I need to rant about Teams culture

[Blueradiators]

As in, Microsoft Teams.

The constant pinging and "quick" questions are driving me potty. The interruptions!! I can't ever just get on with things because I am in a Teams meeting, or Frank wants to know if I have 2 minutes to call him and refuses to say why and then keeps me on the phone for 40 minutes, or Zainab wants to "quickly" run through the reporting slides cos she sees I have a free half hour in my diary.

Whatever happened to sending me an email? Or scheduling a meeting with an agenda so that I have time to think and prepare? Why does everyone feel entitled to an immediate response?

I am in my 30s and I genuinely don't know how this has become my life. It seems to have crept up and suddenly is everywhere. Is this just my company or are others suffering like this too? What can be done?

And if you're one of those on the offending side, WHY do you do it?!

I've had to make a conscious effort to only consider email and teams messages at certain times. Otherwise you spend the whole day responding to them and doing no work. Particularly when you have to be in dozens of groups.

I hate Teams. A whole generation will be triggered by the Teams ring tone.

You need to implement "No Hello" and mean it.

https://nohello.org/

I also hate it when you get a little pop up saying soneone has contacted you and you need to go through a million Teams groups to find out who'd what it was.

This.

Remember the days of a typed memo sent in a inter department reusable envelope 😂 delivered mornings only

I am glad I only have 10 years working life yet.

Its really hard to concentrate when there are so many instant distractions.

Agree! Treat it as email.

Don’t want to go into the office and work then moan about having to use a source of communication when wfh 🤣

This is me

I respond several times during the day 😊

I find this is generally when they want a real time interactive chat exchange about a difficult or sensitive topic. They want to check you're there and ready to engage, then perhaps they get interrupted themselves. Sometimes people can't call to discuss eg if sat in open plan office.

So I’m primarily a self employed tutor, no teams (thank fucking god). But sometimes I do some work for my DH which is via teams, I’m normally in one day a week and oh my god… the first few times I did it were a shocker. People really are very entitled. I tend to reward the reasonable ones with flexibility and punish the unreasonable ones with really ridged boundaries. So if someone says “two mins” and takes 40 then they will need to apply for a meeting next time, there’s no wiggle room or flexibility for them. Overall though I hate it. Especially vs what I’m used to.

I hate it. It's not like a phone used to be in the old days at all. Now there are relentless group chats for every project and piece of work. You can mute chats and disable alerts but Teams still shows you in the taskbar that there are unread messages. There seems to be an expectation that messages will be answered even when you are in meetings with video on (in several organisations I have worked) And people can still message even when you're on do not disturb - the messages just stack up for you to come back to. I am sure with previous instant messaging apps like Skype or Office Communicator, if you were on do not disturb people could not message you. Teams is probably the biggest barrier to my productivity every single day.

Some of these replies are bonkers. I wouldn't like to deal with some of you. Teams is meant to be fast paced, that's the point of it. But what I do object to is people trying to dial me into meetings I wasn't invited to when I'm showing as busy because I'm on a call with someone else. I cannot be on two separate meetings at the same time.

I genuinely think some adults are quite lonely and really feel a need for interaction swith others through work so can eke a chat out of any small query

I get Teams is meant to be fast paced to a point, but it's also become a dumping ground for stuff which is the impossible to keep track of. I'm on so many groups for so many different things that it's impossible to keep track of files, chats, etc with all the many pointless replies and emojis - at least with group emails you could track them and find files more easily.

I completely agree with you about the issue of people ignoring your busy or dnd status and calling anyway - bloody annoying.

And I'd honestly have zero issues with that. But for me, it's never that. They want to ask me something project specific (and tbf only a couple of team members are guilty of this) and it often takes me off on a project specific side quest that I haven't really got time for. I have the attention span of a caffeinated squirrel as it is.

Getting to understand office/wfh stress. Can't you switch off notifications with a 'busy' response?

Sorry to soundi like a dinosaur but having worked in a face to face job, we can't prolong a response, it has to be immediate.

You have 30 plus students in front of you, all with their own dynamics and have to teach a topic they have no interest in, manage behaviour, while also dealing with pings from colleagues and management. Now this is difficult/impossible.

If sat in a office/wfh you can prescribe your time.

That’s what do not disturb is for. You don’t have to respond immediately to every message. I just reply when it’s suitable for me, as do my colleagues.

I do this and it still doesn’t stop the fuckers. My job is just me and my computer. I might need to talk to someone occasionally but essentially I need to get my head down and concentrate really hard. And every day, a good 40% of my time is fending off contact on Teams, then having to play catch up as soon as the working day ends and I can pretend I’m offline.

Worst invention ever. Everyone thinks that when you put yourself down as busy, you obviously don’t mean that you’re too busy for them. And if you put yourself on DnD for a couple of hours just to concentrate on your actual job, the whole place goes into sodding meltdown, with people asking where you are and what you’re doing (obviously at my desk working, dickhead, or that red icon would have turned amber). That little flashing orange button is so bloody distracting.

And then you crack and look, just in case it’s something really urgent, only to find that someone you don’t ever chat to (so very clearly a work based query) has just typed ‘Hi Wilf, how’re you?’ and is waiting for you to respond before telling you what they want. What does it matter how I am? I’m only ever going to reply ‘good thanks, and you?’ And I don’t give a flying fuck how you are. Just tell me what you want and fuck off so I can add it to the list of things that appear to have become my job.

And whoever invented cameras on laptops is a demon.

And whoever invented cameras on laptops is a demon.

Of the highest order.

Can't recommend Cal Newport's books highly enough:

World without Email (provocative title, the real thrust is defining the right communication channels for different communication types)

Deep Work (totally changed my worklife when I'd had it spelt out that my greatest value came from focused work which adds value not endless comms management).

Same, I actually treat these so called urgent pings below someone taking the time to draft a good email. I’ve learnt to not open them (so as they are unread) unless of course it’s my own manager or someone very senior to me.

I liberally use DND, my status says if you want me to review something block my calendar and add the link / send over email, and I have no pop-ups for anything - teams / email etc

It’s all a massive distraction

If I sit for 10-15 min every couple of hours can get through the backlog of random messages and some email but if it pops all day I get nothing done

To the comment on “fast paced” - there is the perception of “fast” (“oh so busy… busy busy…”) and actually making progress

And if someone pings me “hello” and nothing else I ignore it

It hides a multitude of sins, does Teams. People are a lot more available, but a lot less accountable

I like Teams, much prefer to random calls and it's great for the quick Qs. Anything longer I'd ask them to put it in an email. But it sounds like your colleagues are pinging you constantly OP so as pp have said you need to carve out DND time.

Turn off the notifications!