Personal training blog

Avoid temptation in the workplace

If you are reading this hoping for advice on how to not sleep with your co-worker, sorry, wrong post. We mean calorific work temptations in the form of food and drink that can often derail even the most determined resolution to get fit and lose weight.

Eating (and drinking) well is usually fairly achievable when things are under our own control. It’s when we fail to plan, get hijacked or surprised that things can start to go wrong. Here’s our top 8 tips to avoid temptation at work while not being ostracised too badly.

1 – Invent a condition. 20 years ago this might have been tricky. However today nearly everyone claims to have (or might even actually have) an eating or health disorder of some kind. If staff room cakes are hard to resist than tell colleagues that you have been diagnosed gluten intolerant. Or even an egg allergy might do the trick. Just be careful to hide the boiled eggs in your pack lunch salad.

2 – Make a pre-emptive strike. If you had breakfast reasonably early then chances are by noon or 1pm you’ll be starving. Not many of us would be able to resist donuts shoved towards us at this point. So take a couple of healthy snacks in to work with you, so that when temptation arrives you just aren’t that hungry.

3 – Be on a “dry month”. Work drinks and functions can be lethal. Not just in terms of calorific intake through alcohol, but in the poor eating that usually follows. So even if it’s not January, tell colleagues that you’re having just a month off drinking – assure them you’ll be back with a vengeance. This should keep the peer pressure off. You could also claim to be on medications that require abstinence.

4 – Drink smart. Swap full fat mixers for low calorie ones. Swap beers and ciders for champagne and prosecco. Have a look at our list of low calorie cocktails and low calorie alcoholic drinks.

5 – Drive positive change. If you are a manager, try to move the workplace towards offering more healthy choices. There can be cakes, but even a single healthier alternative might just make the difference between a good or a poor choice.

6 – Track your calories. Not for everyone, and not forever, but tracking calories – even if it’s just for a few weeks – means that you will actually be aware of how many calories you’ve blown in a work place snack. Cakes, donuts, croissants and similar savoury treats are all high in calories and low in filling nutrition.

7 – Recruit a friend. Is there someone at work with a similar weigh loss goal? Seek them out and join forces. Two people working together are more likely to avoid office temptation than facing it alone. It can also give you someone to hang out with if you have to go for the final option below, point 8.

8 – Stay away. We don’t want you becoming the outcast, but if you know your weaknesses, can’t say no and have failed again and again, then avoidance of functions/staff rooms/lunch meetings may be the only way. It doesn’t have to be long term, but just for long enough for you to see some weight loss. Come up with a constructive and plausible reason why you can’t be there – “I have to finish this really important project” etc.