10 – You should eat with your co-workers, today.

Although it is intuitive that you will be a happier employee and more productive at work if you build positive relationships with your co-workers, most of us overlook one of the easiest building blocks to use – eating together. Think this is a good idea, but don’t know where to start? The next series of blogs will walk you through WHY it is important to eat with your co-workers, WHO you should eat with, WHAT you should talk about during the meal, WHERE you should eat together, and HOW to avoid the awkward who should pay the check situation at the end.

As with anything you do, knowing WHY it is important sets the stage for success. I propose following four reasons you should eat with your co-workers.

1- Immerse yourself in company culture and history

Remember when you asked your parents, “Do you remember when you first learned to drive?” When I was younger, I asked my grandmother about how she learned to drive. She told me a story about how she first learned to drive using a truck with a manual transmission and power steering. However, she had watched her mother (who learned to drive in the early 1900’s) drive a car without power steering. To compensate for the lack of power steering, her mother constantly pulled the wheel back and forth while driving. Therefore, when my grandmother first got behind the wheel, she pulled it too far to the left and ran over a cement birdbath.

Listening to stories like these from your loved ones helped you form a bond with your family, likely resulted in a teachable moment where you learned a lesson from their mistake, and allowed you to see your future-self in the driver’s seat.

In this sense, eating with you co-workers is similar to eating with your family. Both situations provide you an opportunity to learn the history and culture of the group you are dining with and to learn from others. Most companies have marketing material and/or a website that provides information on past projects. You can easily read these and get a broad sense of the company history and culture. However, if you have the opportunity to dive deeper and ask someone who worked on those projects to describe them to you, you are likely to learn about the project challenges and how the team worked together to make the project successful.

Just like your kitchen table, as you listen to “oral traditions,” you learn about unwritten company norms, innovations your co-workers have made, and previous team accomplishments. In The Surprising Power of Family Meals, the author shows us that kids who know more about their family history are more resilient. The same is true in your corporate life. This enables you to see where you fit in as part of the team, learn from the stories of others, and to be motivated to take an active role on the team, which results in you being a strong, sustainable member of the team.

2- Build and foster strong relationships

Just like a building foundation, strong relationships with your co-workers form the integral base of a successful career. One way to build or strengthen these relationships is to eat together. Numerous studies have shown that eating releases a chemical called oxytocin, which promotes a feeling of connection. As you start to feel more connected with you co-workers, your team will grow stronger which results in your being more likely to innovate and succeed as you strengthen your career foundation. This gives both you and your company an advantage in the marketplace.

Also, in keeping up with the modern fast-paced business world, most professionals will have several different jobs throughout their lifetime. One of the best ways to set yourself up for a positive transition in the future, whether it is for a new job or a new career, is to continually strengthen your relationship foundation with your current co-workers. Eating together is a simple way to do this.

3- Take advantage of the opportunity to build your experience library

As discussed in other posts, it is important to learn from your successes and mistakes. However, an often-overlooked opportunity is to learn from the experiences of others. Michael Hyatt writes, “When something succeeds…you can do it again. And the next time, you’ll probably do it even better,” while former President William Clinton said, “If you live long enough you make mistakes. But if you learn from them you will be a better person.”

Each of your co-workers, including peers, bosses, and subordinates, has a different set of experiences from which learned and applied to other situations. A low-stress way for you to siphon their experiences, both positive and negative, is to ask questions and engage in discussion over a meal. Actively engaging in these teachable moments will benefit you throughout your career as you learn and grow by adding your experiences to those of others to form an experience library to pull from when you need it.

4- Eating alone results in missed opportunities

Eating together is an inherently social activity. Yet, according to CNBC.com, over 50 percent of meals are solo. This means that one in every two opportunities to connect with others is missed. You can’t build a successful career alone. The most successful people build with the continual help of others. Engaging your co-workers in a lively discussion allows you to access thought processes that are different from your own. By listening to different viewpoints, you fill your advice pool higher, which gives you more options to choose from when deciding what works best for you, your career, or your project. Think of how much better brainstorming and strategy sessions are when others are involved. What better opportunity to engage others than over a meal? Some of the best solutions I have had for difficult projects have come from engaging a few colleagues while sitting around the lunch table and sketching with a pen and a paper towel. Don’t be part of the 50 percent of people that will miss these types of opportunities because they choose to eat a meal solo. Be smart and use meal times to engage others in lively discussion.

Eating with your co-works instills a sense of company culture and history, enables you to build both your personal and professional relationships, helps you develop your experience library, and allows you to take advantage of opportunities you might otherwise miss. Are you ready to engage others to eat with you but not sure when is the best time? Next week’s post will help you find the right answer.

Why do you (or don’t you) eat with your co-workers?