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> "Noone is forcing you to look at it immediately every time there's new conversation happening." Nobody except your employer. In shops that use slack it is of

> "Noone is forcing you to look at it immediately every time there's new conversation happening." Nobody except your employer. In shops that use slack it is often the expectation that slack messages should be read and responded to ASAP. If someone PMs you in slack that is taken to be the equivalent of an IM or a phone call, with the same implications of urgency. If there is a chat for your specific team then it's expected you are following that pretty closely (at least as closely as your email if not more so). Additionally, sometimes it's not possible to avoid paying too much attention to slack. If people have a habit of dumping lots of context and decision making into slack without putting that info elsewhere (like wiki, issues, email, etc.) then at some point you need to go back and read all that backlog to keep up to date on what the hell is going on, typically it's far easier to do that as close in time as possible to the original messages, so that you're in the loop. Relatedly, people have a habit of having substantive conversations and effectively virtual meetings in slack which can include decision making as well. Meaning they can make decisions without your input, advice, or consent if you're heads-down and not paying attention, which can mean people make the wrong decisions (they did it without additional context, information, or advice you could have provided) or they make decisions that put you individually at a disadvantage (because you "weren't in the room" when things got decided). Yes, these are absolutely undesirable and unnecessary ways of using the platform but they are also very common and they are some of the big reasons why people tend to dislike slack.

deleted 8y ago
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ramraj07 8y ago
Sucks for you that you need to be responding ASAP but that's not necessarily the norm. My organization and team clearly set expectations that we are only expected to respond ASAP if it's regular work hours or if you're on call. All other times people can ping you but no one's gonna hold you to it if you don't reply all Sunday. In our team what organically transpires is that we generally get a response time of 3-8 hours over weekends and a few hours in weekday evenings. No one's complaining over lost sleep. And from what I've heard from my friends who all made informed decisions on where to work, that seems to be the norm. I'm perfectly fine with that. Looks more like you've decided these hardass companies are the only places worth working at for various reasons and have concluded that these are the norms everywhere.
- adrianmsmith 8y ago
  "only expected to respond ASAP if it's regular work hours" - I think InclinedPlane meant regular work hours. It's a problem if you have to respond ASAP during work hours, if your job involves doing deep work during work hours.
- InclinedPlane 8y ago
  This is not, mostly, my personal anecdotal experience these are my observations of the "way it works" for many people throughout the industry, especially those working at startups. Notice that I said nothing about working outside of the typical 40 hour work week and yet you immediately took my comment to be concerned with that. Absolutely the core problem with slack is that it makes it easier for people to be inconsiderate of other's time by making synchronous communication the norm. Slack normalizes the model of everyone communicating synchronously all the time and everyone interrupting everyone else's work in order to communicate, which is corrosive both to productivity and the overall office environment (for the reasons I outlined above). And yes, there are ways to "use slack better" but the problem here is that most tools encourage a natural pattern of use, and if that pattern has a severe negative impact then using that tool will tend to have a negative impact on work as well, on average. See also: using gotos in code or writing readable Perl programs. If there is a "correct" way to use slack then that should be the default, baked into the software, and it should take work to use slack incorrectly. Unfortunately, the exact opposite is true, using slack well requires an uphill battle. People aren't complaining about slack being impossible to use "correctly", they are complaining that it's an uphill battle to do so.
allannienhuis 8y ago
> "If someone PMs you in slack that is taken to be the equivalent of an IM " How is a Slack PM NOT the equivalent of an IM? It's exactly the same thing, isn't it?
- InclinedPlane 8y ago
  Exactly. The difference is that slack is used much more casually so people (including your boss) will have a tendency to PM you much more casually as well, even when that conversation is not important or doesn't need to be synchronous.
User23 8y ago
One of the most successful sysops I knew at Amazon (he was director level last I checked, maybe higher now) refused to use any instant messaging app whatsoever on the grounds that the interrupts were a productivity killer.

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ramraj07 8y ago

Sucks for you that you need to be responding ASAP but that's not necessarily the norm. My organization and team clearly set expectations that we are only expected to respond ASAP if it's regular work hours or if you're on call. All other times people can ping you but no one's gonna hold you to it if you don't reply all Sunday. In our team what organically transpires is that we generally get a response time of 3-8 hours over weekends and a few hours in weekday evenings. No one's complaining over lost sleep. And from what I've heard from my friends who all made informed decisions on where to work, that seems to be the norm. I'm perfectly fine with that. Looks more like you've decided these hardass companies are the only places worth working at for various reasons and have concluded that these are the norms everywhere.

adrianmsmith 8y ago
"only expected to respond ASAP if it's regular work hours" - I think InclinedPlane meant regular work hours. It's a problem if you have to respond ASAP during work hours, if your job involves doing deep work during work hours.
InclinedPlane 8y ago
This is not, mostly, my personal anecdotal experience these are my observations of the "way it works" for many people throughout the industry, especially those working at startups. Notice that I said nothing about working outside of the typical 40 hour work week and yet you immediately took my comment to be concerned with that. Absolutely the core problem with slack is that it makes it easier for people to be inconsiderate of other's time by making synchronous communication the norm. Slack normalizes the model of everyone communicating synchronously all the time and everyone interrupting everyone else's work in order to communicate, which is corrosive both to productivity and the overall office environment (for the reasons I outlined above). And yes, there are ways to "use slack better" but the problem here is that most tools encourage a natural pattern of use, and if that pattern has a severe negative impact then using that tool will tend to have a negative impact on work as well, on average. See also: using gotos in code or writing readable Perl programs. If there is a "correct" way to use slack then that should be the default, baked into the software, and it should take work to use slack incorrectly. Unfortunately, the exact opposite is true, using slack well requires an uphill battle. People aren't complaining about slack being impossible to use "correctly", they are complaining that it's an uphill battle to do so.

allannienhuis 8y ago

> "If someone PMs you in slack that is taken to be the equivalent of an IM " How is a Slack PM NOT the equivalent of an IM? It's exactly the same thing, isn't it?

InclinedPlane 8y ago
Exactly. The difference is that slack is used much more casually so people (including your boss) will have a tendency to PM you much more casually as well, even when that conversation is not important or doesn't need to be synchronous.

User23 8y ago

One of the most successful sysops I knew at Amazon (he was director level last I checked, maybe higher now) refused to use any instant messaging app whatsoever on the grounds that the interrupts were a productivity killer.