eat the Right Foods

Research has shown that certain foods can actually improve your cognitive function, so if you find that you feel a little foggy as the day goes on or even want a nap, try to work a few of these food items into your daily lunch. Brain-friendly foods include:

• Wild Salmon
• Blueberries
• Nuts and Seeds
• Avocadoes
• Whole Grains
• Beans
• Pomegranate Juice
• Freshly Brewed Tea
• Dark Chocolate

Salmon and nuts can easily be added to a salad for a delicious, healthy lunch, while blueberries, dark chocolate (in small amounts), and guacamole can be enjoyed as a light snack at your desk.

Eat the Right Portions

It can be difficult to strike a balance when it comes to your lunch portions. It’s important not to overeat, but it’s just as important that you get the right number of calories to fuel you throughout the day. Read a nutrition guide, and instead of guessing, be sure to measure each portion of your lunch. This will not only help you avoid overeating, but it will ensure that you’re eating the correct amount of protein, vegetables, and other foods on a daily basis.

If you aren’t getting enough calories—or you’re eating the wrong calories—your work performance can suffer. Help your brain keep up with your busy schedule by eating healthy, nourishing foods, and you’ll see your productivity and overall health improve.

What foods fuel your brain at lunch? We want to know.

Are You Being Real With Your Employees?

When there’s a lack of honesty or transparency in upper management, it can be very easy for a divide to occur in the workplace. Managers will feel pressured to maintain a level of secrecy, while employees feel mistrusted or misled. If this describes your company, you are going to have a problem facilitating healthy, cooperative relationships between staff and management.

Here are a few ways you can address a lack of transparency.

1. Trust your team.

When you get down to it, the foundation of transparency is trust. If you aren’t being honest with your staff, it may be because you lack confidence in their abilities. This can be a two-sided problem. If, for instance, you haven’t been transparent about performance problems on your team, your staff will continue to under-perform, which in turn lowers your confidence in them.

This vicious cycle can only be corrected if you begin by providing them with real, honest constructive feedback. By assuming that they will respond to a performance review with genuine introspection, you place your trust in their abilities and increase their confidence in you as a result.

2. Don’t put a spin on the truth.

Managers can often be spin doctors when it comes to the harsh realities of the workplace. Whether you’re giving a performance review or updating your staff on recent developments in the company, be completely honest with them. This will help your employees develop a clear picture of where their company is, and how they fit in as employees. If you “sugar coat” the truth, this can distort their perception and result in lack of alignment, misjudgment or lowered performance.

3. Hold yourself accountable.

There should also be a large degree of transparency when it comes to your own personal shortcomings. A manager who can admit to their own mistakes and weaknesses is often better liked and more trusted by their staff. This will also encourage your employees to do the same.

Of course, there will be occasions when you must obscure facts from your staff. Whether this is information bound by confidentiality clauses or upcoming plans that are still in development, you should try to avoid the sense of secrecy and mistrust. Simply explain the circumstances to your employees, and ask for their input, when possible, to help involve them.

The goal of being authentic with your staff is to bridge the gap and connect to your employees on a human-to-human level. If there’s a chasm between management and the workforce, it’s impossible to achieve true collaboration or trust. The only way to overcome this divide is by being real and transparent.

Contact us to learn more about our “Real Deal” workshop to help your company create real, authentic relationships between managers and staff.