Work Mode with Brown Uzuokwu: What Has Food Got to Do with Career Success?

Some career paths have forced a lot a lot of people to imbibe healthy eating habits in order to maintain a marketable body mass and shape. For instance, people that venture into Modelling, Entertainment and Sports, already knows that food choices ultimately influences their career success.

However, those of us in the blue-collar or corporate industry, we rarely associate our food with workplace productivity. This is despite the fact that we know that, what we eat has a significant impact on our performance. What you had for breakfast can make a meaningful difference in your cognitive performance, energy, levels and critical decision-making ability.

A lot of young career persons skip their breakfast especially those of them working in Lagos State due to a couple of reasons. That might seem convenient or it might even score some economic points. But if truth be told, we are short-changing our peak performance with whatever it is, is the reason behind our skipping breakfast, which happens to be the most important meal.

A good breakfast empowers you to get the most out of your day, stay present and be mentally alert through long meetings and stressful situations. Public presentations, customer interactions and tense negotiations require maximum concentration and mental power. According to scientific studies, food helps to power electrical impulses for learning, memory and other cognitive tasks.

Using Lagos State as a case study, a greater percentage of the working class, especially the ones working in the private sector do not have the luxury of eating proper breakfast before leaving for work. In fact, considering the time when most of them get ready for work, it will be immoral to be asking for breakfast at that time. I mean, who eats breakfast at 4:00am?

As a result, the ones that insists on having something for breakfast will have to make do with grabbing something on the way viz a viz Gala and Lacasera (saving Nigeria since 1962), Fries, Fast-foods and a whole lot of junk. The other side of this development is that, diets filled with energy drinks, fast foods and sugar negatively affects your mood, learning and memory.

Nutrition Experts advice that we eat more of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds especially in the morning. It has been proven to help in enhancing concentration and outlook. Now what does this mean to an average young career person in Nigeria? Are you telling them to eat cashew nut or groundnut for breakfast because that is the nuts we are familiar with here. What vegetable? What seed? Like seriously, fruits for breakfast? These and much more are questions that might be popping up in your head right now. Don’t be discouraged.

Personally, I am not even a religious adherent to the nut and seed thing for breakfast, but I still manage to ensure that I eat properly in the morning and avoid unhealthy snacks. I encourage you to embrace the recommendations from the experts if you can afford to. But if you can’t, it shouldn’t deter you from eating well and healthy especially in the morning.

Staying alert on an empty stomach is difficult. So it is imperative you eat breakfast. Then if you are seeking an edge to achieve maximum performance, then intelligent food choices are key. To function at our highest potential, our mind needs nutrient-rich and low glycemic foods. Aside from breakfast, we can still afford to eat plenty of fruits and vegetables for lunch. Healthy snaking including fruit, nuts, seeds, and vegetables helps to maintain our body glucose at an optimum level.

Our brains relies on glucose as its primary fuel, according to various studies on glucose enhancement of human memory. Increased circulation of blood glucose can actually facilitate cognitive functioning.

Some career persons miss the signs and take healthy eating for granted because skipping meals have become a norm. Considering the prevalent stress level in this country and coupled with the fact that most of the jobs in this country come with long working hours and a large amount of responsibility and pressure, placing someone prone to anxiety due to lack of healthy eating habits is a sure way to sabotage peak performance.

There is an obvious link between healthy eating and career success. I encourage employees and employers as well to make their health and nutritional choices a priority in the workplace, in turn maximum productivity will be attained.

Employers should encourage their employees to refuel with a snack and take time to eat a healthy lunch. Enough of the donuts and pizzas we grab at lunch hours; instead, foods that contain plenty vegetables, fruits and nuts should be encouraged.

This will not only help you be in shape physically, but it will improve your overall health and mental well-being. When this is achieved, you will be in a better position to help your organization improve their bottom line while advancing your career in the process.
Have a great day and stay productive.

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