Lunch time meetings

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Orange Cola
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Lunch time meetings

Post by Orange Cola »

Why do people feel the need to check your calendar, see it’s free not at a lunch time, then proceed to bung an hours meeting in at lunch time or worse still a regular hour meeting slot at lunch time? Then you have to suffer the noise of other people chewing as they talk, or chewing when not on mute, making the parents suffer even more as they try to support a meeting and entertain or feed their kids at the same time. What’s the office etiquette when you ask someone to move a meeting from a lunch time slot to some other time in the completely free afternoon and they get arsey with you for asking for the meeting to be moved?

I can understand it if there are no other slots available but Jesus suffering fuck have some common sense and thought for others...
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mik
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by mik »

When is lunchtime?

My body no longer likes anything more solid than a cuppa in the morning, so I often have lunch before mid-day. Others like it after 1pm.

Factor in colleagues in other time zones across Europe - v difficult.

If I want to prevent people booking time during my lunch break - I need to book my calendar out. Nothing else works.
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Simon
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Simon »

Just decline the invite with comment - 'I'll be at lunch'

Do it often enough and people will get the message.

Or as Mik says book out your calendar, but make sure to do so with a private event so that people think you're having a lunchtime affair or something.
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Swervin_Mervin
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Swervin_Mervin »

"Decline"
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Jobbo
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Jobbo »

Book out your calendar with 'Lunch' - if you don't work over lunchtime that's perfectly reasonable.
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mik
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by mik »

Set up a rule so that - if someone tries to book a meeting during your lunch, your outlook automatically responds with FOYC? :?
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Orange Cola
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Orange Cola »

EU/International isn’t a problem because funnily enough they get it. You’re also berated for suggesting meeting slots when the French have their lunch.

Sticking in another meeting slot called lunch is an invite where I work, that’s classed as free time and gets the response of ‘well your calendar says you’re free for a working lunch’.
mik wrote: Thu Jul 16, 2020 1:57 pm Set up a rule so that - if someone tries to book a meeting during your lunch, your outlook automatically responds with FOYC? :?
Finally, a sensible option!
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Beany
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Beany »

Do you get paid for your lunch?

Do you get paid overtime for working lunches?

If the answer is no to both, tell them to get to fuck.
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Orange Cola
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Orange Cola »

Beany wrote: Thu Jul 16, 2020 5:05 pm Do you get paid for your lunch?

Do you get paid overtime for working lunches?

If the answer is no to both, tell them to get to fuck.
That’s not the attitude we’re looking for, Steve (especially when the people above are on fixed salary contracts and not defined hours, so their view is you can go fuck yourself :lol: ). There’s a culture of those who are good must want to move up the ladder :lol:
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duncs500
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by duncs500 »

12 to 2pm should never be booked for meetings IMO. Some time for lunch and rest of the slot to actually be able to do some work rather than being stuck in meetings! :-D
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Sundayjumper
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Sundayjumper »

Orange Cola wrote: Thu Jul 16, 2020 8:39 pm There’s a culture of those who are good must want to move up the ladder :lol:
This is a reason why I like contracting - you don't have to get involved with this office-politics-greasy-pole nonsense.
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Simon
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Simon »

What's almost as annoying is those people who see a 30 minutes window between meetings in your diary then go and fill it with a client call. Like 'yeah, sure, the other meeting is definitely unlikely to overrun and having to hard stop on the hour to attend the next call is a really good look. NOT'.

I had 5 back to backs the other afternoon. No time to breathe.
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Rich B
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by Rich B »

The beginning of lockdown was a bit overkill on meetings for me, particularly as I was cramming 5 days of work into 3 days with childcare. I had 7 30min -2 hour in one day once - great, but when do I actually do any of the actions raised?!
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DeskJockey
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by DeskJockey »

Rich B wrote: Fri Jul 17, 2020 8:14 am The beginning of lockdown was a bit overkill on meetings for me, particularly as I was cramming 5 days of work into 3 days with childcare. I had 7 30min -2 hour in one day once - great, but when do I actually do any of the actions raised?!
That's what the follow-up meeting is for: explaining why you've not done what was agreed because you were on meetings explaining why you hadn't done what was agreed in the meeting before that, etc. Ad nauseam.
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JonMad
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by JonMad »

This sounds like my calendar at the moment. And woe betide taking a day off - everything just moves to fill subsequent slots.
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simon_g
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by simon_g »

I have 12-1 as a recurring lunch "meeting" every day. Make sure appointment titles are visible to all so they can see what it is.

I also do 9-9:15 every morning (for "planning") and 5-5:30 every afternoon, to discourage people booking meetings too early or late.
mr_jon
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Re: Lunch time meetings

Post by mr_jon »

I avoid this situation by not having to go to meetings.
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