Comment by mjamil
4 years ago
I DM my staff on slack “after hours” [1] all the time, and set the expectation that they should respond when appropriate at their discretion. That could (and often does) mean the next business day or even later. Or it could mean ASAP; they’re adults, and have the judgement to make the correct call.
[1] Obviously, this policy is not targeted at staff in different time zones, which makes their remedy meaningless.
It's great that you don't have the expectation of people reading or replying to your messages after hours.
However, please recognize that even with a well-meaning boss like you, there are still mechanisms that incentivize individuals to at least read these messages, and once their free time has been "tainted" with work stuff, much of the damage is already done. Psychological pressures (which may be entirely internal but often are the result of other peers' attitudes as well) will still take a toll.
IMHO, as grown-ups, it is the most reasonable thing to avoid such leakage altogether; when my phone rings after hours I need to be certain that this is not something that can wait.
Luckily, since you're already using slack, you can just use the "send later" feature which is super simple to use and will work around this effectively. :)
This boss isn’t well meaning at all. They expect people (unlike what you said) to actually read all messages right away, no matter the time.
Because, as they also say, sometimes it might be appropriate to respond right away (“Or it could mean ASAP”).
If that’s the case, then the clear expectation is that people read all messages at all times, they just might not always have to respond right away (but in order to make that judgement call they have to actually read all messages).
This might actually be worse than just sending messages after hours where you actually have to respond right away – because you actually have to do sifting and filtering (after hours!) through messages, the vast majority of which might not require an immediate answer. If you are only contacted at those times where you actually do need to respond right away then at least you know what to expect …
This sounds like a pretty awful boss with awful communication who somehow convinced themself that they are oh so gracious and nice.
I disagree with your take and I am mostly on the receiving end of those late Slack messages. If you do not wish to get notified unless it's an emergency there is a nifty feature that allows you to define your working hours, out of which you won't get a notification when getting messages on Slack.
In case of something that is urgent the sender can override the "do not disturb" and send a notification anyway. This in my opinion is the right way to do.
You should own the fact that your free time is yours and that you shouldn't open Slack to read those late messages. People work at different times (especially true for globally distributed team) and expecting people to "know" that they are outside of YOUR business hours simply does not scale to multiple employees.
> You should own the fact that your free time is yours and that you shouldn't open Slack to read those late messages
It sounds like that works for you at your company. Congrats!
But if you're lucky enough never to have had an overbearing boss, you're not familiar with all the nifty ways they will try to control or coerce labor while not paying you.
In US low-wage jobs, they know they can get away with violating labor law with impunity until it gets bad enough to attract media attention. Even if workers had the money to sue, it wouldn't be worth it.
I got to see texts from a younger relative's boss at a national chain restaurant leading up to quitting. She had been working 6-7 days a week for over a month, but wage theft was keeping her under 40 hours a week paid. Multiple demands she come in on her day off with less than a couple hours notice to "support the team" or "do her part", with escalating threats in response to anything less deferential than "yes boss".
She finally responded by quitting. That solicited a remarkable fit of rage, calling her a loser who can't hold down a real job and so on.
The thing that kills me is I know most people don't want to be abusive shitheads. It is absolutely learned behavior from an abusive top-down system. The only way to win is not to play.
And I think that's driving a lot of the job churn our sanctified "job creators" are bitching about. Fuck 'em. If you can't build a company without abusing people, you don't deserve a company. Go get a real job, whiners.
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The right way to do it is to not install work slack on any of your non-work devices. Barring emergencies, which should be directed to dedicated on-call staff, or extenuating circumstances like prearranged projects with tight deadlines, there should be no reason to have to reply to your boss until the next work day.
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Slack also has a scheduled send option. Just schedule it for the morning if its unimportant. Then there's no implied expectation of when something should be addressed.
I, like others, sometimes use work laptop for pleasure. actually, I know a lot of people who do this exclusively. sure, you can blame it on them... but also I use slack for more than just work, and when I see unread notifications, even if I didn't get a push, i'm compelled to read them.
> out of which you won't get a notification when getting messages on Slack.
This is actually not true. Slack will still red-badge the app or workspace and show that you have an unread message waiting for you. All do-not-disturb does is prevent OS-level push notifications I believe.
I use Slack also for some social groups (though, I'm trying to less and less), so just "quitting slack" means also removing myself from groups im in outside of work.
I wish Slack had a way to "soft log out" of a workspace - right click -> deactivate and it greys out the workspace and doesnt show any unread messages indicators until you reactivate.
Instant messaging should be used for instant messaging. There’s a reason we have email and now tickets as well.
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I agree. Even if I don't receive a notification, if I happen to open the Slack app and see pending messages – particularly if they're from a manager or someone higher in the hierarchy – then I feel obligated to respond to them.
Well then, it sounds like you need to put your phone down or at least don't open Slack, knowing well what would happen if you do. The onus is on you to disconnect from work, not to ensure everyone else conforms to your schedule.
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> Or it could mean ASAP
Reading this as written, you're requiring your staff to read every message immediately but they only need to respond if you think they need to.
That's no different than 24/7 on call when it comes to making some people's lives miserable.
Or in other words "I expect my staff to always check every DM I send them out of hours and correctly deduce whether I expect them to respond immediately. If they don't I will consider them to have poor judgement."
> Or it could mean ASAP
Why?
This basically means they must “read” the message ASAP to decide whether to reply ASAP or not.
That OUGHT NOT TO BE the expectation ever!
Let alone the expectation of an immediate answer, the root problem is expectation of that message “being read right then” or soon.
[Sentence removed due to misinterpreting comment I replied to]. It's important to consider the managers and poor leaders out there who might not be as upstanding as yourself with regards to expectations, necessitating legislation or regulation. Citizens are entitled to their uncompensated time off hours not being interrupted.
It's likely the end result of this is using communications tool features to queue or hold messages until a worker's work day starts. I believe Slack, Teams, and Office 365 already support "quiet hours" at org level.
Tangentially, when thinking about labor regulation, I think it's important to frame the conversations as "what monsters lurk in the private sector? [1] [2]" vs "I am a great boss, why would this be necessary?"
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=ceo+type+psychopath
[2] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=leadership+dark+triad
He says that he expects people to respond to DMs ASAP when he considers it appropriate. That means his staff have to read each message he sends them when he sends them. This is hardly good leadership.
They said they set appropriate expectations, and I’m supposed to be polite and assume positive intent of other comments per HN guidelines.
I believe my comments make it clear where I stand on support of regulation to prohibit this activity.
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I have an 11 month old child. My work hours are all over the place. A law telling me I can't catch up on Slack when I'm up at midnight for unrelated reasons just makes my life worse.
Why not just close slack when you leave for the day? I don't get it.
> Why not just close slack when you leave for the day? I don't get it.
Because there are bosses out there who, if you don't meet their expectation of round the clock access to you, will fire you or PIP you out. Regulation will always have some edge cases where said regulation is suboptimal, but optimal over the aggregate. Your life might be worse, but more people's lives are improved.
Having children myself, I understand and can relate to your situation, but also understand the value of setting employment boundaries using regulation. Constant off hours contact is legitimately harmful to worker wellbeing [1].
"The insidious impact of 'always on' organizational culture is often unaccounted for or disguised as a benefit – increased convenience, for example, or higher autonomy and control over work-life boundaries," says Becker. "Our research exposes the reality: 'flexible work boundaries' often turn into 'work without boundaries,' compromising an employee's and their family's health and well-being.
Becker's research [2] is part of a growing body of work that is affirming the negative effects of an "always on" work culture. Around the world, several governments have begun to go as far as legislate laws allowing employees the freedom to not have to engage with work outside of official work hours."
[1] https://newatlas.com/right-to-disconnect-after-hours-work-em... (The right to disconnect: The new laws banning after-hours work emails)
[2] https://journals.aom.org/doi/10.5465/AMBPP.2018.121 (Killing me softly: Electronic communications monitoring and employee and spouse well-being)
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As someone mention in another comment, sending an email would be more adequate. The reason being that even if people are "adults, and have the judgement to make the correct call", there is always a looming implied pressure in sending an instant message. Not everyone will have the mental fortitude to just leave things for later, when the boss sends a message.
I turn off my work computer after work day. I never install company chat apps / email on personal devices. So it really doesn't matter whether my manager messages me after hours or next business day because I'll only see when I login to work computer next morning.
That's the correct answer
> they’re adults
But adults who's source of income is their job that you hold the power over.
Even if everybody has a great relationship, that power differential is real and present and can't be changed.
That sounds terrible. Your staff has to read every message after hours in case they get one where they have to respond ASAP. Now I can see why Portugal deemed the law necessary.
We have a team distributed over many time zones so we have to send messages to each other at "off hours". Thankfully we have a good understanding that this is for the convenience of the sender and the receiver can reply the following day.
I have one team member in Quebec and the way they handle this seems to make more sense than Portugal's. Basically, the employees have the right to refuse 'overtime'. So, the boss can message them, but they cannot be penalized for not responding.
Yup slack is async communication. I always reply to my bosses 24 hours after they send me a message. To make sure that there is no expectation that I will be responding immediately.
Early 2021, I was overstressed from (among other causes) being micromanaged.
When a project manager asked me on my private WhatsApp if me being at home meant I couldn't attend this very important number, I looked into a separate phone for work.
I got a separate SIM for 2,50 euro per month and put it into my previous smart-phone (I don't need performance for WhatsApp and the like). This was one of the best decisions I have ever made. Being able to physically shut down your work phone gave me heaps of peace.
I generally shift over to email, because the expectations around email are quite different. In the past I've made it explicit what my expectations are for response time based on communication method, this has worked for cross-cultural work where unspoken assumptions are probably not shared.
Slack has the feature to send later. If it is after hours and non-urgent, it is scheduled for tomorrow or sent as an email. Anything else is disrespectful to the recipient's time and attention.
Would you dm your boss's boss after hours? I would only if important.
Yeah, no.
The entire point of this law is that you don't get to message employees who aren't working.
They aren't obligated to read your message and determine whether it is appropriate to reply immediately or tomorrow.
You can message them during work hours.
I guess there can be lots of exceptions, but it's probably appropriate for many roles to not read the message until the next business day.
This is our policy as well and it works perfectly. In a world where working in different time zones is increasingly becoming the norm, there's really no other workable policy unless you want to hamstring team members outside of your company's "official" time zone.
That said, I'm sure some bosses have abused this policy despite its well-meaning origins.