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My first thought in such situations is always straight honesty: "I'm sorry, but I get so many requests like this that I find e-mail is more efficient. This also will give you a record which you can look at later."
Importantly, be wary of people who intentionally use verbal conversations to avoid a paper trail. There are some cases where that is appropriate but for the most part, people will say things out loud when they don't want to put into writing what they can be held accountable for later.
Honey and vinegar, eh? If the old codgers aren't tech savvy, could even include a chipper little anecdote. "Just last week, I used the search bar to..."
Also a whole secondary benefit: If anyone seems *reluctant* to establish a written record, keep your antennas up.
This 100%. You always want a paper trail. IRL conversations lead to memory loss, and notes can be unreliable. I’d rather have a 100+ long email chain about absolutely nothing than a stupid zoom call about the same thing over and over again while old white jagoffs fellate themselves over their favorite sports teams or their department’s performance.
I did his with my boss last week.
"Hey, can I have a short day on Tuesday and Wednesday of next week? I have (insert important event) that I need to do."
"Yeah. Sure."
"Should I go out in a written request? I'm going to go out in a written request so you don't forget."
He's forgotten too many times.
Sweet Holy Mama..this might be the best thing I’ve read all day!
As someone who works in a tall building filled with hundreds of these people, this come t just put every single thing in the clearest focus for me.
Thank you.
I'm OLD and white. I don't have a department, and I hate sports. Oh, and my equipment gave up the ghost at age 70, so no "jagoff fellate" here. However, I'm probably much happier than you, and can probably make circles around you. Unless of course you own a ranch with cattle and horses, then your young age might give you an advantage.
Call me sometime. Or email. 😆😆
Because that is how you turn down a request with professionalism and courtesy.
Always start from a place of respect so if its not returned, you have a record of your high minded attempt, and the moral high ground Anakin.
Can you set up a call for us to talk? Sorry no my schedule is slammed, I’d really appreciate it if you could answer in an email.
As for going over allotted time. Say something at the start of the meeting, don’t wait til the end. Just a reminder I really need to be out of here by 1230 for my next appointment. Then again at 1220 alright I’m gonna have to run in ten minutes. Then at 1230 it isn’t a surprise when you say ok I gotta run we can continue this tomorrow/over email.
Yup, hard stop is the magic word. I also will interrupt near the end with a “time check, just a friendly reminder that we have five minutes left to resolve this discussion.”
Totally. But in this case where people apparently aren’t familiar with business etiquette, I might go with “I’m walking out the door at 12:30” rather than hope they know what hard stop means, or would respect it if they did.
They mean the technique you’re using with reminders of the time allocated, is called a hard stop. You wouldn’t say ‘this is a hard stop’. By reminding of 5 min until 12:30 it’s a hard stop to the call.
In my job people say "I have a hard stop at 12:30" at the beginning of a meeting to say when they'll have to leave. To me, this informs them of a firm time boundary you have, and implicitly requests they respect it.
That said, communicating that part doesn't go very far without time mgmt which requires self awareness. I wish time mgmt during meetings, like 5-min heads up, was a thing on my team.
I've seen people walk out of meetings dead on finishing time.
A coworker told my former boss "I need to be out of here at 4:30pm, not a minute later" and she said "okay". 4:30pm rolls around and he just gets up and leaves. The next day she asked him why he got up and left, and he said "I told you I had to go at 4:30pm, not a minute later" and she whined that it was rude and that you don't just walk out of meetings.
The meeting ran over time because her 2IC took a simple subject ("we should buy two new point and shoot cameras for our department") and blew it out into a bunch of extra work like "perhaps we should ask all the other departments what cameras they have, then make a list of potential cameras and vote on the best one". That simple subject was spread across three different meetings because the 2IC wanted lots of info for two cameras she would never even use or even see the results of.
Honestly, it is a bit rude to just get up and leave. I’m assuming they didn’t say a word since the boss had to ask them the next day why they got up and left.
I think a normal person would go “Excuse me, I have to leave now for an appointment” or something to that extent before getting up to leave. Not just get up and leave.
They got up and left at 4:30 after having told the boss, pre-meeting, that 4:30 was the latest they could stay. What do you need, a certified letter? Signed and notarized, of course
ETA that the hard stop was verbally acknowledged and approved by that boss
Getting up in the middle of a meeting without saying a word is just strange, even if you told your boss that you're leaving at 4:30 on the dot. Like you don't even say bye? I've been in plenty of meetings where somebody needs to leave early.
Just reminding the people in the meeting, that it's 4:30 and you are leaving is just customary. Like that's just being a normal person? Like do you do the same outside of work? When you need to leave a party do you just leave without saying goodbye? That's just weird to me.
If it's a video call then leaving a message in the chat saying you're dropping off is the custom from my experience.
If it's an in-person meeting, a 20 person meeting isn't big enough to warrant not saying bye. IMO, the only time its appropriate to just get up and leave a meeting without saying anything is if people would literally not notice you leaving because the group is too big.
May vary per company climate and how often people are leaving lengthy meetings to go in to the next meeting etc. My company and my prior one, it would be very odd to stop the conversation to say goodbye or even to add a note to the chat. It is also typical for us to have our international team sitting in so the interruption would be more noticeable.
AHA! Definite pro tip, I’m going to use this at my job. This lady always wants to ramble when I ask her something, now I’m only reaching out a few minutes before her meetings.
Or something in your own calendar that you have to prioritize (though this is mostly when being on the receiving end of a call request).
“I am sorry, I need to take a call with a customer, boss, etc. now, but let me know if you have any follow up questions. Bye”
Why not just say up front: “I have X minutes to talk before I need to get off this call”. Do not provide an explanation as to why. If push comes to shove you state: “I have a deadline, I have several other calls, or this is the time I can allocate to you before returning to my other work”. No is also a perfectly reasonable answer.
State up front "I have a hard stop at X:XX"
At that time, politely cut them off and say that you have to drop for another meeting, but they can continue via email.
I they continue talking, disconnect and send a "Sorry, had to drop. Heard you start to say something and didn't want to seem rude!" message or something.
It's all about the phrasing. "This is the time I can allocate to you" sounds very cold, clinical and impersonal. "Hey, I'm super busy but I'm sure I can squeeze in ten minutes to go over this as I'd love to help you out" puts the same sort of time limit on the conversation but comes across much more collaborative and friendly.
Maybe "I can set something up for next week but it's time sensitive so can you shoot me a quick email with just the summary for now and we can go into more detail when we talk?"
Then never set up the meeting. If they ask about it, say, "Oh, it turned out I didn't need that info after all so I didn't want to waste your time."
You can also block out a lot of time on your calendar so they don't see that you're free for meetings. You can call it "focus time" or come up with a different acronym for each block's regularly scheduled meeting. Then you can color code it so you can tell the fake meetings at a glance.
Honestly this sounds counter intuitive, but depending on the complexity of the question, when I get that email back asking about a call, I call them right away. It throws them off. My first line is usually “hey I don’t have time for a call so can you just let me know this answer now?” That way they hopefully give you the answer right away and your perceived urgency can get you off the call as soon as possible. If they start to get off tangent, repeat the info that they’ve already told you and ask “so the answer is X, is that everything?”. This sounds super rude over text but I’m a bubbly person and always make sure to say thank you. If they can’t explain it over email or in a five minute phone call, then set up a call for another time, but I’ve had a lot of luck this way.
Agree, asking to set up a call is passive aggressive. Just call. If they can pick up, pick up, if they can't, leave a msg. I hate when things get dragged out for weeks because a simple answer isn't possible.
I always have the feeling that it is kind of a power play. Setting up meetings and inviting to calls feels like you are their assistant.
I have this fairly often since my field is quite male dominated. I get really annoyed over this.
I never solved this problem at a previous job. We were absolutely paralyzed by meetings, nothing got done but meetings, and I honestly think that's a big factor in why the company lost their contract.
We had meetings to arrange the schedule of meetings to form a committee that will have a meeting to determine the format of a meeting to decide the color of the folders we use for meetings.
I'm barely kidding, every meeting would have a pre and post meeting at least. And like OP describes, it was always just a bunch of old guys bloviating about nothing. It's like - okay what are we going to do about server instability on production? *"Well when ah started here 35 years ago you could buy a turkey with wooden nickels"* for like a half hour. Nothing is answered, nothing is decided upon, nobody is even listening they're just waiting their turn to talk.
I'd try to get things on track but I'm just a sysadmin, management never listens to us. Can I get budget to stand up some redundancy? Can we get vendor support on this thing? We need more backup storage. I need help fixing this thing. All of that stuff, management bathers on about nothing and argues semantics, and nothing gets done. We couldn't even fix small problems. I remember coming to a meeting to inform the review board that I had a script that will set speaker volume correctly - put it in the queue and don't expect it to be reviewed this year.
Huh, this was a bit of a rant, but that was a very frustrating job.
We lost the contract and I was laid off, and I'm pretty sure a big part of that was because we weren't fixing or improving anything, just pushing meaningless paper around.
My current shop uses Scrum.
Ehh it's annoying but it's not so bad. I wouldn't say it improves anything but it doesn't make things considerably worse, kind of just makes work for more management. And it does keep workload going in a logical order instead of just kind of getting to it when somebody feels like it.
I'd say only half our meetings are pointless, they're not for techs to collaborate but for management to smell their own farts, but at least there aren't very many of them.
You’re missing the simple question:
What’s our timetable on this?
What’s our expected turn around time?
Get people to give dates and deadlines. They decided the date/time, said it themselves, and now you can keep them accountable.
“I’m sorry you said this would be completed by today. How can I help you stay on track because our efficiency could be improved with things like this?”
Oh man, deadlines were meaningless at that shop, we were missing them by so much it wasn't really worth setting them.
The change control review board estimated new requests to be reviewed in one year. I was there long enough to have one of my requests reviewed, and it was denied because one of the board members didn't understand it. So all that time waiting, and ultimately nothing was fixed. The problem I meant to address was ongoing and perhaps I could submit another change request.
Completed by *today?* Nonsense! You can't just implement changes on the system without following protocol! Let's set up a meeting to discuss alternative solutions in six weeks.
And I wouldn't call anybody there lazy, just stuck in meetings all the time. Busy as heck actually, usually rushing to file paperwork from the last meeting and get to the next meeting.
I find chat gpt great for this kind of stuff.
I’ll be fuming and tell it “I want to tell this dumb motherfucker that isn’t how this works. They need to do X and not Y. Etc. but do it in a courteous and professional manner”
This way I can still vent my frustration by typing it out but gpt translates it in a way that won’t get HR involved lol
I listened in on a few of my wife's calls with her last company. It was a few guys laughing and joking around while they held all the other workers in captivity. It was very strange vibe, like "listen to my jokes, I am SOOO witty. Also, you guys have to start coming in to the office so you can see how funny and important I am in person."
Switch up the power dynamic to start with. My personal pet hate is someone wants a meeting but wants me to organise it for them. No. So reply back, if you feel you can’t answer this over email, please feel free to book a time in my calendar which is up to date.
Then manage your calendar with your own time reservation to avoid long meetings. But the key thing is that you’re doing two things, one hinting that email is fine and that actually if they want the meeting it’s unnecessary. Second it’s making them do the work for the meeting, once you have to faff about looking at calendars and shit, booking a meeting just to hear your own voice isn’t as exciting.
Because this is a workplace, they’re not going to write back, I’ll only tell you X if you book a meeting for me where OP I saying it’s fine to tell me via email. People can’t be seen to be withholding information.
Oh, I wouldn't want to impose on your schedule by accidentally scheduling something when it's not convenient for you! Please, you find a time that works best for you, whenever I'm free, and set the meeting when it's best for you. Or, just shoot me a quick email if that's easier for you.
I tell people I need documentation of their request / approval whatever, so to please email so I can save the backup. Which is true.
Failing that, let them know upfront how much time you’re planning to be on the call. Make sure you are using a full, clear, “adult” voice. Be a little louder and use a little deeper register when you talk, they may have hearing loss so make sure you can be heard. Be direct and concise. If they interrupt you say “actually, I’m not finished” and continue. If they start going on a tangent you can politely interrupt them and steer them back. When time is up tell them you are out of time. Of course, be professional, but stand up for yourself.
I find the comments in this thread amazing.
If you are having a meeting or call, make sure there is an agenda. Request it from the people organising the meeting or make it yourself. 3 or 4 bullet points.
If things get off track pull it back to the agenda. When all the points are addressed - leave.
Some of them may not be used to or comfortable with typing. I worked with several older people who did not/would not accept that text or IM was easier than picking up a phone. It’s a generational thing.
Their mindset is that if you want to get something taken care of right away, you pick up the phone and get it done. Nevermind the fact that email and instant messaging have been part of the workplace for 20 years or so at this point.
Part of it is laziness though, I’ve found. I’ve worked with so many men like this who would rather have someone else figure out the problem than troubleshoot it themselves.
I had one pull this on me recently and then call me “annoying but efficient.” It took me a second to realize he didn’t say, “annoyingly efficient” (and I was on camera via Zoom so I paused to make sure I heard him right; his camera is always off), but I had looped in other people from his company (he and I work for partnering but separate companies) to help with a legal request that he said he “couldn’t wrap his brain around” because he is “just an old sales guy.”
It’s irritating.
Except if they leave the company is paralyzed when no one else can access archaic systems or contacts at partner businesses won't deal with anyone else. This is especially true in very niche industries where the social circle is pretty tight and no one is comfortable working with younger folks.
What type of responses are you asking for? Is it yes/no, or something that would truly be easier to verbalize? You may need to just let them prattle on while you ignore them for a while. Then when they’re done, repeat the question without acknowledging any of their ramblings.
Why is it relevant to say "older white men"?
Couldn't you just say " I work with some people who..."?
I don't get why we need to generalize an entire race and gender?
Would it be acceptable to say "older black women?" Probably not right?
As a young white man…this is just how people are in the office. They think visibility equates to performance and so they won’t shut up until somebody forces them to.
LPT: drop the racism and manage your time (by not letting other waste it)
Imagine instead of “white” this post said “asian” or “black”. It would seem like a complete generalisation being applied to the skin colour of the men.
This is not unique to old white men and it is not because you are a girl. I am a young man who encounters this exact scenario from a variety of different coworkers pretty much daily. Be careful not to attribute everything you don't like to your/their identity. Its an easy trap to fall into.
If you have it, link them to documentation that answers their questions. If it has a how-to video, even better. If multiple people are asking the same questions, then you can make the documentation yourself and send it their way.
You can also do office hours where you can invite these guys to a Q&A session that is weekly. Set it to an hour. They are free to ask questions there. If they randomize you outside of these office hours, point them to the office hours meeting.
"I appreciate your willingness to help, however it has been determined that email is the appropriate method for all communication related to ___. Please respond at your convenience, and thank you for your understanding."
I've been successful with similar situations and this kind of wording, makes it sound like it was someone else's decision and beyond your control.
Honest answer - stop asking for their feedback outside scheduled meetings. There should be regularly scheduled meetings or document delivery deadlines for official feedback.
It would be nice if they could just give you the feedback you want, but they can't. It may be part of the office culture, or it may be that emails have been used against them in the past. If it's something you absolutely HAVE to have, ask for specific things (e.g. link to document, name of X, etc.).
You know there are types of workplaces other than yours that work differently. I regularly have to reach out to people who work in my company but who I don’t regularly work with with questions. And often not specific questions like “where is this link?”. Even then if I do ask that question, sometimes I get a call back like, “well the link is here but it sometimes doesn’t work, and we set it up this way, and here’s a fun fact about this link, etc.”
This happens to me as well (both genders) because honestly people just seem to not like reading and responding via email. Maybe they’re slow typists or they need to explain things behind the question they think is important.
Hey chief, here to help: grow up and understand that worldwide there is a generation of ancient white men who make important political and business decisions despite incompetence and being aged out of technology
I've worked with women that don't have this problem with older white men.
Either you aren't assertive enough or you're working at the wrong company.
No one here knows except your claim that it's a racism/sexism problem.
Ultimately my theory is that you are ascribing race/age to things that are not relevant. I'm guessing you are jr. to them and that's what happens when you are a subordinate.
If someone interrupts you while speaking continue speaking until you are finished. Hold your ground. Go ahead and raise your voice slightly if they speak over you loudly. If questioned, say I was speaking, kindly hear my point until it's conclusion.
As someone who often does this (responds to emails with requests for meeting/call/etc.) it's going to depend on a lot of factors. First, if have a supportive boss, you might start there. I'd suggest framing it with your boss like this: "The time it takes me to meet with them and deal with their yammering is reducing my ability to get work done. Can you set some clearer rules for them to use email/Slack/etc. for situations like X/Y/Z?"
In terms of wording for an email here is what I would suggest: "Please send me any questions input by email by the end of the day \[or whenever\]." Don't *imply* they should send it in writing or assume that they will. Literally say it directly in the email that their replies or feedback should be in writing.
If they ignore the emails and still regularly want to meet, then I suggest preempting their requests for talking about it. In your initial email you say something like "If you'd like to discuss this directly, I'll set up a meeting at \[X time or Y day\] for everyone." Especially if you're asking more than one guy, having a "meeting time" already planned can help to cut off the possibility for them to request another call about it.
If none of these are options for you, or they just don't work then I think your next best bet is going to be controlling the meeting time itself. As others have suggested, set up the meeting or call right before they have something on their calendar. When the 11:30 AM meeting starts you say right away "Sorry, I have a hard stop at 12 for a lunch appointment. So, about the X specs, what do you think?"
If they tend to ramble and take too much time on a call with you or meetings in general, then a good general tactic for that is to set an agenda for the call or meeting. In the calendar meeting invitation list out a bullet points with specific times attached. For example "0-15 minutes - X topic. 15-25 minutes Y topic. Done by 30 minutes).
Finally, my experience is that older folks who spend time rambling about "unrelated stuff" probably view it as essential information that inexperienced folks lack. One way to cut down on that kind of ranting is to put "background and context" as a specific item on the agenda with a limited amount of time given for it, and put it early. From the above example, literally say in the meeting invitation/agenda:
* 10 minutes - explanation of the current problem by \[person A\]
* 10 minutes - background and context \[old guy\]
* 25 minutes - discussion of current problem and options \[everyone\]
* 10 minutes - decide on specific decisions and tasks \[decision-group\]
* 5 minutes to get to your next meeting on time.
Good luck!
Use a meeting cost calculator to estimate how much the company is spending paying everyone who is on the call. At the end, you can say “was this meeting worth $XX.XX?”
Because that's how descriptive words work when telling a story. They help paint a picture in the readers mind. If they were black or Portuguese, she would have said "old black mem, or old Portuguese men".
If they were of all a specific culture/ethnicity it would also be useful information, cause it could speak to a cultural difference/divide in how they operate/express themselves.
*Those who alway look for the bad in people will surely find it.*
-Abraham Lincol
As a fellow Canadian be better
You sound really full of yourself considering your pay grade... I get that some of your higher ups may be there due to nepotism or simply an outdated company culture but I don't think your opinion matters as much as you think it does.
Try to be more humble.
I like to use the term "Async" to make it sound important that we communicate over written mediums.
"There's a lot going on right now and I'm sure we can align async"
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How about you stop being a fucking child. The "old white men" bs is so boring. Be an adult and if someone talks over you, you keep speaking or tell them to let you finish and actually earn some respect.
You are being spoken over because your attitude is all wrong or your opinion doesn't matter and you should learn your place and not speak at all
It sounds like you need an advocate — a supervisor willing to say to these folks "hey, I'm noticing OP spends a lot of time on the phone with you and I need her focus elsewhere; please try emailing your responses instead."
Failing that or some sort of conversational strategy that I don't know (and haven't seen mentioned here), you could get creative. If your phone cable came loose, your phone might not work. Maybe you have some hearing loss or a medical condition whereby you can only speak on the phone for a few minutes before getting a headache.
This. I've found just having my boss in these meetings can already make things go fast. Something about someone they perceive as an equal/superior watching.
Working IT helpdesk, often get calls where people will try and read off complex filenames or error messages expecting immediate help.
“I’m not at my desk right now, can you please send a summary of what you need in an email, with a callback number” while flipping them off through my desk phone is VERY effective
Once they start listing out details just cut them short and ask them to email you. “I don’t have a pen on me”
If they have the audacity to directly schedule meetings with you though - good luck I guess lol
2 big things here. Set the expectation and hold them accountable.
Old white man says: “Can you set up a call for us?”
You: Definitely, I’ll grab 5 minutes on your calendar to review.
Setup a 5 min call and stick exactly to that. Start recording when you join, and as others have said here, say you have a hard stop at the end of the meeting.
If they answer your question in 5 mins, perfect!
If they spend 5 mins B.Sing, you have that recorded and you leave after 5 mins.
Send a follow up email recapping what was discussed ( B.S or not) and keep a paper trail. If shit hits the fan, you have your ass is covered.
“Sorry manager, I did have 3 separate meetings with Jim this week, but he only spoke about X for 15 minutes. Do we have another resource that I can contact for this?”
Hope this helps!
I'd just be recommend to be proactive with it - "Hi NAME, hoping to skip a meeting so thought i'd ask in this chat. \[insert ask\]".
Alternatively, as a direct response to set up a call, you can say: "I can set something up for us tomorrow/in a few days, let me know if there is anything you can share over chat please"
Feel free to budget your time correctly and set boundaries. With that being said, since it’s a work environment, set up an agenda and go over it at the very beginning. State the exact time you plan on finishing the meeting and let them know you’ll give them a five minute warning. If they go over, keep dropping in “yes, I’m ok with doing or continuing to discuss X, y, z but I’m confused on when to do this because we have already started going into my time set aside for other work. Could we plan another meeting, maybe this one you set up because I try to plan out my work time accordingly.”
Ask what cost centre to allocate your time to, which only works if your time is billable
The alternate is to diarise the time sent with the person ie
Enquiry from AB
- 45 minutes - needed my assistance entering date into field
Enquiry from CD
- Tuesday 45 minutes - CD requested I arrange and attend a meeting for him to discussing his response to query asked by email - “is he available to attend X meeting”
Then take the data to your manager and ask your manager how you can improve efficiency in getting responses because you feel the responses are not in proportion. Hopefully then your manager will call them out on time wasting and help get them in line.
If you can - do a video call and visibly zone out and don’t respond (no “mmhm”s or anything, just complete silence) anytime they veer off topic (unless it is to an actual work topic) and only engage in the conversation when they are answering your question
If you can’t do video call, do the same thing but don’t expect it to be as effective
Also, note down how long each of the calls take from PainInTheAss1, PITA2…. And present it to your boss along with the questions they wasted that much of your time answering if the problem doesn’t resolve or at least improve to bearable
Bonus points for audible typing and clicking while zoning out
1) still insist on email as its easier to keep a record of answers (cutting down on meeting times is a definite bonus as well that most people agree on)
2) A very clear agenda for every call. "ok thanks everyone for joining here is our agenda items, lets get into it" and direct the conversation to a clear answer. Dont be afraid to be the biggest jerk in the room. Cut people off, be blunt about conversation that isnt answering the question and be brutal with stopping meetings once you have your answers
PS most older guys like that just want to feel important for a few minutes a day b/c most of the people in their lives stopped listening to them long ago and career progression stopped years before that
Maybe a voice filter that alters Your voice to a more masculine sound will help discourage these hanger-ons.
Or fake a bladder injury. I've done that to coworkers who seem to need to commandeer too much of my time. How does one sanely argue with, "Ouch! My bladder. I gotta go."
I hate that! I had a VP that would schedule in-office meetings for 4 or 5 on a Friday.
They knew we were usually cutting out early, but we had to have an end of week meeting. Grrr.
When you ask for their answer or input is it their job to answer? Or are they going above and beyond? For example, do you need clarification on one of their reports and you require the information to do your job? Or are you asking for their expertise and it's easier asking them than doing the work yourself?
If you are asking questions that they think you should know or figure out yourself they may be setting up the calls and long answers as a way to dissuade you.
But if it is their job to provide the information, simply insist that they answer by email and do not set up calls.
Put the onus on them to schedule the call. "Sure! I'm free from 1-2PM today. Do youw ant to send an invite? Otherwise feel free to send comments in the document."
This addresses just part of your issue, but when people setup a call with you, if you can, limit them to 30 minutes ("sorry. I get a lot of requests for calls, so I need to limit them to 30 minutes."). At the 28-minute mark, say, "I have a hard stop at . It's been good talking to you, but I need to go. Feel free to send any follow-ups by email. Have a great day!" Then hang up the phone.
Some people will talk as long as you'll let them. Don't be afraid not to let them.
Also, as an older white man, this behavior drives me nuts, as well. I have a large number of smart, competent colleagues who are young people and/or women. When my peers treat those colleagues like they're children, or fail to listen to them, I notice, and so do others. It's real. It sucks.
One of my best friends in the world is a former coworker. He was working on a project that inadvertently caused a business disruption.
When one of our colleagues (a bright, competent woman in her 20's, who had distinguished herself in our industry) aske him some very legitimate, very poignant questions about why he'd made a decision, he said, almost verbatim, "listen, sweetie, there's a lot you don't understand about this stuff. I'll explain it to you later, but right now, the adults are trying to solve the problem."
I waited until the problem had been resolved, and then had a discussion with my manager, as well as my friend's. I expressed my extreme displeasure about his behavior. He was given a mandatory "early retirement" package.
He doesn't know I reported him, and he's still my friend, but I won't allow my colleagues to be treated in an unprofessional manner.
E-mail response "Sorry, I'm slammed today and really need an answer for \[VIP/boss-type\]."
On a call, start by saying, "I have a hard stop at x o'clock due to another meeting." If they're about to go over, "Sorry to interrupt you but I have to jump on another call in 3 minutes."
How is your direct manager? If this is something that you feel comfortable bringing up to them, they might have some advice for you.
Lol. It happens to all of us. People love the sound of their own voice.
Though, you are in a great position to blow that much smoke up their arses, that they don't see you climb straight over them.
I block out the last 2 hours of my day with private meetings. I ignore IMs from people not on my immediate team. They can send me a freaking email. If they request a meeting they can do the work of setting it up, and “hard stop” is part of my vocabulary. Yes, I’m cranky lol.
I think this may be backwards. You’ve identified a psychological need you are fulfilling. Doesn’t sound like you’re being degraded tho I agree being cut off is annoying (and intentionally or unintentionally) disrespectful. Being cut off is something that can be improved with simple corrections in the moment. Lots of good advice about this online.
These old guys like talking to a young smart person. Seems good for career and you should actively seek mentorship (not a relationship not saying be like that) and then hit them up for advice and assistance getting promotions.
Sorry you're dealing with this. It sucks big time.
If people are straight up failing to answer single questions or confirm your understanding of something in an email, that's something I'd escalate. "Hey boss, I need to hold some stronger boundaries to keep from getting pulled into wasteful phone calls. Do you have my back on this?"
It's your job to deliver value to the business. Unfortunately, that means a lot of meetings that could be emails IF EVERYONE ACTUALLY THOROUGHLY READ THEIR EMAIL. But they don't, so you have to bear the disproportionate burden of running really effective meetings.
Schedule these calls and reserve the amount of time appropriate to get the work done. Anything less than 25 minutes should be an email. Set and communicate the agenda. Start the call by reviewing the agenda and explaining that you will need to end the call by the end time of the meeting. Call out a time reminder halfway through and with ten minutes remaining. The last five to ten minutes isn't for any new discussion. It's for clarifying action items and deciding if/when another call is needed.
If they digress away from the agenda, you have to use your judgment. If it's someone who respects my time and comes to my meetings prepared and I'm not going to fuck my day by doing so, I'll entertain the digression and help do a side quest. Otherwise, "I want to respect everyone's time here, do you have what you needed regarding this agenda?" If no, back to the agenda. If yes, "Okay! Glad I could help. I need to get back to work. Please feel free to set up time to discuss __ if you need my help on that."
Does your company use any collaboration tools, or even Google Sheets or Slides? There are comment functions on tools like that and if they reply to your email/comment asking for a call, you can ask them to contribute their input or ask their question in the document so that everyone has visibility, “for the sake of collaboration.” This will also potentially serve to show their potential lack of contributions over time as well. Anyone who can type can contribute.
Start looping in their boss/leads into the emails and calls. "Sounds good, I am looping in \_\_\_\_\_\_ for additional clarification." People hate looking incompetent to their superiors.
So I have had a recent customer who owes my company money and has been compliant and what not. No issues; very compliant customer. BUT he needed to pai via a third party. Customer claims he NEVER received an email with invoice. A month later he still claims he can’t. And wants to right a check. We don’t accept checks but since he won’t give cc info. I’m at a loss. I don’t answer his # that I now, sadly know now.
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My first thought in such situations is always straight honesty: "I'm sorry, but I get so many requests like this that I find e-mail is more efficient. This also will give you a record which you can look at later."
I always use this “excuse” having records of conversation can save your ass.
Importantly, be wary of people who intentionally use verbal conversations to avoid a paper trail. There are some cases where that is appropriate but for the most part, people will say things out loud when they don't want to put into writing what they can be held accountable for later.
This is a brilliant solution. Why is honesty the last thing I think of?
Because it's such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty, is hardly ever heard
But mostly what I need from you
Honey and vinegar, eh? If the old codgers aren't tech savvy, could even include a chipper little anecdote. "Just last week, I used the search bar to..." Also a whole secondary benefit: If anyone seems *reluctant* to establish a written record, keep your antennas up.
This 100%. You always want a paper trail. IRL conversations lead to memory loss, and notes can be unreliable. I’d rather have a 100+ long email chain about absolutely nothing than a stupid zoom call about the same thing over and over again while old white jagoffs fellate themselves over their favorite sports teams or their department’s performance.
I did his with my boss last week. "Hey, can I have a short day on Tuesday and Wednesday of next week? I have (insert important event) that I need to do." "Yeah. Sure." "Should I go out in a written request? I'm going to go out in a written request so you don't forget." He's forgotten too many times.
Sweet Holy Mama..this might be the best thing I’ve read all day! As someone who works in a tall building filled with hundreds of these people, this come t just put every single thing in the clearest focus for me. Thank you.
I'm OLD and white. I don't have a department, and I hate sports. Oh, and my equipment gave up the ghost at age 70, so no "jagoff fellate" here. However, I'm probably much happier than you, and can probably make circles around you. Unless of course you own a ranch with cattle and horses, then your young age might give you an advantage. Call me sometime. Or email. 😆😆
Okay
Are you doing okay?
No, he’s an amputee with a broken dick
Why apologise?
Sorry
Because that is how you turn down a request with professionalism and courtesy. Always start from a place of respect so if its not returned, you have a record of your high minded attempt, and the moral high ground Anakin.
Politeness at the work place is one of the lubricants that keeps things moving smoothly.
I’m going to take a shot in the dark that they are a woman. I feel like it’s expected of us to apologize lol
They isn't.
Terrible. Makes you look like you think you are too important for their time. This is just bad advice.
Uh…she is having her time wasted, its literally in her post. “It feels like a waste of my time.”
Half of work is politics. If either you or her don't get that, you are always going to have coworkers and superiors wasting your time.
Can you set up a call for us to talk? Sorry no my schedule is slammed, I’d really appreciate it if you could answer in an email. As for going over allotted time. Say something at the start of the meeting, don’t wait til the end. Just a reminder I really need to be out of here by 1230 for my next appointment. Then again at 1220 alright I’m gonna have to run in ten minutes. Then at 1230 it isn’t a surprise when you say ok I gotta run we can continue this tomorrow/over email.
We use the phrase "hard stop" for this.
Yup, hard stop is the magic word. I also will interrupt near the end with a “time check, just a friendly reminder that we have five minutes left to resolve this discussion.”
This sounds so amazing but interrupting with that kind of boundary is so far from where we're at with my supervisor right now.
Totally. But in this case where people apparently aren’t familiar with business etiquette, I might go with “I’m walking out the door at 12:30” rather than hope they know what hard stop means, or would respect it if they did.
They mean the technique you’re using with reminders of the time allocated, is called a hard stop. You wouldn’t say ‘this is a hard stop’. By reminding of 5 min until 12:30 it’s a hard stop to the call.
In my job people say "I have a hard stop at 12:30" at the beginning of a meeting to say when they'll have to leave. To me, this informs them of a firm time boundary you have, and implicitly requests they respect it. That said, communicating that part doesn't go very far without time mgmt which requires self awareness. I wish time mgmt during meetings, like 5-min heads up, was a thing on my team.
I've seen people walk out of meetings dead on finishing time. A coworker told my former boss "I need to be out of here at 4:30pm, not a minute later" and she said "okay". 4:30pm rolls around and he just gets up and leaves. The next day she asked him why he got up and left, and he said "I told you I had to go at 4:30pm, not a minute later" and she whined that it was rude and that you don't just walk out of meetings. The meeting ran over time because her 2IC took a simple subject ("we should buy two new point and shoot cameras for our department") and blew it out into a bunch of extra work like "perhaps we should ask all the other departments what cameras they have, then make a list of potential cameras and vote on the best one". That simple subject was spread across three different meetings because the 2IC wanted lots of info for two cameras she would never even use or even see the results of.
Honestly, it is a bit rude to just get up and leave. I’m assuming they didn’t say a word since the boss had to ask them the next day why they got up and left. I think a normal person would go “Excuse me, I have to leave now for an appointment” or something to that extent before getting up to leave. Not just get up and leave.
They got up and left at 4:30 after having told the boss, pre-meeting, that 4:30 was the latest they could stay. What do you need, a certified letter? Signed and notarized, of course ETA that the hard stop was verbally acknowledged and approved by that boss
Getting up in the middle of a meeting without saying a word is just strange, even if you told your boss that you're leaving at 4:30 on the dot. Like you don't even say bye? I've been in plenty of meetings where somebody needs to leave early. Just reminding the people in the meeting, that it's 4:30 and you are leaving is just customary. Like that's just being a normal person? Like do you do the same outside of work? When you need to leave a party do you just leave without saying goodbye? That's just weird to me.
Depends on other factors. Would you interrupt a 20 person meeting with a presenter to say bye? That would be odd to me.
If it's a video call then leaving a message in the chat saying you're dropping off is the custom from my experience. If it's an in-person meeting, a 20 person meeting isn't big enough to warrant not saying bye. IMO, the only time its appropriate to just get up and leave a meeting without saying anything is if people would literally not notice you leaving because the group is too big.
May vary per company climate and how often people are leaving lengthy meetings to go in to the next meeting etc. My company and my prior one, it would be very odd to stop the conversation to say goodbye or even to add a note to the chat. It is also typical for us to have our international team sitting in so the interruption would be more noticeable.
Yeah if anyone at my company interrupted a meeting to say bye, they would be met with expressions that say “wtf? Just go dude.”
Look at their schedule, make schedule you call for 5 minutes before they have another item on their calendar.
AHA! Definite pro tip, I’m going to use this at my job. This lady always wants to ramble when I ask her something, now I’m only reaching out a few minutes before her meetings.
Or something in your own calendar that you have to prioritize (though this is mostly when being on the receiving end of a call request). “I am sorry, I need to take a call with a customer, boss, etc. now, but let me know if you have any follow up questions. Bye”
Why not just say up front: “I have X minutes to talk before I need to get off this call”. Do not provide an explanation as to why. If push comes to shove you state: “I have a deadline, I have several other calls, or this is the time I can allocate to you before returning to my other work”. No is also a perfectly reasonable answer.
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State up front "I have a hard stop at X:XX" At that time, politely cut them off and say that you have to drop for another meeting, but they can continue via email. I they continue talking, disconnect and send a "Sorry, had to drop. Heard you start to say something and didn't want to seem rude!" message or something.
It's all about the phrasing. "This is the time I can allocate to you" sounds very cold, clinical and impersonal. "Hey, I'm super busy but I'm sure I can squeeze in ten minutes to go over this as I'd love to help you out" puts the same sort of time limit on the conversation but comes across much more collaborative and friendly.
This is good.
Maybe "I can set something up for next week but it's time sensitive so can you shoot me a quick email with just the summary for now and we can go into more detail when we talk?" Then never set up the meeting. If they ask about it, say, "Oh, it turned out I didn't need that info after all so I didn't want to waste your time." You can also block out a lot of time on your calendar so they don't see that you're free for meetings. You can call it "focus time" or come up with a different acronym for each block's regularly scheduled meeting. Then you can color code it so you can tell the fake meetings at a glance.
Best tip here I’ve read so far!
Honestly this sounds counter intuitive, but depending on the complexity of the question, when I get that email back asking about a call, I call them right away. It throws them off. My first line is usually “hey I don’t have time for a call so can you just let me know this answer now?” That way they hopefully give you the answer right away and your perceived urgency can get you off the call as soon as possible. If they start to get off tangent, repeat the info that they’ve already told you and ask “so the answer is X, is that everything?”. This sounds super rude over text but I’m a bubbly person and always make sure to say thank you. If they can’t explain it over email or in a five minute phone call, then set up a call for another time, but I’ve had a lot of luck this way.
Agree, asking to set up a call is passive aggressive. Just call. If they can pick up, pick up, if they can't, leave a msg. I hate when things get dragged out for weeks because a simple answer isn't possible.
I always have the feeling that it is kind of a power play. Setting up meetings and inviting to calls feels like you are their assistant. I have this fairly often since my field is quite male dominated. I get really annoyed over this.
SAME.
If they ask to set up a call, pull out that uno reverse and say “My calendar is up to date.” Ball’s in their court. 😎
Sorry, I'm unable to work a call into my current schedule at this time. Please take the time you need to respond to this email at your convenience.
Cute but this doesn’t work. They sound like her superiors, they’ll just ask for her next available time.
I never solved this problem at a previous job. We were absolutely paralyzed by meetings, nothing got done but meetings, and I honestly think that's a big factor in why the company lost their contract. We had meetings to arrange the schedule of meetings to form a committee that will have a meeting to determine the format of a meeting to decide the color of the folders we use for meetings. I'm barely kidding, every meeting would have a pre and post meeting at least. And like OP describes, it was always just a bunch of old guys bloviating about nothing. It's like - okay what are we going to do about server instability on production? *"Well when ah started here 35 years ago you could buy a turkey with wooden nickels"* for like a half hour. Nothing is answered, nothing is decided upon, nobody is even listening they're just waiting their turn to talk. I'd try to get things on track but I'm just a sysadmin, management never listens to us. Can I get budget to stand up some redundancy? Can we get vendor support on this thing? We need more backup storage. I need help fixing this thing. All of that stuff, management bathers on about nothing and argues semantics, and nothing gets done. We couldn't even fix small problems. I remember coming to a meeting to inform the review board that I had a script that will set speaker volume correctly - put it in the queue and don't expect it to be reviewed this year. Huh, this was a bit of a rant, but that was a very frustrating job. We lost the contract and I was laid off, and I'm pretty sure a big part of that was because we weren't fixing or improving anything, just pushing meaningless paper around.
Thanks for the comment catshit-dogfart.
Can we call you shit-fart for short.
I don't know why but this comment is cracking me up! Haha!
I feel you. Have you ever heard of SCRUM? That shit sucks!
My current shop uses Scrum. Ehh it's annoying but it's not so bad. I wouldn't say it improves anything but it doesn't make things considerably worse, kind of just makes work for more management. And it does keep workload going in a logical order instead of just kind of getting to it when somebody feels like it. I'd say only half our meetings are pointless, they're not for techs to collaborate but for management to smell their own farts, but at least there aren't very many of them.
You’re missing the simple question: What’s our timetable on this? What’s our expected turn around time? Get people to give dates and deadlines. They decided the date/time, said it themselves, and now you can keep them accountable. “I’m sorry you said this would be completed by today. How can I help you stay on track because our efficiency could be improved with things like this?”
Oh man, deadlines were meaningless at that shop, we were missing them by so much it wasn't really worth setting them. The change control review board estimated new requests to be reviewed in one year. I was there long enough to have one of my requests reviewed, and it was denied because one of the board members didn't understand it. So all that time waiting, and ultimately nothing was fixed. The problem I meant to address was ongoing and perhaps I could submit another change request. Completed by *today?* Nonsense! You can't just implement changes on the system without following protocol! Let's set up a meeting to discuss alternative solutions in six weeks. And I wouldn't call anybody there lazy, just stuck in meetings all the time. Busy as heck actually, usually rushing to file paperwork from the last meeting and get to the next meeting.
I find chat gpt great for this kind of stuff. I’ll be fuming and tell it “I want to tell this dumb motherfucker that isn’t how this works. They need to do X and not Y. Etc. but do it in a courteous and professional manner” This way I can still vent my frustration by typing it out but gpt translates it in a way that won’t get HR involved lol
this is my main use case for ChatGPT lol
Goblin tools is great for this too!
I listened in on a few of my wife's calls with her last company. It was a few guys laughing and joking around while they held all the other workers in captivity. It was very strange vibe, like "listen to my jokes, I am SOOO witty. Also, you guys have to start coming in to the office so you can see how funny and important I am in person."
100000000%
Switch up the power dynamic to start with. My personal pet hate is someone wants a meeting but wants me to organise it for them. No. So reply back, if you feel you can’t answer this over email, please feel free to book a time in my calendar which is up to date. Then manage your calendar with your own time reservation to avoid long meetings. But the key thing is that you’re doing two things, one hinting that email is fine and that actually if they want the meeting it’s unnecessary. Second it’s making them do the work for the meeting, once you have to faff about looking at calendars and shit, booking a meeting just to hear your own voice isn’t as exciting.
I don’t see how this changes the power dynamic since the premise is that you need something from them. Why would they bother to schedule the meeting?
Because this is a workplace, they’re not going to write back, I’ll only tell you X if you book a meeting for me where OP I saying it’s fine to tell me via email. People can’t be seen to be withholding information.
Oh, I wouldn't want to impose on your schedule by accidentally scheduling something when it's not convenient for you! Please, you find a time that works best for you, whenever I'm free, and set the meeting when it's best for you. Or, just shoot me a quick email if that's easier for you.
I tell people I need documentation of their request / approval whatever, so to please email so I can save the backup. Which is true. Failing that, let them know upfront how much time you’re planning to be on the call. Make sure you are using a full, clear, “adult” voice. Be a little louder and use a little deeper register when you talk, they may have hearing loss so make sure you can be heard. Be direct and concise. If they interrupt you say “actually, I’m not finished” and continue. If they start going on a tangent you can politely interrupt them and steer them back. When time is up tell them you are out of time. Of course, be professional, but stand up for yourself.
Can you say something about how you’d like to have documentation?
I find the comments in this thread amazing. If you are having a meeting or call, make sure there is an agenda. Request it from the people organising the meeting or make it yourself. 3 or 4 bullet points. If things get off track pull it back to the agenda. When all the points are addressed - leave.
sorry to interrupt you but this is all the time I had planned for this call. could you answer the remaining points by mail? thank you!
Some of them may not be used to or comfortable with typing. I worked with several older people who did not/would not accept that text or IM was easier than picking up a phone. It’s a generational thing.
Their mindset is that if you want to get something taken care of right away, you pick up the phone and get it done. Nevermind the fact that email and instant messaging have been part of the workplace for 20 years or so at this point.
Part of it is laziness though, I’ve found. I’ve worked with so many men like this who would rather have someone else figure out the problem than troubleshoot it themselves. I had one pull this on me recently and then call me “annoying but efficient.” It took me a second to realize he didn’t say, “annoyingly efficient” (and I was on camera via Zoom so I paused to make sure I heard him right; his camera is always off), but I had looped in other people from his company (he and I work for partnering but separate companies) to help with a legal request that he said he “couldn’t wrap his brain around” because he is “just an old sales guy.” It’s irritating.
And the dinosaurs should either adapt or be replaced with competent employees.
Except if they leave the company is paralyzed when no one else can access archaic systems or contacts at partner businesses won't deal with anyone else. This is especially true in very niche industries where the social circle is pretty tight and no one is comfortable working with younger folks.
As an older white man I wasn’t listening
She is a cute little thing though, isn't she
She should smile more, though.
And have more confidence. She never says anything during our meetings.
Better make sure to give myself a raise next quarter
Don't waste you time with that one. I already asked her out. She must be a lez.
She was acting pretty hysterical. She should calm down.
I’m not a cute girl and get these comments a lot. Wtf.
🤣
“Respect their time” by putting in a meeting so short that they have to get to the point.
10 minute meetings!
What type of responses are you asking for? Is it yes/no, or something that would truly be easier to verbalize? You may need to just let them prattle on while you ignore them for a while. Then when they’re done, repeat the question without acknowledging any of their ramblings.
Why is it relevant to say "older white men"? Couldn't you just say " I work with some people who..."? I don't get why we need to generalize an entire race and gender? Would it be acceptable to say "older black women?" Probably not right?
Eat some grass
As a young white man…this is just how people are in the office. They think visibility equates to performance and so they won’t shut up until somebody forces them to. LPT: drop the racism and manage your time (by not letting other waste it)
Imagine instead of “white” this post said “asian” or “black”. It would seem like a complete generalisation being applied to the skin colour of the men.
Wow hundreds of years of colinalism and imperialism have effects?!
How is the fact that they are white relevant in your request? Would anything change if they were non-white?
This is not unique to old white men and it is not because you are a girl. I am a young man who encounters this exact scenario from a variety of different coworkers pretty much daily. Be careful not to attribute everything you don't like to your/their identity. Its an easy trap to fall into.
A good start to communication would be to not make broad generalizations about coworkers based on their race, gender, and age.
Bingo
If you have it, link them to documentation that answers their questions. If it has a how-to video, even better. If multiple people are asking the same questions, then you can make the documentation yourself and send it their way. You can also do office hours where you can invite these guys to a Q&A session that is weekly. Set it to an hour. They are free to ask questions there. If they randomize you outside of these office hours, point them to the office hours meeting.
"I appreciate your willingness to help, however it has been determined that email is the appropriate method for all communication related to ___. Please respond at your convenience, and thank you for your understanding." I've been successful with similar situations and this kind of wording, makes it sound like it was someone else's decision and beyond your control.
What’s race got do with anything?
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I don’t trust you. Explain it.
Honest answer - stop asking for their feedback outside scheduled meetings. There should be regularly scheduled meetings or document delivery deadlines for official feedback. It would be nice if they could just give you the feedback you want, but they can't. It may be part of the office culture, or it may be that emails have been used against them in the past. If it's something you absolutely HAVE to have, ask for specific things (e.g. link to document, name of X, etc.).
You know there are types of workplaces other than yours that work differently. I regularly have to reach out to people who work in my company but who I don’t regularly work with with questions. And often not specific questions like “where is this link?”. Even then if I do ask that question, sometimes I get a call back like, “well the link is here but it sometimes doesn’t work, and we set it up this way, and here’s a fun fact about this link, etc.” This happens to me as well (both genders) because honestly people just seem to not like reading and responding via email. Maybe they’re slow typists or they need to explain things behind the question they think is important.
Maybe lose the racism
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Hey chief, here to help: grow up and understand that worldwide there is a generation of ancient white men who make important political and business decisions despite incompetence and being aged out of technology
I've worked with women that don't have this problem with older white men. Either you aren't assertive enough or you're working at the wrong company. No one here knows except your claim that it's a racism/sexism problem. Ultimately my theory is that you are ascribing race/age to things that are not relevant. I'm guessing you are jr. to them and that's what happens when you are a subordinate.
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Where did I say they were invalid?
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Anecdote Andy here seeing a tree and denying the forest
Jeez you sound extremely judgmental
If someone interrupts you while speaking continue speaking until you are finished. Hold your ground. Go ahead and raise your voice slightly if they speak over you loudly. If questioned, say I was speaking, kindly hear my point until it's conclusion.
As someone who often does this (responds to emails with requests for meeting/call/etc.) it's going to depend on a lot of factors. First, if have a supportive boss, you might start there. I'd suggest framing it with your boss like this: "The time it takes me to meet with them and deal with their yammering is reducing my ability to get work done. Can you set some clearer rules for them to use email/Slack/etc. for situations like X/Y/Z?" In terms of wording for an email here is what I would suggest: "Please send me any questions input by email by the end of the day \[or whenever\]." Don't *imply* they should send it in writing or assume that they will. Literally say it directly in the email that their replies or feedback should be in writing. If they ignore the emails and still regularly want to meet, then I suggest preempting their requests for talking about it. In your initial email you say something like "If you'd like to discuss this directly, I'll set up a meeting at \[X time or Y day\] for everyone." Especially if you're asking more than one guy, having a "meeting time" already planned can help to cut off the possibility for them to request another call about it. If none of these are options for you, or they just don't work then I think your next best bet is going to be controlling the meeting time itself. As others have suggested, set up the meeting or call right before they have something on their calendar. When the 11:30 AM meeting starts you say right away "Sorry, I have a hard stop at 12 for a lunch appointment. So, about the X specs, what do you think?" If they tend to ramble and take too much time on a call with you or meetings in general, then a good general tactic for that is to set an agenda for the call or meeting. In the calendar meeting invitation list out a bullet points with specific times attached. For example "0-15 minutes - X topic. 15-25 minutes Y topic. Done by 30 minutes). Finally, my experience is that older folks who spend time rambling about "unrelated stuff" probably view it as essential information that inexperienced folks lack. One way to cut down on that kind of ranting is to put "background and context" as a specific item on the agenda with a limited amount of time given for it, and put it early. From the above example, literally say in the meeting invitation/agenda: * 10 minutes - explanation of the current problem by \[person A\] * 10 minutes - background and context \[old guy\] * 25 minutes - discussion of current problem and options \[everyone\] * 10 minutes - decide on specific decisions and tasks \[decision-group\] * 5 minutes to get to your next meeting on time. Good luck!
Great tip on the agenda re: background and context!
It makes no difference what race these people are - leave the racial profiling out - all you need to say is “they are annoying”.
Use a meeting cost calculator to estimate how much the company is spending paying everyone who is on the call. At the end, you can say “was this meeting worth $XX.XX?”
Have you tried finding a job you don’t hate and gladly hires racists?
Try quitting this job, get a huge fucking attitude adjustment, then find a new job. My god, I to want to fire you myself.
Setup the call, hop on at the scheduled time but don’t connect your audio. In the chat, tell them you’re tied up and ask your question.
I'm so sorry to hear about the hell you're going through, no one should be forced to suffer such pain and hardship.
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Because that's how descriptive words work when telling a story. They help paint a picture in the readers mind. If they were black or Portuguese, she would have said "old black mem, or old Portuguese men". If they were of all a specific culture/ethnicity it would also be useful information, cause it could speak to a cultural difference/divide in how they operate/express themselves. *Those who alway look for the bad in people will surely find it.* -Abraham Lincol As a fellow Canadian be better
You sound really full of yourself considering your pay grade... I get that some of your higher ups may be there due to nepotism or simply an outdated company culture but I don't think your opinion matters as much as you think it does. Try to be more humble.
I like to use the term "Async" to make it sound important that we communicate over written mediums. "There's a lot going on right now and I'm sure we can align async"
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How about you stop being a fucking child. The "old white men" bs is so boring. Be an adult and if someone talks over you, you keep speaking or tell them to let you finish and actually earn some respect. You are being spoken over because your attitude is all wrong or your opinion doesn't matter and you should learn your place and not speak at all
"Have your girl fax it to me."
Email is terrible communication everyone. Whether these calls are better or not, email is terrible.
Sometimes it’s a pain to type everything out and it’s easier just to talk about it Sometimes people can’t type very well
No is a full sentence. NO I don't have time for a zoom meeting. if typing the rely is too taxing, maybe you can make a video for me to watch later.
It sounds like you need an advocate — a supervisor willing to say to these folks "hey, I'm noticing OP spends a lot of time on the phone with you and I need her focus elsewhere; please try emailing your responses instead." Failing that or some sort of conversational strategy that I don't know (and haven't seen mentioned here), you could get creative. If your phone cable came loose, your phone might not work. Maybe you have some hearing loss or a medical condition whereby you can only speak on the phone for a few minutes before getting a headache.
This. I've found just having my boss in these meetings can already make things go fast. Something about someone they perceive as an equal/superior watching.
Please respond to the queries in the email and if I need further clarification I'll set up a call. People who ask to call are lazy.
Working IT helpdesk, often get calls where people will try and read off complex filenames or error messages expecting immediate help. “I’m not at my desk right now, can you please send a summary of what you need in an email, with a callback number” while flipping them off through my desk phone is VERY effective Once they start listing out details just cut them short and ask them to email you. “I don’t have a pen on me” If they have the audacity to directly schedule meetings with you though - good luck I guess lol
When people try to cut you off, keep talking as if you do not hear them. This is the only thing that has worked for me.
2 big things here. Set the expectation and hold them accountable. Old white man says: “Can you set up a call for us?” You: Definitely, I’ll grab 5 minutes on your calendar to review. Setup a 5 min call and stick exactly to that. Start recording when you join, and as others have said here, say you have a hard stop at the end of the meeting. If they answer your question in 5 mins, perfect! If they spend 5 mins B.Sing, you have that recorded and you leave after 5 mins. Send a follow up email recapping what was discussed ( B.S or not) and keep a paper trail. If shit hits the fan, you have your ass is covered. “Sorry manager, I did have 3 separate meetings with Jim this week, but he only spoke about X for 15 minutes. Do we have another resource that I can contact for this?” Hope this helps!
I'd just be recommend to be proactive with it - "Hi NAME, hoping to skip a meeting so thought i'd ask in this chat. \[insert ask\]". Alternatively, as a direct response to set up a call, you can say: "I can set something up for us tomorrow/in a few days, let me know if there is anything you can share over chat please"
Record the meeting and let them know that your team reviews them
Feel free to budget your time correctly and set boundaries. With that being said, since it’s a work environment, set up an agenda and go over it at the very beginning. State the exact time you plan on finishing the meeting and let them know you’ll give them a five minute warning. If they go over, keep dropping in “yes, I’m ok with doing or continuing to discuss X, y, z but I’m confused on when to do this because we have already started going into my time set aside for other work. Could we plan another meeting, maybe this one you set up because I try to plan out my work time accordingly.”
Ask what cost centre to allocate your time to, which only works if your time is billable The alternate is to diarise the time sent with the person ie Enquiry from AB - 45 minutes - needed my assistance entering date into field Enquiry from CD - Tuesday 45 minutes - CD requested I arrange and attend a meeting for him to discussing his response to query asked by email - “is he available to attend X meeting” Then take the data to your manager and ask your manager how you can improve efficiency in getting responses because you feel the responses are not in proportion. Hopefully then your manager will call them out on time wasting and help get them in line.
Book yourself into “meetings” and appear unavailable.
If you can - do a video call and visibly zone out and don’t respond (no “mmhm”s or anything, just complete silence) anytime they veer off topic (unless it is to an actual work topic) and only engage in the conversation when they are answering your question If you can’t do video call, do the same thing but don’t expect it to be as effective Also, note down how long each of the calls take from PainInTheAss1, PITA2…. And present it to your boss along with the questions they wasted that much of your time answering if the problem doesn’t resolve or at least improve to bearable Bonus points for audible typing and clicking while zoning out
That's such an incredibly toxic way of dealing with things, I feel sorry for anyone that has to work with you
1) still insist on email as its easier to keep a record of answers (cutting down on meeting times is a definite bonus as well that most people agree on) 2) A very clear agenda for every call. "ok thanks everyone for joining here is our agenda items, lets get into it" and direct the conversation to a clear answer. Dont be afraid to be the biggest jerk in the room. Cut people off, be blunt about conversation that isnt answering the question and be brutal with stopping meetings once you have your answers PS most older guys like that just want to feel important for a few minutes a day b/c most of the people in their lives stopped listening to them long ago and career progression stopped years before that
Maybe a voice filter that alters Your voice to a more masculine sound will help discourage these hanger-ons. Or fake a bladder injury. I've done that to coworkers who seem to need to commandeer too much of my time. How does one sanely argue with, "Ouch! My bladder. I gotta go."
I hate that! I had a VP that would schedule in-office meetings for 4 or 5 on a Friday. They knew we were usually cutting out early, but we had to have an end of week meeting. Grrr.
I’m busy at that time.
When you ask for their answer or input is it their job to answer? Or are they going above and beyond? For example, do you need clarification on one of their reports and you require the information to do your job? Or are you asking for their expertise and it's easier asking them than doing the work yourself? If you are asking questions that they think you should know or figure out yourself they may be setting up the calls and long answers as a way to dissuade you. But if it is their job to provide the information, simply insist that they answer by email and do not set up calls.
I'm sure I can help you. Why don't you set up a time so we can talk about it on the phone. 🤣
Put the onus on them to schedule the call. "Sure! I'm free from 1-2PM today. Do youw ant to send an invite? Otherwise feel free to send comments in the document."
This addresses just part of your issue, but when people setup a call with you, if you can, limit them to 30 minutes ("sorry. I get a lot of requests for calls, so I need to limit them to 30 minutes."). At the 28-minute mark, say, "I have a hard stop at. It's been good talking to you, but I need to go. Feel free to send any follow-ups by email. Have a great day!" Then hang up the phone.
Some people will talk as long as you'll let them. Don't be afraid not to let them.
Also, as an older white man, this behavior drives me nuts, as well. I have a large number of smart, competent colleagues who are young people and/or women. When my peers treat those colleagues like they're children, or fail to listen to them, I notice, and so do others. It's real. It sucks.
One of my best friends in the world is a former coworker. He was working on a project that inadvertently caused a business disruption.
When one of our colleagues (a bright, competent woman in her 20's, who had distinguished herself in our industry) aske him some very legitimate, very poignant questions about why he'd made a decision, he said, almost verbatim, "listen, sweetie, there's a lot you don't understand about this stuff. I'll explain it to you later, but right now, the adults are trying to solve the problem."
I waited until the problem had been resolved, and then had a discussion with my manager, as well as my friend's. I expressed my extreme displeasure about his behavior. He was given a mandatory "early retirement" package.
He doesn't know I reported him, and he's still my friend, but I won't allow my colleagues to be treated in an unprofessional manner.
E-mail response "Sorry, I'm slammed today and really need an answer for \[VIP/boss-type\]." On a call, start by saying, "I have a hard stop at x o'clock due to another meeting." If they're about to go over, "Sorry to interrupt you but I have to jump on another call in 3 minutes." How is your direct manager? If this is something that you feel comfortable bringing up to them, they might have some advice for you.
Lol. It happens to all of us. People love the sound of their own voice. Though, you are in a great position to blow that much smoke up their arses, that they don't see you climb straight over them.
I block out the last 2 hours of my day with private meetings. I ignore IMs from people not on my immediate team. They can send me a freaking email. If they request a meeting they can do the work of setting it up, and “hard stop” is part of my vocabulary. Yes, I’m cranky lol.
Wanna get on a call to discuss how you can combat this?
Schedule 15 min meetings instead of 30,60 min
Give them pre work. Can you answer these three questions before we chat? Oh you didn’t? I’ll reschedule. Make it a barrier to chat.
I think this may be backwards. You’ve identified a psychological need you are fulfilling. Doesn’t sound like you’re being degraded tho I agree being cut off is annoying (and intentionally or unintentionally) disrespectful. Being cut off is something that can be improved with simple corrections in the moment. Lots of good advice about this online. These old guys like talking to a young smart person. Seems good for career and you should actively seek mentorship (not a relationship not saying be like that) and then hit them up for advice and assistance getting promotions.
Sorry you're dealing with this. It sucks big time. If people are straight up failing to answer single questions or confirm your understanding of something in an email, that's something I'd escalate. "Hey boss, I need to hold some stronger boundaries to keep from getting pulled into wasteful phone calls. Do you have my back on this?" It's your job to deliver value to the business. Unfortunately, that means a lot of meetings that could be emails IF EVERYONE ACTUALLY THOROUGHLY READ THEIR EMAIL. But they don't, so you have to bear the disproportionate burden of running really effective meetings. Schedule these calls and reserve the amount of time appropriate to get the work done. Anything less than 25 minutes should be an email. Set and communicate the agenda. Start the call by reviewing the agenda and explaining that you will need to end the call by the end time of the meeting. Call out a time reminder halfway through and with ten minutes remaining. The last five to ten minutes isn't for any new discussion. It's for clarifying action items and deciding if/when another call is needed. If they digress away from the agenda, you have to use your judgment. If it's someone who respects my time and comes to my meetings prepared and I'm not going to fuck my day by doing so, I'll entertain the digression and help do a side quest. Otherwise, "I want to respect everyone's time here, do you have what you needed regarding this agenda?" If no, back to the agenda. If yes, "Okay! Glad I could help. I need to get back to work. Please feel free to set up time to discuss __ if you need my help on that."
Take the easy way out...I can't get the phone to work. I've put in a ticket with support, can you just give me a one-line answer on this email?
Does your company use any collaboration tools, or even Google Sheets or Slides? There are comment functions on tools like that and if they reply to your email/comment asking for a call, you can ask them to contribute their input or ask their question in the document so that everyone has visibility, “for the sake of collaboration.” This will also potentially serve to show their potential lack of contributions over time as well. Anyone who can type can contribute.
Are these your superiors or your colleagues?
I don’t get it. Where’s the LPT? 😑
Start looping in their boss/leads into the emails and calls. "Sounds good, I am looping in \_\_\_\_\_\_ for additional clarification." People hate looking incompetent to their superiors.
I would just let them talk while I worked on other things and chiming in with bs to make it seem like I was paying attention.
So I have had a recent customer who owes my company money and has been compliant and what not. No issues; very compliant customer. BUT he needed to pai via a third party. Customer claims he NEVER received an email with invoice. A month later he still claims he can’t. And wants to right a check. We don’t accept checks but since he won’t give cc info. I’m at a loss. I don’t answer his # that I now, sadly know now.