Workshops by Caroline Bienert
WHAT IS INTELLIGENT NUTRITION?
INTELLIGENT NUTRITION means having your body get all essential macronutrients in the form of a healthy and organic diet every day (not only for x-mas, birthdays or weddings) so that it can turns into macronutritients. Only when the body (engine) receives all the macronutrients it needs, this is INTELLIGENT NUTRITION. How to eat intelligent, to speed up and to hold your efficiency for lifetime.
Intelligent Nutrition
WHY IS THE RIGHT DIET SO IMPORTANT FOR EMPLOYEES?
How the right diet has a positive effect on the performance of your staff.
Do you recognize the mid-afternoon energy slump?
With a balanced diet during working hours you can avoid that inertia after lunch. This is also to the benefit of the entire company.
A healthy diet not only leads to more focused employees, but in the long-term they will also be much healthier. With a staff lacking in concentration, your losses in turnover can be immense.
Today, we already know that the health crisis will be ten times more severe than the financial crisis.
Meaning that promoting a healthy diet immediately increases your turnover by means of productive and concentrated staff.
A good, healthy lunch is unknown in most German canteens. In a survey carried out by the magazine, “MEN’S HEALTH”, 41% declared that the canteen food, if it was provided, was “mediocre” or “really bad”. Only 20% received “good” meals while 39% didn’t have a canteen at all. It is hardly surprising that most of them feel tired (38%) during work, bloated (26%) or simply uncomfortable (12%). A majority eats their lunch off-site. However, the canteen is the first venue for most of the staff. 44% eat there while 34% would rather go to a diner, and 28% prefer a restaurant.
I’m not surprised at that, as I often hear from my clients: “I cannot eat our canteen food, it is a disgrace.” I mentor companies investing in a healthy cuisine by only buying high-quality ingredients. Their sickness absence rate is nearly zero. Delicate food keeps people’s mood up and it champions their sociability. There is no other measure which allows you to improve the office climate more than good, healthy food. A healthy and delicious lunch pays off, both for the staff and the company.
CANTEEN FOOD IS DANGEROUS
It makes staff fat, sick and unfocused. There is simply too much fat, sugar and chemicals in canteen food.
37% say that it is too fatty and 36% complain that there are too many flavor enhancers and additives (pure chemicals) in the meals.
Although everyone should be familiar with the risks of malnutrition, most of the canteens seem not to have tackled this issue yet.
Short-term risks are:
- Performance loss
- Lack of concentration
- Headaches
- Circulatory disorders
- Indigestion (a taboo topic because nobody ever wants to talk about bloating)
However, in the long-term, people who eat bratwurst, schnitzel with fries, and noodles with cream sauce or high-calorie desserts risk serious diseases like:
- Obesity
- Diabetes mellitus
- Dyslipidemia
- Hypertension
- Cardiovascular problems
- Gout
- Pancreatic diseases
- Liver diseases
- Cancer (in the US cancer is an approved metabolic disease)
VITAMINS, MINERALS AND DIETARY FIBER IS ESSENTIAL FOR THE HUMAN BODY
It is no longer a secret that for staff to remain productive it is possible to have an influence by means of an adequate dietary praxis on a job which is dominated by time pressure, stress, appointments and meeting marathons. A balanced diet contributes to handling the increasing requirements in every day life in a better and fitter way. But what does “balanced” actually mean?
Not this, for sure: too fatty, too salty, too sweet.
If you shove empty calories (sugar and fat) into your mouth you will never get the feeling of being full because your body is not getting essential vitamins. Here is where the vicious circle starts – in the unhealthy foodstuff that is eaten.
That afternoon sleepiness becomes an afternoon coma because it puts a strain on your body’s digestive system; it works at full blast and the well-known sleepiness attacks kick in. The meals should be fresh and low in fat with a wide range of vegetables. Salad is not a vegetable!
FATTY DISHES ARE POISON FOR OUR BRAIN
The essential carbohydrates should be consumed in the form of pasta and potato dishes. But this doesn’t mean pasta with cream sauce or potatoes or croquettes fried in a lot of oil, or sweet cakes from the bakery around the corner. Such dishes harm our health and our condition because all our blood supply goes to the digestive tract which makes the brain go easy on working.
The meals should be light and easy to digest and at the same time provide your body with the essential energy it requires. A light meal allows you to work in a much more relaxed way. The same is true for the desserts, sweets and mousse high in calories. Cakes are also counter-productive for the performance curve in the afternoon. The required energy intake rule is that those who work physically require more energy than those working in a sedentary occupation.
NO BREAK – NO PRODUCTIVITY
If you don’t take a break you will not be able to work productively and as a result you will make more mistakes. Plus you have to work three times as much, which leads to a decrease in a company’s output. Due to the predominantly hectic office environment most of the staff only take a 20-minute break for lunch or they don’t eat at all. Nutritionally, this is an absolute no-go. You gas up your car, but not your body. This is the worst thing you can do to your body and leads directly down the “road of disease.”
It is every employee’s own responsibility to eat more healthily, but companies can inspire and support their staff in many ways.
It is not good enough to get a cheese sandwich from the bakery around the corner. This is not a wholefood meal. It is also not an alternative to say “I will eat in comfort at home in the evening and skip lunch.” Plus, you tend to make up for what you haven’t eaten during the day. This is not healthy and doesn’t feel healthy either.
SNACKERS – THE PERMANENT EATERS
Snacks are not a meal, or a replacement for a meal. Snacks which are consumed during the course of the day stress our digestive organs as they have to work (digest) without a break. Insulin is permanently produced which is very unhealthy.
It is healthy to eat three main dishes at certain times and 1-2 snacks at a maximum.
Unfortunately, many staff lack the discipline to eat healthily or to place emphasis on a healthy dietary behavior. There are many reasons for that, but one of the main reasons is that an unhealthy diet is already taught in childhood at home. It takes a lot of effort to change our diet as grown-ups. Malnutrition takes up the same time as eating healthily.
But it is inconvenient to change your diet – a true challenge.
Work is mostly already quite stressful and if you want to nourish yourself with good food, it requires preparation which takes time. Many probably dread the effort and don’t take good care of themselves. The consequences cannot be seen and felt immediately, but at the age of 35 at the latest or even earlier, the first symptoms become apparent.
I haven’t become acquainted with anybody still healthy at the age of 40.
About 1.5bn meals are prepared in German canteens annually, yet the food there is anything but healthy. But it is in the staff’s control to not make themselves dependent on fast food prepared on an assembly line. Everyone can do something for him and herself. Nutrition doesn’t only have to do with food – it is an attitude towards a conscious and healthy life.
WATER – THE SOURCE OF LIFE
One in two people does not drink water or not enough. As with food, it is the same with drinking water; it is all about making a habit of it. If we are not used to drinking, we drink less or not at all. Unfortunately, our eating and drinking habit is often adjusted and subordinated to the office routine instead of to our bodies and health.
WHAT IS MORE INTELLIGENT?
The brain needs sufficient liquid in order to remain capable of focusing and performing. Adults should drink at least 2 liters of clean potable water, if they are healthy. When they are sick, at least 3 liters are required. However, if under pressure, many people drink too little or not at all.
The consequences: the brain lacks crucial nutrients such as potassium and phosphate. Our brainpower decreases and we often get headaches. Dehydration is pure stress for our organism.
WHY DO COMPANIES NOT OFFER HEALTHY FOOD IN CANTEENS?
The basic precondition for the establishment of healthy food in the office is the awareness by the management of the importance of it and an affirmative attitude of the company. It is also significant that the offer of a good diet is not provided separately from other measures. It should be incorporated in a long-term concept of an operational health management.
What role do organic products play?
From a nutritional point of view the quality of ecologically produced products is ten times less polluted than conventionally produced products.
Meanwhile we live in a highly polluted environment and all we can do is perform damage control. Fish from the oceans, for example, is so highly polluted with heavy metals that I, as a nutritionist, cannot recommend fish any longer. For ethical reasons, products from fair trade shall be taken into account.
It is crucial that the balance of nutrients and energy is right.
I have developed special workshops, “INTELLIGENT NUTRITION”, so that your staff eat intelligently in the office. The workshops will inspire your staff to eat well in both the long and short-term. This is a wonderful win-win situation for everybody.
