Away messages wouldn't hurt but that's not what the GP is talking about. We receive dozens of messages and notifications, we shouldn't have to feel we should be dropping everything we're doing to respond just because it's during "normal work hours". This expectation used to common with email, and maybe still is in some companies, but we've slowly come to accept email as what it is - asynchronous communication. Mobile notifications and chat applications are a step back in this respect.
"We receive dozens of messages and notifications,"
I've been "on call" for a while before, and part of the solution is to deal directly with that. Anything app that thinks it has the right to pop up notifications whenever the hell it feels like it (and why is "3am" so often when they feel like it?) better have a setting to undo that easily found, or they're in for a rude uninstalling. Anything else that thinks it gets the priority interrupt had better be prepared to discover it doesn't.
Because I need to save that priority interrupt for the actually important "site down" notice. I was getting a visceral twitch whenever I got a text because having the same alert for "CARTHAGE IS BURNING PREPARE TO SPEND HOURS FIXING IT YES I KNOW IT'S 2AM" and "hey whats up dude" was not working for me.
I'm not on that call anymore, but I've kept the habit of keeping everything away from that level of interrupt. If it's that important, pick up the phone and call me. Provide social proof of its importance by putting your own attention into the conversation. (Which, of course, can only be done by a real human.) Otherwise, you're not that important and you can deal with a delay.
If you're a distributed remote company with people who prefer to work early and others who like to work late, all in different time zones, what are "normal work hours?"
Also, I work I higher education, where things move slowly. Although we don't have an assumption that after-hours emails will be replied to until the next business day, any delay of a day or more can cascade to far more delay on the other end(s).
Comments
Away messages wouldn't hurt but that's not what the GP is talking about. We receive dozens of messages and notifications, we shouldn't have to feel we should be dropping everything we're doing to respond just because it's during "normal work hours". This expectation used to common with email, and maybe still is in some companies, but we've slowly come to accept email as what it is - asynchronous communication. Mobile notifications and chat applications are a step back in this respect.
"We receive dozens of messages and notifications,"
I've been "on call" for a while before, and part of the solution is to deal directly with that. Anything app that thinks it has the right to pop up notifications whenever the hell it feels like it (and why is "3am" so often when they feel like it?) better have a setting to undo that easily found, or they're in for a rude uninstalling. Anything else that thinks it gets the priority interrupt had better be prepared to discover it doesn't.
Because I need to save that priority interrupt for the actually important "site down" notice. I was getting a visceral twitch whenever I got a text because having the same alert for "CARTHAGE IS BURNING PREPARE TO SPEND HOURS FIXING IT YES I KNOW IT'S 2AM" and "hey whats up dude" was not working for me.
I'm not on that call anymore, but I've kept the habit of keeping everything away from that level of interrupt. If it's that important, pick up the phone and call me. Provide social proof of its importance by putting your own attention into the conversation. (Which, of course, can only be done by a real human.) Otherwise, you're not that important and you can deal with a delay.
If you're a distributed remote company with people who prefer to work early and others who like to work late, all in different time zones, what are "normal work hours?"
Also, I work I higher education, where things move slowly. Although we don't have an assumption that after-hours emails will be replied to until the next business day, any delay of a day or more can cascade to far more delay on the other end(s).