As a business professional, I confess I have experienced the bitter taste of each and every drawback of the office lifestyle and I’m pretty sure you did too. 
Over time, I did a bit of research, talked to nutritionists and fitness coaches and eventually came up with a list of healthy principles I apply in order to stay fit, some tips and tricks helping me to challenge the bad habits and give more value to the good ones.

Let’s start with a plan
We all know how important is for a business having a thorough planning. But sometimes we tend to forget applying this principle to our personal lives, kind of the way it is said to do what the doctor says and not what the doctor really does... 
Planning your meals (including the preparation of the breakfast the night before if you lack time in the morning and tend to eat unhealthy foods on the go), some routine exercise in the office premises or even appointments with your personal trainer at the gym should result in adding these activities in your daily calendar, next to your business meetings. Apply some strategy to it!

Clean your office desk 
Now that you already organized your day, do a bit of desk cleaning! It will help you better stick to your schedule and be more efficient. Clutter makes you stressed, stressing will make you crunch.
Don’t forget to also clean your drawers of unhealthy snacks that might be tempting in-between meals.

Breakfast Rules
Good news for some of us: breakfast is not mandatory! Nutritionists advise over the importance of the breakfast, but habitude rule is more powerful as each body is different. If you are not the type of person who eats the first thing in the morning and you get your energy otherwise, then stick to your energy rule and eat your breakfast when you need it (most of the non-breakfast persons take it as a brunch, around three to five hours after they wake-up).
Listen to your body: usually non-breakfast persons forcing into eating as they wake-up will end up adding 200 to 300 calories to their overall daily intake, which could lead to weight gain, especially in a sedentary lifestyle.
Moreover, recent studies showed that intermittent fasting (which could be translated into fasting two days per week or eating in a window of 6-12 hours only) could improve biomarkers of disease, reduce oxidative stress, preserve learning and memory functioning and help to weight loss. Be careful not to overcompensate though!

Your Way Towards The Office
In the morning we all are in a hurry but looks like due to the traffic we get to the office later each year! I have some colleagues who confessed to me they are now starting their day earlier in order to keep the same schedule and let me tell you they were quite annoyed by the fact that they do have less sleep because of that… Regularly having less sleep than your body needs (each body is different, but most of us need seven to eight hours) is very bad for your health. Sleep deprivation can lead to several diseases and increases stress hormones in your body, which could lead to overeating and… weight gain.
If you cannot go to sleep earlier than usual you might consider changing your going to work habits. More and more professionals are going to work by bike, so why don’t you also switch to this faster and funnier (not to mention healthier) conveyance? Options include now all sort of electric riders such as bikes, scooters, hoverboards, Segway etc.

Fight the Desk Gluing 
Being seated for eight hours a day is definitely the worst nightmare of the office lifestyle. But how could I beat it? I have to write that report, answer those e-mails, draw that presentation and meet the new clients over an exhausting two hours videocall.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much to do (yet).  But I’m sure gadgets will allow you, in the soon-to-come-future, to do part of those tasks in other position than seated. 
But until then, fight the desk gluing with your own creativity! For starting, buy an adjustable desk which will allow you to do computer work standing. Moving more often your feet while seating in a chair could also make a difference, as well as interval desk exercising (there are a lot of apps available which guide you through three to five minutes workout at your desk, such as stretching). Including this desk exercise to your routine has an enormous benefit on your health and work, as it will also increase your focus.
Another trick I usually do is being aware of the time spent at the desk in-between tasks. You know that ten minutes browsing you do just for getting your mind off the previous task and clean it for the next one? Well, imagine that you could use those ten minutes for doing something else. What could it be? Take the stairs to another floor and chat with a buddy? Play a short table tennis game in the games room? Or doing some squats? 
I recommend installing a Wii Fit in your office if your company doesn’t have a games room. It is a great investment in your health and good mood, paying all the money, especially if you consider your spending half of the waking hours of your life in the office!

Bust The Office Lunch Myths
Let’s face it: being a business professional is NOT a real motive for you to eat badly. You are allowed to choose what you eat just as anybody else is. In my point of view, it is a myth that it is hard to keep a healthy diet or a weight loss diet while working in an office. Moreover, I could say that working in an office is HELPING such a diet. Let me explain.
The office is a more “cravings controllable” space than is your home, for instance. You don’t have access to your week groceries just opening the fridge door.  Anybody who tried working from home knows that when you have the kitchen at ten metres from your desk it is hard to stop cravings materialize into crunching. Not to mention the lure of the other members of the family’s goodies when you are dieting! 
In the office, you can keep it safe: no chocolate bars or salty snacks in the drawers, no other food than the one you should eat in the company’s fridge (eating the accountant’s cake should be a bigger shame than your wife’s muffins)!
Some business people are arguing that working in the office prevents you from eating healthily, such as home-cooked meals, making you buy fast-food instead. 
This is also a myth, as when you choose what type of lunch you are buying, you are entirely controlling the process. Even if you don’t have the time to get out of the office and have a proper lunch (which I strongly recommend you to do, by taking the stairs instead of the lift!), you could still order office delivery from your favourite restaurant, with fine cooked meals and veggies. Not to mention that most of the offices have a kitchenette with a fridge and a microwave and you could bring your own home-cooked meal and have it at lunch in the cafeteria.
Lunch in the office could be very healthy, depending on what you choose to eat, just as in any other routine, so let’s bust all those myths keeping us off our diet track!

Apply The Common-Sense Rules
As we took down the lunch myths, we still got the questions about what to eat and how to eat in order to stay fit and lose weight.
These apply to our everyday life, not only to the office hours.
If you are trying to lose some weight you are familiar for sure with all the trends in nutrition, changing monthly and all supported with scientific evidence. So, even if armed with the fiercest scepticism, one could end up wondering what to eat, as studies are proving diverging theories. Should it be low fat high carb? Or high fat low carb? Paleo or keto? Meat or vegan? And the list may continue…
Don’t let that beat you. Keep your scepticism high and your personal proven records higher. Your body knows best what makes it fit and the rest is … common-sense. 
Such as eating fast food, chips and sugar will fatten you eventually. Sorry, but there is no healthy diet with Big Macs, sausages and French fries, just as there is no veggie ever invented by mother nature that is going to make you fat. Stay to that common-sense rule and you’ll see tremendous results!  
Don’t give up to those voices trying to mystifies super-foods, detox juices and supplements. A diet based on kale or chia is the same as a diet based on cabbage and oats, only that it costs a lot more. Fruits are best when are chewed, not drunk. Supplements should only be taken when the blood tests are pointing to a deficiency, otherwise the body takes the vitamins and minerals from the food you eat (if balanced and healthy, as it should be). If you overeat fats or carbs (or even protein) you may disrupt the balance, so keeping the proportion between elements is the best common-sense rule. 

Didier H.

Co-Founder at Greenbuildinginfo.eu / Officerentinfo.com & Warehouserentinfo.com