Plus: Corporate Coffee Culture, Beware the Communal Snack Bowl and MORE.

Corporate Coffee Culture
Workers today are putting in longer hours, shouldering heavier workloads and depending more on caffeinated coffee to ease fatigue, stimulate awareness or elevate their mood. Nearly 40 percent of U.S. office workers say they couldn’t make it through the workday without coffee, according to a recent survey by Alterra Coffee Roasters. Sixty-five percent of workers drink coffee at work (on average, three cups a day) and 30 percent say the brew helps them focus and be more productive.

A 2010 survey jointly commissioned by Dunkin’ Donuts and CareerBuilder.com determined that nurses, physicians, hotel workers and designers/architects are the ones who seem to need coffee the most.

Apart from being a necessity, office coffee can also be a source of bonding (or battles) among employees, according to the Alterra Coffee Roasters survey. Two in five workers enjoy talking with coworkers around the coffeemaker, while 21 percent say coworkers who make a mess in the coffee area cause friction and 25 percent say there’s someone at the office who never steps up to make a fresh pot.

Where to Stand in an Elevator
Approximately one year ago, an IBM survey offered this sad truth: Office workers in the U.S. spent a total of 92 years over a 12-month period waiting for elevators.

However, rather than complain about lost time, let’s figure out a way to make the elevator ride a more pleasant experience.

Please study and share this diagram so we can all avoid those awkward moments in the elevator when someone stands ridiculously close to you for no reason at all, even though there are only two of you in the elevator.

Credit: Eating Ham and Drinking Water (via I Love Charts)

On the Seductiveness of the Office Candy Jar
Although many office dwellers bring in snacks as a way to help build camaraderie in the department (or simply to discard party leftovers), the communal snack bowl is reportedly wreaking havoc in workplaces everywhere.

How can something like the office candy jar be divisive? Because for workers trying to eat healthy, long hours of sitting at a desk, snacking on candy or Girl Scout cookies brought in by coworkers or clients can kill good nutrition faster than you can say “peanut M&Ms.”

The Wall Street Journal reports that the candy dish is now the ultimate office underminer, pointing to a 2006 study in the International Journal of Obesity that shows how irresistible the candy dish can be:

A four-week study of 40 secretaries found that when candy was visible in a clear, covered dish, participants ate 2.5 pieces of chocolate on top of the 3.1 candies they would have eaten had the chocolates been in an opaque container, according to the 2006 study in the International Journal of Obesity. Moving the dish closer, so the subjects could reach the candy while seated at their desks, added another 2.1 candies a day to their intake.

“The proximity and visibility of a food can consistently increase an adult’s consumption,” according to the study, led by Brian Wansink, a professor of marketing and human behavior at Cornell University and author of Mindless Eating. “Even for a person with the greatest resolve, every time they look at a candy dish they say, ‘Do I want that Hershey’s Kiss, or don’t I?’ At the 24th time, maybe I’m kind of hungry, and I just got this terrible e-mail, and my boss is complaining — and gradually my resolve is worn down.”

In the end, each empty calorie adds to the department’s collective waistline.

Milky Way and Nature from a Unique Perspective
Terje Sorgjerd‘s time-lapse shots of the Milky Way galaxy show a stunning sky and a view of our planet’s natural elements. The Norwegian photographer captured the footage earlier this month from atop El Teide, Spain’s highest mountain and site of Teide Observatory.

At one point in the video below (00:32), a large sandstorm blows across, rendering Sorgjerd unable to see the sky, but leaving his camera with some stunning images:

The Mountain from Terje Sorgjerd

Cheers.