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.

When I worked in an office it was very common for people to talk a walk around every hour or so it's healthier than sitting at a desk constantly and also it helps concentration.
I don't think that what you are doing is any different.

What if you need the toilet? !
Also when I was working we all had an app that reminded us to take a break from the screen every hour

This is not why companies are doing that.

If you think other people can’t work from home effectively, you should look at your own work ethic.

As others have said either get a mouse jiggler or set up a script to move it every couple of minutes. For best effect set the time to a random interval between a minute and however long it is before your status goes orange.

Another good tactic is to arrange a meeting with yourself and share your screen so that your status goes "presenting" - not sure if this prevents a timeout or not so you'd need to check. It's a good method of stopping people calling you though.

Of course people shouldn't need to resort to these tactics just to get their job done effectively, but "presenteeism" is still an important metric for some (shit) managers who don't know what they are doing.

I’m not in a computer based jobs but I’ve seen the videos on SM about faking your teams status. The “hacks” that I saw were about setting up scripts rather than buying a gadget like a mouse jiggler.

Not my company. In fact we just had a global monthly townhall last week which each month includes looking at our values and focusing on one, this month it was "There is more to life than work".

The sessions included senior managers talking about how they used the flex policies we have for things like working from different locations/even countries if visiting family, taking time out for school sports days, appointments, taking elderly parents to hospital appointments, one even opened up to say their disability means it is easier for them to work in the evenings and she does that where possible instead and has longer breaks during the day. They actively encouraged all to think about and discuss with their line managers how we could all, use the flex policy with the global head saying if anyone had any resistant to a reasonable adjustment to go directly to him.

We are a high performing global team for a reason.

No! It can be detected don’t risk your job!

Don't do it they can be detected easily

Exactly how mine works, my project is quiet at the moment so I am getting housework done, exercise etc. My boss is fully aware and we all go through times like these. It also means when its chaos and we may need to work through a lunch or join a meeting late in the day we do, because we appreciate it is give and take. I would hate to be micro managed.

Just tell them you’ve taken up smoking.

I’d hate to work somewhere like this. It’s nuts.

My organisation has an agile working policy. We’re performance driven, and time spent in front of screens is not monitored. It’s utterly puerile in my opinion and creates an atmosphere of distrust.

That is genius! I've been putting a film on - any old film, longer the better - to run whilst I'm doing something else.

A mouse-jiggler! What a time to be alive...

Small informal breaks. Aye.

Why is your manager watching your Teams dot anyway?

Maybe op is away a lot and it's been noticed?

Exactly

Unless they're an inadequate manager - and TBF there are a few - there's no reason to notice in the first place as long as the work's getting done, but every reason to monitor this if it's not

put a You tube video on. It will keep your screen alive and therefore keep teams active too

But peiple in the office make tons of tea, stand around chatting, pop out to smoke, etc etc!

i'm fairly sure they take more notice of the WFH people.

If the work is being done, I don't see the issue tbh.

Focus on presentism over productivity seems very old school.

If you need to get up regularly get a doctor’s report to say so, and your employer has to make reasonable accommodation for that.

The fact she has time to do this suggests either she has no work, or she has a grudge with you.

I don't monitor my teams Teams status. I don't have time. We work on output, but also (being a service team) responsiveness. My Manager isn't going to be concerned that my status is orange. But he will expect me to respond within a timely manner unless I've set myself as unavailable.

People disappearing every now and then is really tedious for other team members.
I don't mind people working from home but the quid pro quo is that we have to know when they are away from their desk. In the office it's obvious, they would just say "I'm going to get a coffee, who wants one" or "I'm stepping out, will be back in 20mn" so if something comes up, you know what to expect, who to delegate the work to.

I've had issues with my some of my reports, disappearing randomly for long periods of time, being yellow for more than 30mn several times a day (it's never 5mn - they go and walk the dog, go for a run, run errands etc). It really does infuriate me.

Before anyone says something - we work in a fast moving environment, we have to be able to react very quickly and the work is endless, there is always something to do as we do make the job so the more work we do the higher the output (and the $$). Skivers can't hide and when they do, they don't stay for long.

I used to notice people who were yellow every time o was on teams - it was only one person - my guess is OP is away for a lot longer than the odd couple of minutes here and there

Just do what the rules are. Why does everyone have to be so awkward all of the time and expect special treatment?? It does my head in. I imagine they have a large team, how are they meant to keep track of breaks if everyone then decides to do this approach? You’re thinking of you, one person, not a wider company and a team to manage. Entitlement again.

I thought regular short breaks - such as to make a coffee - were encouraged for health and safety reasons? I’m not sure this should be instead of a lunch break!

Something like playing with the dog or doing household chores is a bit different as it probably takes longer than you think. I can also see that a single lunch break is easier to keep tabs on.

More to the point, I think her complaint seems to be that when she wants to communicate with you, you aren’t available, as you’re on orange due to these short breaks. That must be very inconvenient for your manager as she never knows when she can get hold of you. You presumably sometimes need to do some work that needs a block of concentrated time?

So maybe look at minimising these breaks to just a very short “movement” break, and take a bit more of a lunchtime.

Open a PowerPoint presentation - make it full screen and job done