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Where and with whom we eat lunch is a much bigger deal than most people care to admit. Obviously, psychologists will tell us, obviously<\/em> it goes back to childhood, and especially school, particularly Junior High, where who you eat with is of monumental importance. Being in any<\/em> clique, even if it\u2019s just the nerds, is vastly preferable than eating alone. For loners and geeks, finding people to eat with in the cafeteria at school can be a huge source of stress.<\/p>\nThe importance of eating together with your co-workers is not negotiable, to me. It\u2019s too important to be left to chance. That\u2019s why we eat together at long tables, not a bunch of little round tables. That\u2019s why when new people start work at the company, they\u2019re not allowed to sit off by themselves in a corner. When we have visitors, they eat together with everyone else.<\/p>\n
Even though Stack Exchange and Fog Creek are completely separate companies, we take advantage of the fact that our offices are in the same building to eat together every day. I\u2019m glad that we have a chance to do this, even though a lot of people tend to clique-up and sit with the same people day after day.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a lot of stuff that\u2019s accidental about Fog Creek and Stack Exchange, but lunch is not one of them. Ten years ago Michael and I set out with the rather ambitious goal of making a great place to work. Eating together is a critical part of what it means to be human and what it means to have a humane workplace, and that\u2019s been a part of our values from day one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"