Pulled up on my teams light

[outlanderish]

I work from home full time with occasional travel. My employer allows either a half hour or one hour lunch break, based on personal choice. I typically don’t take a formal break instead, I take brief pauses throughout the day (e.g. five minutes here and there to make a coffee, play with my dog, or put a load of laundry on), while otherwise remaining at my desk and working.

Recently, my manager called me to ask why I appear “orange” (away) a lot during the day. I explained that I take small, informal breaks rather than a long formal one. She told me this was unacceptable, even though my approach has not negatively impacted my productivity. In fact, I’m often more efficient this way. I also need to get up regularly as it hurts my back sitting for a long period of time

Other colleagues especially smokers also step away from their desks regularly, but it seems to be accepted for them.

Unless your working in an urgent care setting it is absolutely not okay to not be okay with someone moving regularly and taking short breaks to stretch / move etc
I have an app on my phone I think it’s called Flow or something and every 20 mins (I can change this) I get an alarm to move for 5 mins
this maintains my physical and mental health
Before this i used to sit at my desk like your manager has asked, for hours on end
I gained a stone / my ankles swelled and I had a heart attack
I am 53 and have 4 children.
my workplace completely trust me to wfh as effectively as I can while prioritising mental and physical health but perhaps I’m just lucky
As such I probably work more hours than I’m paid for but I really don’t mind because there is mutual respect
Your organisational culture sounds dreadful
Perhaps you could lead the way somehow and suggest positive ways for management to embrace healthy change?

My employees have applied a 30 day retention policy to teams so colleagues now use it less to collaborate over message and revert to email, so the dialogue/shared docs aren’t lost, so it’s normal to see lots of orange dots now

Is it only you this has been raised with? If everyone is doing the same then there will be a reason you have been spoken too. It might be that they want to ensure you take a decent break for lunch? Did your manager go into more detail about why it was unacceptable? I figure the occasional 10 min break to put a washing load on whilst making a tea is no different to chatting to a colleague in the office whilst making tea.

Here we go

Found the HR drone

This!

In a previous job, a couple of years ago now, I used to be told by my boss that I wasn’t “allowed” to have my status as “Busy”, even if I was trying to focus on getting deadline based work done. Teams just gives managers more excuse to micro manage, if you ask me! I’m glad I don’t work from home, anymore. Mind you, I didn’t care if my status showed me as away. Whether I’m at the office or not, I still have to pee, eat, drink, etc. Do I sit locked to my desk all day at an office? No. So why would I do that at home? I wouldn’t. Simple as.

Are you sure you’re not talking at cross purposes - employment law requires that you take at least one 20min minimum rest break (not 2x5minute ones) if you work for more than 6hrs. Your manager may simply be pointing out that you are not actually allowed to break up your 30 mins the way you are. You can, by arrangement, take 1x20 and poss 2 x 5mins to make up the 30mins, but you can’t have 6x 5min breaks. It may seem counterintuitive, given you are working at home, but H&S requires employees have that rest break - it will be about stress etc. The employer is contravening the law if they don’t enforce the 20min rule or they knowingly allow you not to abide by it?

That’s really poor, outdated advice. Employers should encourage staff working at VDU set ups to get up every hour to avoid injury or strain.

As an aside, I find that when I’m in the office I’m ‘away‘ for more of the day due to in-person meetings, quick discussion with colleagues that would usually happening over teams, even toilet breaks take longer to get to/ queue etc.

this! say you were embarrassed and didn't want to admit it
that's only if it really is okay if other people take lots of smoke breaks, I'm not sure how you'd know whether that was the case or not, tbh, unless you are also watching their teams light, in which case does anyone actually do any work at your place or are you all just monitoring each other?

I agree with @CautiousLurker01 , she probably means you HAVE to take at least one longer break (of 20 mins or more) otherwise the company are breaking the law. If you take a half hour and then keep doing your odd 5 minutes as well, I can't see how that would be an issue - it must take at least 2-3 every time someone goes to the loo or makes a cuppa, which you hope would be allowed!

if yours is going orange long enough to notice you might be taking longer on each of your 'mini breaks' than you think, it's easy to do.

I'm glad I work somewhere where I'm treated like an adult and judged on performance rather than the exact number of minutes I spent staringly unblinkingly at a screen.

They actually don't work on the new version of Teams, don't bother.

I can't believe there are people who think workers should sit on their chair for six hours at a stretch! That's not just unhealthy, it's inhumane.

My plug in one works just fine in the new version.

If I remember correctly, it is recommended that a 5 minute break every hour away from screens by HSE. In addition to a minimum of 30 mins for lunch.

Someone at the gym cafe opens word and leaves a heavy object pressed on a button on the keyboard and buggers off to a class. I assume that’s a luddite version of a mouse jiggler

Have you told them that when your light is amber, you are probably doing laundry or playing with the dog so will be back soon if they need you?

That’s ridiculous of her! Doesn’t she have better things to concentrate on? What kind of work are you in? I believe people should be trusted - presenteeism for the sake of it kills company culture

You need to ask yourself why you are being watched. Most managers don't notice someone's light on Teams as they're busy themselves.

Have you actually added up your 5 minutes there and 5 minutes there? Given you're away alot, maybe it's more than you realise.

This is a good idea.

Another thing that works for me is I play rain sounds on YouTube or an mp3 on my other screen, to keep the computer 'active'. As an editor I can spend quite a while looking at one page without moving the mouse, and it's so annoying when I'm concentrating and the screen goes off into lock screen.

Yeah this is what I was thinking.

Is it possible the OP is gone for more than 5 minutes?

Even playing with the dog would take longer than that as all 5 minutes would do is get the poor thing excited.

True, plus she still has to eat at some point as well.

Because they make cups of tea?

Our company insist on a formal 20min break to be taken. The rest can be taken as smaller breaks as long as we roughly don't use more than an hour.