Flavors Through Generations
Taste is a completely unique sense. It brings out memories, and when we experience reality with it in the company of loved ones, we are healthier. This year at the Humanites Institute we decided to make taste, in the broad sense of the word, the leitmotif of the 14th edition of the “HumanBE – Two Hours for Family | for Human” campaign.
Every year the motto is different, in 2025 it reads: “Flavors through Generations”. Don’t delay and register your business!
The “HumanBE – Two Hours for the Family/Human” campaign was created in 2012 in response to global challenges looked at by the Humanites Institute: the epidemic of loneliness and the crisis of connectedness that has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic; the atomization of individuals and deepening anxieties related to the economy and the geopolitical situation; and changes in the global labor market related to exponential technological advances, among other things. The aim of the campaign is to serve as a reminder of the tremendous role that human ties play both inside and outside the work environment. Our message is to stop the artificial division of these two spheres.
SEE WHAT WE HAVE PREPARED FOR YOU THIS YEAR:
- Inspirations and ideas for activities that you can implement in your company -> Inspirations
- Ready-to-use texts about the action for communication inside and outside the company, graphics for your social media and intranets, as well as Press Release -> Downloadable Materials
- How to celebrate HumanBE /2h4family – download presentation with practices of other companies
- Conditions of participation -> How to join?
- Did you know that the action can be included in the non-financial report, read: social impact, CSRD and ESG
- The 2024 edition of ASK ME Cards is available in our store. The 2025 edition is coming soon!
FLAVORS ACROSS GENERATIONS
Taste is an extraordinary sense. Just by crushing a raspberry or a strawberry on your tongue, you can feel summer in all your nerve endings. To Polish millenials, the taste of tangerines will always be associated with Christmas, and one only has to remember what happened to Proust when he bit into one small Magdalene to understand – taste is power.
Since the taste of a cookie can drive a man to write seven volumes of a masterpiece of world literature (this is, of course, “In Search of Lost Time”), it’s scary to think what else this sense is capable of. In our opinion – it is as perfect as the dough for grandma’s dumplings an intergenerational binder. And not just in culinary terms – every life, every success, every failure has its own distinct flavor. This year we encourage you to taste our action!
Taste, or the power of shared meals
As Dr. Katarzyna Wolnicka writes for the National Center for Nutrition Education, children who eat meals together with their parents find it easier to maintain a healthy weight, harder to have vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and will have healthier eating habits in the future. On the other hand, psychodietitian Klaudia Stawowska on Dietly’s blog cites a study according to which children who eat meals together with their caregivers have… a wider vocabulary!
In Poland, we can breathe a sigh of relief – according to a survey of 2,000 people commissioned by Glovo in 2023: 90% of us eat meals together with our families at least once a week, and 46% do so daily. The increased pace of life has not made us stop feasts together! We save time by giving up… cooking. More than 60 percent of us order takeout food at least once a month.
However, a study conducted by researchers from the University of Oxford, published in 2017 in Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, shows the issue in a broader context. While the results indicate that eating in company promotes well-being and strengthens social bonds, we are increasingly choosing a taste for isolation. The average person eats 10 out of 21 meals per week in solitude. More than ⅔ of those surveyed have NEVER eaten anything together with any of their neighbors. ⅕ of respondents have not met at a shared table with their parents for months. As many as 21 percent of those who share an apartment with someone generally do not eat meals together with household members.
And what does this look like in your company or organization?
Is there a friendly space where male and female employees can eat? Do they use it? Do they enjoy doing it at the same time? Do any interesting ideas arise during these meals? If yes, congratulations! If not, we suggest you reinvent the space. Maybe together with your team?
Once you have answered the above question, don’t hesitate to join our action. “HumanBE – Two Hours for Family | for Human” is an international movement for proximity, changing work culture and lifestyles. Over the past few years, 3,000 companies from 59 countries around the world have joined it.
Photo: Conference “Fighting for Talent and Employee Well-Being in the Age of AI” with the HumanBE Action Celebration Awards Gala, October 03, 2023.
Partners of action #2024, thank you! YOU are the biggest change!
PATRON MEDIALNY
We believe that through the social change we inspire, through Employers, we are able to fight the phenomenon of loneliness, which, according to many studies, leads to a deterioration of quality of life, many diseases (including depression) and, unfortunately, often to premature death*.
We believe that from good interpersonal relationships, i.e. those in which we are accepted and loved, comes much happiness and a sense of meaning.
The campaign is aimed at companies and institutions that address our message further to their employees. Companies, on the occasion of participation in the campaign, organize activities related to relationships and well-being (visiting children at work, lectures, training, competitions, integrations, trips). The symbol of #HumanBE, #2h4family is the two hours that the vast majority of employers offer their employees as time off work. This gives employees an extra opportunity to take care of themselves, their loved ones and nurture relationships that are important to them. The action culminates on May 15 (International Family Day), and on this day the activities of the action participants intensify.
We observe how our action over the years strengthens families and teams in companies and has a positive impact on people’s mental and emotional health. It also influences the organizational culture in companies and makes it more family-oriented and pro-human.
The #2h4family #2h4human has been running continuously since 2012, and so far more than 3 million people from more than 3000 companies, from 59 countries, have participated.
We wish you many moments spent together nurturing relationships, preferably intergenerational!
See previous editions: 2024, 2023, 2022 ,2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017
Do you have questions? Do you want to share something with us?
Feel free to contact us:
Katarzyna Lorenz Director of Communications and PR Humanites Institute – Man and Technology tel: +48 505 017 957 e-mail: katarzyna.lorenz(at)humanites.pl
We would like to thank the winner of the 2025 motto contest, Mr. Krzysztof Stachel, for creating this beautiful sentence.
Did you know?
According to the report “Well-Working. Family Responsibility of Business” 2022, prepared by the Humanites Institute, 93 percent of those surveyed feel pressure to prioritize work over private life.
Is there room for private dreams in such a reality? Together, we can change this by making workplaces more family-, people- and dream-friendly.
Download the abbreviated report “Well-Working. Family Responsibility of Business” 2022
