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While there are some positives, to enforce this seems quite inhumane.

People often need a bit of space in order to work together better.

Also, in a group > 2 there's huge potential for conversational drift. So, if two people want to talk about a certain topic, it becomes too easy to derail.

Embrace the quiet.

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We do this at my company and it's awesome. The idea is it's not at all mandatory. Do whatever you want for lunch. But everyday, at noon, there will be a free lunch served at this location. Most people will participate in that 4 out of 5 days. If they have a deadline, want to meet a friend for lunch, need to run some errands or whatever it's fine. Most often the conversation is about everything but business.

It makes us closer as a team and some of our best ideas come out over lunch when we're not trying to brainstorm or think about business issues.

Yes, I think this is great.

It's the idea of making it mandatory that I consider domineering.

Great for a cult ... not so good for herding cats.

This is exactly what it's like where I work. It's fun to grab lunch when you want/need it at the same time as others, but it's ultra-low-pressure and in no way mandatory. Best of all possible worlds, in my opinion, and a huge perk for anyone working at a company <20 people.

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