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Comment by varispeed | Hacker News Reader

This is so true. If a company has any wellbeing programs or even "free lunch" or "pizza Fridays" it's a big red flag. It basically means they don't pay enough for you to afford a pizza or lunch, not to mention a private therapy if stress gets onto you. Probably some managers are feeling guilty they pay so little, so they come up with these virtue signalling schemes. It doesn't bother them that they take private jets for a quarterly getaway in Caribbean, while employees spend extra hour before work to make sandwiches, because they can't afford going out at their lunch break.

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What you're describing sounds totally different from the wellness program described in the article. What the article describes is something that seems to be totally targetted at individuals. If you desire them, and get paid enough, you could just get them yourself - there's no reason for the company to get involved.

What you're describing are more like team building. Enforced lunches or dinners with coworkers are not just about directly rewarding you with free food, but also enforcing some informal time with team members that you might not choose to spend time with outside of work (or even those you might but maybe wouldn't normally make time for). In many cases it's not even disguised that this is the goal. Although I might not always be a fan of spending time with some of those people, I see the benefit to the business and even myself and it's quite orthogonal from compensation.

In many workplaces lunch breaks are not paid. I view my lunch break as a sacred time for myself and as an introvert I use this time to recharge. Unfortunately employers don't see these schemes as discriminatory. Any team building stuff means that HR didn't do a great job at hiring and since often it is difficult to let people go, they do that to "patch things up".

Regarding optional programs, sure these exist - unfortunately you are unable to get a cash equivalent if you don't want to use it.

> Any team building stuff means that HR didn't do a great job at hiring

This is just wrong. Team building has a place like anything else and reasonable people can disagree about how much is too much.

While I disagree with this, that's not the point. My actual point was that your comment is off topic for this article, and that still stands.

In none of the job I had did my colleagues discuss work at lunch. It was and is a kind of big no no. Might be a cultural thing.

I battled with a previous employer with this. I don't care about the yearly weekend getaways, bi-monthly restaurant dinners, takeaway etc you buy us, I know best what makes me happy and its not that. Just give me what I need to do my work, be a good manager, give me good pay and let me enjoy my life outside of work in peace.

Right but this suggests those things might be for your benefit when it looks to me like they're for team cohesion ie for the employers benefit. There's nothing wrong with that unless they're trying to portray those things as being for your benefit!

Exactly, pre-COVID we would go out for a group lunch maybe once every month or two. 7 or 8 people total. Everyone paid their own way so it wasn't seen as a benefit but everyone did acknowledge it as a good bit of team building/cohesion around something everyone was going to do anyway (eat) so it was much better than trying to do something after hours or on a weekend when we have better things to do, or during the work day when the company has better things for us to do.

Yes, a multi-day team (weekday) offsite every now and then is fine (and probably beneficial). But, in general, weekend getaways and things like that are bad practices.

Normally I travel a lot so nights and at least parts of weekends away are pretty routine for me. But companies should attempt to minimize it to the degree possible.

> If a company has any wellbeing programs or even "free lunch" or "pizza Fridays" it's a big red flag. It basically means they don't pay enough for you to afford a pizza or lunch

No, and there are many companies that serve as counterexamples. Companies can offer both high compensation and small office perks, food and other gimmicks.

Exactly, every time workplace conditions comes up on HN, it seems like the vast majority of people just work at companies that absolutely suck. They then come to the conclusion that all companies suck.

It is actually possible to have a well paying job, at a company that also try to care about your well-being.

I realize this is a forum that caters to tech folks who might be accustomed to these kinds of perquisites, but I’m pretty sure you’re describing the default state of employment for the vast majority of people. No free food. No restaurant lunches everyday. No attention paid to employee mental health/wellbeing.

That's definitely true. I remember well when I wasn't able to afford a restaurant meal, but a manager was taking us out for lunch to quite expensive ones, my partner was crying that we weren't going out for ages and I am going to restaurants. That put me in a bad place mentally. She even asked me if I could get some leftovers home, but I couldn't get myself to ask that as other employees wouldn't ask. I didn't want to look like I have a problem (that is not being paid enough). So on my way from work I'd draw some of my savings and buy a small meal at inexpensive restaurant and pretend I got saved some food for her. That's why I despise such programmes.

Wow that’s really sad to hear, hope both of your situation has improved

I worked for a hedge fund that did pizza on Fridays. I can assure you that ordering that for everyone was unrelated to the pay.

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