Aibu about bad zoom etiquette

[Timinfuckingruislip]

Will preface this with “I know times are unusual etc etc”.

However - I always work from home (not covid related - have done so for years). And a huge majority of my meetings are conducted online.

However am starting to get a bit fed up with people deciding to do any of the following

• speak to their children throughout
• decide to answer their phone - WITHOUT muting
• wonder off

And all manner of other things you just wouldn’t do in a normal meeting

It pisses me off as meetings are taking twice as long as they need to, and while I’m happy and friendly enough to say hello to your child/dog/cat whatever at the start - it shouldn’t then interrupt.

Aibu to say that, while having a booked meeting you should be fully present?

I’m scheduling in day a half day training course at a set cost - because of interruptions etc I’m not getting the courses done in their allocated times (and I give myself a lot of leeway.)

Explain at the beginning that you will need x amount of time, if there are too many interruptions you’ll need to schedule in further time to complete it. That is also what happens in every physical training course I’ve attended.

Can't you mute people like in Teams?

Yep. Again, pretty standard practice.

YANBU - definitely not!
Meeting etiquette!
You need to have a buy in from your management to enforce it... Unfortunately so many people dont understand the basics when it comes to videoconferencing.

@minty in theory that works and do say this. However very often - those paying for the courses aren’t in them

In a class setting this wouldn’t matter / it’s that “you can go home at 4pm or we will be here until 6pm type thing. That’s not really an option at the moment.

Will has a think on it though.

The children arguament I'm muddying the waters here.

I have a yr 1 child, i stay on mute in group calls unless I need to talk, if she needs me, I turn the video off, type a quick 'BRB' in the chat window, deal with whatever needs dealing with then return to the call.

Not muting and having a personal chat while in a group call, or bringing your kid on camera is unprofessional.

@Coffeeandteach did they also have video on - love the idea of just seeing glimpses of a red face and random ground

For a lot of people Zoom is new - there is no etiquette - or at least it hasn't been explained to them.

I've only used it for family but have been accused of making people 'seasick' (because my lap top is on my lap and moves .

With regards kids, to an extent animals, and other home interruptions - unless the employer is paying for the office space that the employee is using - then they have no right to insist that it is for their exclusive use.

Wandering away or taking phone calls is rude though I agree.

You've just boiled my piss here.
I am working from home every day with my 3 year old.
My husband is having to go into work every day. Leaving me to work a full time senior manager job and parent our 3 year old too.

What would you have me do on zoom meetings? Shut my child out of the room? Ignore my child (likely resulting in a tantrum)?

I take steps to entertain her during these calls but it cant always be done.

Let me guess, you have no children?!

Wouldn't bother me with everything going on it can't really be helped with no childcare etc.

As frustrating as it can be for others. Many parents have lost their previous childcare . I can guarantee they are extremely stressed trying to keep any kind of professional edge.

I voted YABU based on the comment on children, but seeing you've now responded to that, I would say I do think it's complicated. Like you, working from home is my normal practice, and I've combined work and childcare for my DD since she was under 6 months old. I do sometimes feel quite angry that, suddenly, everyone seems to accept things as inevitable, which I would never in a million years have got away with before now. I remember when DD was very tiny, I had a dangerous work emergency, which meant that what usually took about an hour per week of my time turned into a full-time concern. Because there were serious risks involved, I had to do the work, but even then I remember being ticked off by someone because my DD could be heard in the background of a phonecall.

I think we should cut people slack given this is mostly a new and unexpected experience. But I really do hope that, in the future, more people will take a minute to think about the realities of life for those of us who work from home and/or do a lot of caring around work.

@Frankola as above - I’d have you press the mute button and perhaps step away from the camera.

These examples are shockingly unprofessional. Do people really have so little management over kids/pets etc but expect to be paid as if they are fully focused?

Just mute the person who is making the background noise?!

"Just mute the person who is making the background noise?!"

They should mute themselves. It could be considered rude for the host to mute them and we don't know if OP is the host anyway.

@SarahAndQuack thank you, and that’s such a helpful response, and yes it maybe is a bit of, I don’t know, not quite resentment - but a feeling that - I’ve always had to work from home and juggle - now everyone’s not taking it seriously!

That’s not those who are strugglin’s problem / it’s mine. Food for thought - thank you again

Do people really have so little management over kids/pets etc but expect to be paid as if they are fully focused?

Well, yes, of course people expect to be paid properly - they didn't choose to work like this!

I have combined work and childcare, to a degree where my employer was satisfied I was working full time, and it is absolutely hellish. It's absurd. It is not healthy, either for a parent or a child. I can only imagine what it would be like to feel pressured to deliver full-time work while caring for a child, and facing all the current restrictions and stresses. I'm incredibly thankful my employer has acknowledged it is not realistic for us to try to work full time, and has asked us just to do as much as we sensibly can.

I’m not always the host for muting - and as @Gwenhwyfar says - when I am - it’s not really right of me to mute them.

I had one yesterday where someone cried (unrelated to the content) for the duration, she left her mic and camera on and batted off every question and concern. It made it very awkward for everyone else. We just had to stop asking what was wrong as she kept saying "I'm fine" when she obviously wasn't. She has history of this, she has done it before in a face to face meeting as well.

Cross post. YY, I could go to the Olympics for resentment, some days! I do think it shows people like you and me where we stand in the pecking order, and it is more than irritating.

I do hope we're going to see some changes to attitudes as a result of all of this, though. It would be good.

Increasingly l think peoples grasp on etiquette gets worse each year. But l digress. The lack of muting, wandering off, exercise etc on zoom / Teams calls aren’t acceptable. Whether it’s tricky working from home with children, then the noise is still annoying and incredibly distracting. Again what’s wrong with mute, debates about phonics and snacks aren’t useful in my line of work

I am lucky that I can work in peace. I am also a supportive colleagues who understands that life happens.

IBM released this pledge that is worth reading on accepting that life happens and not to pass judgement. My organisation shared it and promotes it and I am very thankful.
www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-pledge-support-my-fellow-ibmers-working-from-home-during-krishna

@SarahAndQuack well at the very least I’m hoping that people will get why I can’t “just”

• pop out for lunch
• run a random errand

Or whatever it is that someone thinks you can fill your working time with because you work from home.

We use zoom meetings for college, the ‘rules’ are that we mute ourselves unless we indicate we want to talk, ive spoken to my kids during it and I’ve wandered off to Get a drink. They have been pretty informal.

My daughter uses teams for school contact with teachers, no cameras which is fab. SHe can paints her nails, or do what she wants while chatting, no pressure,

If only wandering off when it gets boring was do-able in the endless & usually pointless, face to face meetings in normal corporate life .... (misses point of post totally).