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 love it. Hate email. You don't need to answer immediately though. And can ping back ' will stick it on my list' and get back to them in your own time or ' up the wall today can chat 11-11.30 tomorrow'

I’m an offender.

But I started working pre Covid and pre Teams so most of my working life meant that you could just walk over to someone’s desk and ask them - do you have 5 minutes or you’d pick up the telephone and call them.

what you are experiencing on teams is normal human interactions from normal humans.

the way around it is ‘do not disturb’ and putting ‘prep time’ in your diary.

This is a good point, also depends on your retention policy for Teams - ours disappear after 30 days, meaning it's often used for things that don't necessarily need (or would be compromised by!) an audit trail.

At my work people still phone randomly on Teams, and message on Teams plus the normal emails!

I quite like Teams but I can't stand when others message you in dribs and drabs: hi.....have you got minute...etc instead of getting to the point. Also hate it when someone moves from an email chain to Teams or send you documents in Teams. I want the info all in one place so it's coherent and easy to refer to. Also all the effing Teams channels. We've been told to reduce email traffic. It's just being replaced by stuff in Teams.

Ditto.