AIBU to dread a new week as MS Teams chat at work driving me absolutely berserk?!

[blossom2026]

I know this isn't the worst problem in the world - but with every Sunday that comes along, I increasingly dread Mondays and going back to work. It's not the people individually - it's the bloody Teams chat. I work in a reactive service and we are required to be logged in and active on our MS Teams group team chat from 9am - 5pm, whether WFH or in the office, as this is where important stuff is shared and division of work is agreed. Fair enough. What isn't fair enough is the amount of completely non-work related bollocks that goes in there too, with the constant DING DING DING when I'm trying to fucking work. I don't give a fuck if your cat was just sick on your rug, Sandra. No didn't watch fucking Love Island and I don't care how long it took you to get a coffee in Greggs this morning. Fuck off with your dings you absolute bunch of nobheads. NO I can't mute it because I might miss something important. Please join me in my rant against this crime against employment.

You're right, I did suggest that and I should have been clearer about that. The management use that chat as their way of staying connected to the team, rather than speaking in person. That's why it's not something that I can just opt out of.

You're right I did say that, apologies for not being clear. The management don't often engage in person, even when they are in the same building on the same day. The chat is where everything is said. To be honest, there is one particular member of the team who really takes the piss with using the chat for everything and perhaps crosses the professional line quite often, which encourages others to follow suit. The managers are watching so I'm not sure why they haven't noted this and had a word - but they haven't, so I'm assuming they think it's "team building" as a PP said. It isn't by the way, it's fucking annoying and also isolating, bordering on cliquey behaviour. I'm too old for this shit and I get paid barely above minimum wage so please stop it, if you wouldn't mind! Thank you. FFS.

We have this at my workplace (education setting). Mangement loved it at first - people messaging about room changes, trips and so on. Then it became dominated with pictures of people's cats and lunches - cake pictures from the on-site cafe... That was stopped and now we have the teams chat clique and people who message to look busy..'its 7.30am and I need my office unlocked please'.. or 'love the art display in the hall' (hello I'm here and want to be promoted).

Leave the group
If anyone actually needs you for work, they'll message you separately.

I would love to embrace it, if embracing it meant that I could ignore it altogether unless there was something urgent to do - and I could dip in if I wasn't busy and felt sociable. This chat is literally relentless, all day. Even in the middle of very important stuff, there is someone talking about what they are having for lunch or what their dog just did, which then prompts 100 gifs. I can't ignore it because it's where we decide who will do what - and the managers are in the chat as they rarely see the team in person. I just find it exhausting.

OH GOSH the people who look busy. Thank you x

I wish, but the entirety of our work allocation happens in the same group as people telling us whether or not they enjoyed their noodles from B&M x

We have multiple channels and it drives me berserk

Work related stuff on one
'Standing orders, general advice and changes in policy on another
General chit chat on another

The whole organisation is on Teams, however and random meetings, webinars, 'sessions' and whole organisation 'advice' notices just randomly pop up too

I work a later day shift, so the first part of the day is everyone saying Hello

Every fucking morning

If it's only the managers messages that are important, turn off notifications from everyone except them (using do not disturb mode if necessary; I can't remember if you can do this without dnd)

I was always the person that would say 'I know I'm new here but there needs to be a better way of managing this. How can we screen chit chat away from actual work stuff as this is just a complete nightmare trying to keep track of work requests and actioned?'

I was responding to this comment:

we have managers in the chat who think it's all very entertaining when 100 gifs get shared in an hour.

How do you know they find it entertaining if they’re not joining in? Apologies for misinterpreting your comment however perhaps you can see how that happened.

There should be a channel for inane chatter.

I worked in a central government department (contract) and we had (I'm sure) a separate channel for this. So if you wanted to chat you could. In one way it was handy as if you were visiting the London office you’d state it there, or if you logged off early (they had flexible time) you put that there.

Does everyone else on the team like it ? It can be lonely WFH, and it’s a nice social window for some people. If you don’t like it, just mute the notifications

hahahaha that is brilliant!! 😂

Do you also have ADHD and a tendency to piss off management for stating the obvious?! eek x

Hello - the managers do join in, usually by reacting with emojis, numerous times each day.

There is someone who started at the same time as me and doesn't really engage much with the chat, which she gets teased about. She is very popular with the team (much more so than me as they are all a similar age) but she has told me she hates the constant messaging. It really is not helpful at all for anyone other than the people who desperately need others to know every thought in their heads.

Ask management to keep the work chat for work and start a social chat for everything else.

MS Teams is a curse of the modern workplace. It definitely needs to be managed properly. Trouble is, in some workplaces the tail wags the dog and managers are wary of clamping down on this sort of thing for fear of being seen as unsociable and boring.

What a clown world.

Op I don't know if you'd feel comfortable doing this, but asking for a work only chat that has fewer disturbances would come under 'reasonable adjustments' for neurodivergence. Adaptations for communication styles should be considered, and this would be one that I think would be hard for an employer to refuse because there's literally no cost or detriment to the business to do it, as you're not saying you won't log in to teams, you're literally just saying only interrupt me if it's work related.

I have had to push back on my manager for setting up multiple routes for us to 'keep in touch as a team' as I find it overwhelming and of no benefit to me (I'm ASD and the social chit chat is more of a stress than a support for me)

Yes, I think this is the way to go. At least the OP knows there's one other person who doesn't like the constant Teams chatter and there's probably others too.

Take off the dings, there is no need for it and it's a massive pain in the bum for those of us with misophonia. Drives me nuts,

Get used to check the channel for important information. If necessary have a recurring reminder on your calendar to check during the day,

Thank you so much for this and for reading through and seeing that I'm neurodivergent, I appreciate you for seeing me.

It's hard because I'm new and the team are all younger than me, with some quite well-established and others also new. The experienced staff are brilliant at their jobs, no doubt. However, I have at times noticed when things are likely to go tits up (a mixture of my previous experience and pattern recognition) and been totally ignored - and then things have gone wrong.

The chat is then used to pile praise onto the person who ignored me, saying it wasn't their fault and it couldn't have been avoided, just one of those things, etc, I can't say - actually, I told you all that x was going to happen if x wasn't sorted out - but I just get ignored. I HATE THIS BLOODY CHAT!

I'm sorry that you suffer with misophonia - I wonder if this might be part of my issue as well x

No im just old school say what I see/be that person/no fucks to give/says the quiet stuff out loud.

Always have been.