AIBU to not care about pleasantries with colleagues?

[mamabeeboo]

Just wanting some opinions on this.

We are a team of 8 and all work remotely, since the pandemic. Each week, we have a one hour team call where we 'don't talk about work'. We also have a whatsapp group.

This is a one hour call to replace the office coffee chat, where we share photos on our whatsapp group about our 'highlights' of the week - holiday photos, the kids in the park, birthdays, netflix recommendations etc.

I find it very superficial. I don't like sharing photos of my kids or personal life, and to be honest, I don't really care about anyone else's personal life. I don't even download any of their photos to my phone. I listen politely but the whole call is very boring for me. When it's my turn to speak, I blag a short 'I did this, it was nice', 60 secs max.

I've suggested to management to do this every 2 weeks, answer no. I have suggested that I want to only attend sometimes, and was met with 'please try to prioritise this call, since we work remotely and it's the way to get to know the team'.

I am used to the office chit-chat over coffee about nice weather and traffic complaints. That's it.

AIBU to not care about colleagues' personal life and want to not join these calls?

Awful and another reason why people shouldn't work from home all the time.

@HelplessSoul so if you are working in an actual office and you wander into the break room for a coffee break and a colleague is in there and they start to ask about your weekend....what do you do?
Blank them?
or
Make small talk?
You might not care what they chat to you about - but can't you just be polite and make conversation.
You might discover you share an interest and become friends. Is that so awful?
You might say it's a waste of time - but you're getting paid for it 😂

I would not not like that either. Especially if you had some pressing emails that to action urgently instead

You should not have to reveal anything about your home life if you don't want to.

This would annoy me.

I would find it a complete waste of time and I also don't like the idea of sharing personal stuff.

Colleagues are not friend.

Mine are also the back-stabbing, toxic kind so I wouldn't see the point in faking being interested in anything they do in their spare time...

I think it is also annoying that people assume others have kids, a partner or enough money to go on regular holiday and that might make some people feel excluded if anyone just pontificate about their wonderful life while they have less to share.

Every week is also rather silly. I have better things to do with my time...

''@Mrsttcno1 · Today 16:33
It’s a duty of care and mental health thing more than anything else. ''

I disagree.

I am neurodivergent and have had some serious issues with my mental health this year and I can think of any benefits of me spending an hour listening to people talk about their kids/holidays...Also if I was honest about what I am doing in my spare time in this type of meeting I would have to say 'I have counselling, try to deal with constant exhaustion and burn out and basically try to survive each day' which of course is incredibly personal and not something I would want to discuss.

Ultimately, if my boss wants to pay me £50 to sit and listen to my colleagues talk about their lives for an hour I'm alright with it.

If I go into the office I spend longer than that listening to it anyway.

And I share as much as I want. Having good connections with people is important and there's plenty of superficial things I can talk about.

If you ever go on a walk (with the dog / kids) I’d take pics of flowers, mushrooms, leaves, moss. acorns, squirrels etc … then share them

‘ lovely nature walk with the kids - saw some really interesting things…’

let them all mmm and arrrghhhhh over them… job done! Nothing personal shared but you’ve ‘contributed’ .

You are being unreasonable not to care about pleasantries with your colleagues, but not at all unreasonable to resent this bizarre sounding structured personal life update. I mean, maybe a quiz or something, but even things like that I find a bit much.

I work from home 99% of the time since covid and have great relationships with my colleagues, most of whom I've only started working with in the last 2-3 years. We do this by having a relaxed approach to meetings and if sometimes you get talking and spend 20 mins talking about weekend plans when you should be talking budget numbers, so be it (within reason of course!). We always have a bit of chit chat for 5 mins or so at the start of meetings. I do spend the majority of my time on calls due to the nature of my role though, not sure how it would work if it was less collaborative.

I really don't understand this...
How on earth do some of you mumsnetters make friends or find partners if you never share anything about your "private life"?
A friendship/relationship has to start somewhere.
As someone who had many years of being lonely and unhappy - this makes me sad.

I think I must either be very strange, or just really lucky to have worked with great people throughout my career, many of whom I 'click' with. Because most of my current friends are ex colleagues. We made friends because we shared stuff about ourselves, not just the traffic and the weather. When you're together for 8 hours a day, I thought it was normal to talk about things and people in your life. I find workplaces really uncomfortable where there's none of this happening, you're just there to work and go home again, on repeat. How dull is that?!

Op, I kind of understand your reservations about this manufactured socialisation via Teams and how it feels superficial and forced. But you sound quite aloof and ai should think that even if you were office based you'd find social chat quite draining while at work. I understand why your organisation does it, and lots of people will appreciate it. But I agree that making it mandatory seems a bit much and people should opt in or opt out. However, if it was optional I suspect numbers would fall and it would eventually just stop, because people will prioritise their workloads instead.

I'm not here to answer on the OP's behalf - and in response, I dont use the office facilities for exactly that reason - having to engage with people.

I'm there to work, not blather on about my weekend. JFC.

I voted YANBU but not because I don't like exchanging pleasantries with colleagues. I do, in person. But my experience of zoom socials in the pandemic showed me that these are completely different from natural conversations face to face.

Everyone has to take turns to talk online and it's quite unnatural. I remember saying something about a problem I had once to 3 friends to which no one responded. The next person just spouted about their news. In real life they'd have been all sympathetic and kind.

@HelplessSoul sorry.....I want to apologise for my last post. It was a bit rude and harsh.
In my last job I did indeed go to work to do my job. Wasn't a particularly great job, didn't enjoy it much and the nature of it meant I didn't get much opportunity for casual chats with my colleagues. I didn't get to know people as much as I would have liked which potentially could have developed into friendships.
I think that added to my hate for the job.

I’m usually quite supportive of Initiatives like this and I really hate the way misanthropy is increasingly being passed off as “introversion” and indulged. I do think a degree of workplace cohesion needs to be encouraged.

But I actually think forcing people to talk about their personal lives at work is both intrusive and dull: a rare double whammy of cringe.

a) it’s potentially upsetting and awkward for people whose personal lives aren’t working well for whatever reason and

b) no one cares. I am not interested in hearing about people’s spouses, pets, children or hobbies or social lives unless I have met them and being mandated to talk about them once a week sounds unbearably contrived.

This sounds really fake and forced and would drive me nuts. I work in a team that is spread over 3 countries, so we have a daily 'standup' call to plan the work and the first few minutes while we wait for everyone to join is filled with informal chat, just like an actual meeting would be. So I'm totally in the loop about W's cat, M's kids, and J's dad's health, even though I've never met W, M or J in person.
People might be going through a really hard time personally and it is totally valid to not want to talk about yourself. I had a former colleague who wasn't ready to come out at work for years; he kept his private life private, and we respected that.
Also asking people to share photos of their families is just weird and would get a polite but firm "no" from me.

@HelplessSoul I requested my rude message to be deleted which they have.
Apologies again 🙂

Exactly this! 👏👏

Our team also predominantly works from home - we haven't really done team catch-ups for years and it's definitely had a negative impact on team morale.

OP - Not contributing to these calls could make your bosses/colleagues question your commitment to the role and your ability to be a team player.

I and my team are fully remote. We have a weekly half an hour plus a social channel on Teams. I like it and am not a particularly sociable person.

I am with you OP in that I am very personal and do not want to tell most colleagues all that much.

If you do not know them that well then make up some crap that you did. Perhaps make up a pet and you can prattle on about them for 5 minutes each week and avoid more personal family events. Finding a complete unknown based in another country on social media who has loads of photos of a cat or dog will be easy enough.

You sound very superior, OP. Congratulations.

Damn right!

To me it wouldn't replicate work chat as that's more subtle. You might talk to some more than others if you get on with them more.

Also teams calls tend to be some ppl monopolising the chat.

In fairness, I did not see it. But appreciate your kind words.

In closing and to quote what the OP said earlier:

"If other people's MH are struggling and they need the social interaction, then maybe don't get a Wfh job."

Don't tell colleagues anything about your private life . You would be surprised just who knows who and who is related .