I Refuse to Sacrifice My Lunch Break for Unpaid Office Meetings — Now HR Is Building a Case Against Me

Hi Bright Side,

I want to be clear about something before I start: I am not a difficult employee. I have been with this company for 4 years. I have never missed a deadline. I have covered for colleagues, stayed late without being asked and taken on work that was never officially mine. I say this not to brag, but because what I am about to describe needs that context.

8 months ago, my manager started scheduling “optional” team check-ins during the lunch hour. Mondays and Wednesdays, noon to 12:45. The word optional lasted exactly two weeks. After that, the people who didn’t show up received follow-up emails asking why they had missed “an important alignment session.”

I stopped attending.

Not because I was making a point. I eat lunch at my desk most days. But between noon and 1pm I walk. 30 minutes, same route, sometimes with headphones, sometimes without. I started doing it two years ago when I was burning out and my doctor told me I needed to move my body and step away from screens during the day. It helped. I kept doing it. It is the reason I have not burned out again.

My manager pulled me aside after the third meeting I missed. He said, “I’ve noticed you’re not prioritizing the team.” I told him I don’t attend meetings during my lunch break. He said, “It’s only 45 minutes.” I said, “So is my walk.”

He looked at me like I had said something in another language.

Over the next month, two things happened. My colleagues told me quietly that they wished they could do what I was doing but didn’t feel they could. And my manager began cc’ing his manager on emails directed at me, with subject lines like “Flagging attendance concern.”

I went to HR before they called me in. I brought my employment contract, which does not list lunch as available meeting time. I brought my doctor’s note, which I had never shown anyone at that company before and had hoped I would never need to. I told them I was not refusing to work. I was refusing to work during the one hour a day I am contractually entitled to use as I choose.

HR met with my manager the following week. I was not in the room.

Since then, nothing has been officially resolved. The meetings were moved to 10am, but my manager has gone cold. Last week my manager’s manager passed me in the hallway and said, “I hear you’ve been having some concerns about team culture.” I don’t know if I did the right thing. I know I was within my rights. I know my health is better when I take that walk. I know 3 colleagues have started eating away from their desks since all of this happened. What do you think?

— James

Thank you, James, for your letter to us. What you described is more common than most people admit, and the fact that your colleagues didn’t know they were allowed to take a real lunch break says everything about how quietly those boundaries get eroded. We’re opening this up to our readers now.