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Meetings After 8 p.m. Are On the Rise, Microsoft Study Finds (bloomberg.com) 150

Posted by msmash from the new-normal dept.
Meetings starting after 8 p.m. are up 16% compared to a year ago, and at 10 p.m. almost a third of active workers are still monitoring their inboxes, according to research from Microsoft. Bloomberg: The company's annual work trends study, which is based on aggregated and anonymized data from Microsoft 365 users and a global survey of 31,000 desk workers, also found that almost 20% of employees actively working weekends are checking email before noon on Saturdays and Sundays [non-paywalled source], while over 5% are active on email again on Sunday evenings, gearing up for the start of the work week.

[...] Meetings are often spontaneous. Some 57% of the gatherings tallied by Microsoft came together without a calendar invite, and even 10% of scheduled meetings were booked at the last minute. [...] Mass emails, those which loop in more than 20 participants, are on the rise, climbing 7% from last year.
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Meetings After 8 p.m. Are On the Rise, Microsoft Study Finds More

Meetings After 8 p.m. Are On the Rise, Microsoft Study Finds

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  • Haha (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ArchieBunker ( 132337 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:22PM (#65455871)

    Yeah good luck with that. You want me to attend a meeting at 8pm from my home? Fine then you're getting billed for time.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Burdell ( 228580 )

      Fine then you're getting billed for time.

      Incorrect response - some manager will believe that THEIR meeting is SO important that it's worth paying for (and you said it's fine if they pay). Even if they pay time-and-a-half for extra time, it's still almost certainly not worth the intrusion into your life... living a life outside of work is worth more than some extra $$.

      Which, that's kind of a privileged point of view, because I've never needed to work more than one office-hours job to survive. I've been on-call, but that's kind of a necessity in my

      • Re: Haha (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Austerity Empowers ( 669817 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:55PM (#65455959)

        Except this is really about having meetings with India.

        • Don't be so quick to generalise. Many countries have offices around the globe. I myself host a meeting that is attended by people in US Eastern Time, US Central Time, UK time, Central European Time, Gulf Standard Time, India Standard Time, Australian Western Time, and Eastern Indonesia Time.

          And those attending from India Standard Time are marked as optional, in fact the meeting I host predated us opening any India office for engineering work by a decade.

          • Yes, well in my history of US-based companies doing any kind of tech work, it's always India. And in my experience, right now, due to Trump's TCJA R&D tax grenade, companies are trying to move work back to India again. Since the BBB is once again putting the R&D tax breaks on a fuse set to blow up after he leaves office, companies aren't changing course.

            • It was India at my last company. In fact, it started out as a small office over there supporting us in the off-hours, and by the time I left, it seemed like the roles had changed so that the US office was supporting them.

          • Not sure why you explicitly mentioned India there because surely with that range of times zones you already had people working out of hours.

            • Not sure why you explicitly mentioned India there because surely with that range of times zones you already had people working out of hours.

              It's almost like I mentioned India specifically... TWICE... to make a point about the post I was replying to. A post about India.

              Protip: Don't reply to a post, try join a conversation instead. This isn't some cocktail party. Slashdot allows you to rewind and see what I was replying to.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by Malc ( 1751 )

                Burdell made a point about out-of-hours meetings being about managers thinking their time is more important than theirs and how they wouldn't enjoy working in a company with 24x7 high-level staff.

                Austerity Empowers said that this was about India, although without explaining why.

                You then replied with a perfectly valid and common case about companies spanning many time zones, which essentially points out that this is more than just about India. I totally agreed with your point. Then you started waffling on

        • So training your replacement then? Pass.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Gleenie ( 412916 )

          Here in NZ timezones for everywhere except the east coast of Australia (2 hours behind) is a PITA for us. So we make it part of the SoW for all new contracts that our day-to-day contacts must be either local or Aus east coast. Obviously there will be exceptions and escalation resources could be anywhere in the world, but that keeps it down to a dull roar at least.

      • You're lucky. Last time I had a job that involved an on-call rotation it meant that one week out of five was 80 hours but only paid if something happened. Having to monitor email and phone queues is work, damnit.

        And yet I kept working there longer than I should have. Sigh.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by whitroth ( 9367 )

      Sorry, you're salaried. No overtime for you.

      Why do you *think* they list you as management, other than to call you "salaried", and not pay *anything* more. Your life is theirs.

      • Sorry, you're salaried. No overtime for you.

        Why do you *think* they list you as management, other than to call you "salaried", and not pay *anything* more. Your life is theirs.

        Hardly. You have to look at what you are paid. My life is definitely mine, but there are times when something needs done. Especially when we live on a globe, where it isn't the same time in each zone. If I'm dealing with ten different people in ten different zones, it just won't fit into a nice little box.

        But that aside, while I don't get paid hourly, I get a lot more in my paycheck. Even compared to if I was paid overtime because if I was an hourly worker I'd be paid less.

        Consider that there are peo

        • Yup.
          If you're paid what you feel is fair compensation for having to work the odd extra hours- then all is good.
          I know I certainly feel more than fairly compensated.
          I feel like, in fact, as hourly, I'd have a lot more trouble pulling in my yearly salary without actively *trying* to work those extra odd hours, rather than just having to sometimes.

    • And some meetings seem have weird hours because the attendants cover multiple timezones.

    • Yeah good luck with that. You want me to attend a meeting at 8pm from my home? Fine then you're getting billed for time.

      Ah yes - I take it that you never will deal with different time zones?

      For you see, it is many different time zones in this big ol globe, and by golly, we sometimes have meetings, when the meeting needs held. And there is no way that it will be worldwide at the same local time. And occasionally, it ain't even the same day! I show up for the meeting. when it is called, usually by Universal time, and if it is at a time I'm not at work, so what?

      These are great things to know before hiring someone!

    • It's part of my salary package, I don't have any legal right to refuse. I can either not do it and get fired or quit.

    • At double rate, at the very least. I religiously clock out at 5pm.

    • They can call me at the pub, but theyâ(TM)ll have to tolerate background noise and me steadily getting more sloshed and not remembering anything. Better to just send me the meeting notes and Iâ(TM)ll change the plans tomorrow ;). Some of us actually have a life, and some of us also respect our colleagues and reports (which starts with respecting their time).

  • Nightmare Workplaces += AI Bullshit Story (Score:3)

    by JakFrost ( 139885 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:26PM (#65455885)

    This article describes what a nightmare workplace looks like that everybody should avoid. If you work in one of these companies, start looking for other work before you are no longer able to mentally function and the amount of prescription and non-prescription drugs overwhelms your system.

    If you work in IT or do On-Call work then you will be asked to do something after hours and it's normal if there is an outage or some kind of a serious issue or a project is about to go live and you need extra preparation due to an unusual event, but if this is your constant workflow then you are screwed and also inefficient.

    At the end of the article it throws the idea of being an agent boss where you use the Microsoft AI to do more useless AI slot production to help you work and produce more useless bullshit

    • Re:Nightmare Workplaces += AI Bullshit Story (Score:4, Insightful)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:40PM (#65455917)
      The economy is in freefall. So you can look all you want you're not going to find anything.

      The current political situation means things aren't going to get better either. The massive tax cut going through the US Senate right now is going to spook the bond markets and lead to a deep deep recession. The people pushing the law through know this so they have scheduled it all to hit 2 weeks after the midterm elections. The 800 billion in Medicaid cuts aren't going to help either. You can't take almost a trillion dollars out of the economy and hand it to the 1% and not see a massive impact. Rural hospitals will be shutting down. And all the economic activity that goes with them.

      I don't think people realize how screwed we are yet. We may be heading into a new Great depression. Basically everything is lined up for it. A pointless trade war. Multiple real wars. A shock in the bond market from out of control trickle down economics and the goal of being the first trillionaires (admittedly it was billionaires back in the day)...

      And then you have climate change causing food shortages and natural disasters they're all being mismanaged plus you've got bird flu also being mismanaged by a man who literally said you shouldn't ask him for medical advice.

      We put absolute lunatics and psychopaths in charge of everything. Bad things are going to happen and it can't be stopped now.

      • The massive tax cut going through the US Senate right now

        What tax cut?

        They are merely making permanent the current tax levels we have NOW...otherwise eveyrone's taxes are going to jump way up....

        As for the rest of your rant...wow, you sounds like a nervous nelly, how are you able to sleep at night being so frighten the sky is falling and that climate change will send us to the Stone Age in the next year or so....

        I'm still always confused at your worry about the US and how we conduct our business here, s

      • The current political situation means things aren't going to get better either.

        Those under 25 might find themselves with a new job as a military conscript late next year.

        • Those under 25 might find themselves with a new job as a military conscript late next year.

          And if so, it may well turn out to be the best thing that's ever happened to them, although they probably won't believe it at the time. Not only will they get food, shelter and a paycheck out of it, they'll come away with some new and marketable skills as well. And, once they're out, they'll have access to subsidized schooling to put a polish on those skills and low cost world-class medical care for the rest of t

          • Yea, a great adventure. I'm sure young Russians in Ukraine would agree. The neurotoxins that riddled my uncle's body after the Vietnam War certainly shaped his adult life.

            • As did the Agent Orange responsible for my LADA diabetes and non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Still, I think I came out a better man for the experience.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by jp10558 ( 748604 )

                You might think you came out a better man, but I strongly question that as being widely true. PTSD tends to really screw with people as I know from a relative who was in Vietnam.

                • If I had any PTSD, it's had over half a century to manifest itself so I think I managed to dodge that bullet. Still, my hearing loss (including tinitus) and diabetes took several decades to show up, so there still might be a surprise or two in my future.

        • I don't assume that the draft age will not be expanded. Assumptions which once seemed safe now appear quaint.

      • The only thing that can save the USA at this point is a revolution. Taking Trump and his associates out and execute them publically as a reminder for the next would be dictators and incompetent fools that ruining a country carries a price tag.

    • This article describes what a nightmare workplace looks like that everybody should avoid.

      You're generalising. Having calls out of hours does not mean you're working for a nightmare place. I have calls out of hours all the time. In fact I have one at 9pm tonight to deal with an issue in the USA and I have one at 5am on Friday to deal with an issue in West Papua. But I would wager I have a better work life balance than 100% of Americans on Slashdot. Just because some people are connected to meetings supporting a global engineering workforce doesn't mean we are overworking and doesn't mean we can'

      • This article describes what a nightmare workplace looks like that everybody should avoid.

        You're generalising. Having calls out of hours does not mean you're working for a nightmare place. I have calls out of hours all the time. In fact I have one at 9pm tonight to deal with an issue in the USA and I have one at 5am on Friday to deal with an issue in West Papua. But I would wager I have a better work life balance than 100% of Americans on Slashdot. Just because some people are connected to meetings supporting a global engineering workforce doesn't mean we are overworking and doesn't mean we can't switch off when we need to.

        I worked last Saturday. *GASP!* *SHOCK*. But that isn't the full story is it, you didn't ask me if I went to work on Monday.

        Flexibility goes two ways and the article doesn't even remotely provide enough information as to whether it is a two way relationship or not.

        Same here. My work schedule is all over the place, stuff happens when it happens. And I don't mind at all.

        And my work/life balance is just fine. Now I don't know how your situation is, but one of the things I get in compensation for my flexibility is money. So I get to take a lot of vacations to interesting places. I get to buy a lot of my big-boy toys. That's the old work hard, play hard thing.

        I think perhaps a lot of people just hate working period, so spending a second longer at work, or a late mee

  • Working with people in other countries/emergencies (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ardmhacha ( 192482 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:27PM (#65455889)

    Occasional meetings, planned well in advance, with people on the other side of the world, in the late evening are acceptable.

    Genuine emergency meetings at short notice, also acceptable.

    Effectively being on call every evening and at the weekend (without getting paid for being on call), not acceptable

  • Go and smell grass .. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mirnotoriety ( 10462951 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:30PM (#65455895)
    If you think the company will appricate you working evenings and weekends then you are deluded. Clock out at 05:00 and go and smell grass.

    • Just don't inhale...

    • Having started at 2100? ;)

    • You could just go home real early the next day. Or take a free day off whenever. You can be flexible and still get your time back. Who expects you to work nights and weekend and isn't flexible like that. Nobody can say shit if you show up late after working late the day before, you just have to know where you stand and not be a dick about it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mjwx ( 966435 )

      If you think the company will appricate you working evenings and weekends then you are deluded. Clock out at 05:00 and go and smell grass.

      The power imbalance between employee and employer, especially in the US, is why it needs to be made law that you cannot be required to work outside of work hours (which will be defined in law as a fallback if they're not defined in a contract).

  • Never attended a meeting past 5PM. No will I.

  • According to research? (Score:4, Funny)

    by allo ( 1728082 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @12:59PM (#65455965)

    Is that the research defined somewhere in the middle of the 30 pages privacy policy of a Microsoft account?

  • Did someone mention that there are people that work other shifs... I have an 8am meeting and 4:30 EOD call, so I bookend my day, but outside of an oncall event I am not on in meetings at 8pm.
  • It's up to you, the employee, to set your own boundaries, preferably from day 1. Make it clear what you find acceptable to be asked to do and what you find unacceptable. Don't be unreasonable, of course, like saying "there will never be a situation I am willing to work outside 9am-5pm." Emergencies do truly happen sometimes. Employers won't by default take your life and well-being into account, but good ones will respect you if you are clear about your boundaries. If you have an employer that doesn't respec

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by skam240 ( 789197 )

      Who do you think stands to land the job? The person who lays out their demands for working hours or the one who displays flexibility?

      Don't get me wrong, I think it sucks some people are stuck having to spend so much of what should be personal time on their job but your advice sounds like a great way to not get a job.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by flippy ( 62353 )

        I'm not suggesting that anyone should "lay out their demands for working hours." In every position, one needs some flexibility. However, especially in white collar jobs, employment contracts are not uncommon, and these should spell out the employee's responsibilities as well as the employer's requirements. When someone is hired, it is under certain obligations for both sides. What's being described above is expectations made by the employer *after* the employee has been hired.

        To look at it another way: if s

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by skam240 ( 789197 )

          If one has scarce job skills or part of a union then what you describe is realistic as one has leverage to shape the hiring conditions or they've been pre negotiated (hopefully in a more favorable manor than what the general public gets) by the union. For the vast majority of working Americans though I think you're being idealistic, not realistic as even the act of establishing special employment conditions is rarely available to most folks outside of things like medical needs.

          In other words, most employers

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by flippy ( 62353 )

            Allow me to clarify my position. The only thing I'm suggesting is that someone being hired be told what is expected of them before being hired. It's then up to them whether to accept the job or not.

            If a potential employer won't tell a potential hire what is expected of them, that's a company that's very likely to take advantage of that person.

            The "normal employment agreement" you referenced IS a written, legal agreement. All I am saying, in that case, is that, like any other legal document, it is important

  • I can see checking your email late, if you're part of a small shop - assuming that 1) you willingly agreed to it when you accepted the job + 2) it is balanced out by flexibility during the traditional workday. This is pretty much my situation... and I have to say no one foisted it on me, I just find it less stressful to make myself aware of any issues when they happen (in the end, I'm left to decide whether to deal with them right away or leave them for the next day) versus walking into a wall of distressed

  • Lunch time meetings (Score:3)

    by esperto ( 3521901 ) on Tuesday June 17, 2025 @09:45PM (#65457117)

    From the article the worst thing is lunch time meetings, I can do 8pm meetings occasionally, and even done 10pm weekly when working with asian clients, but the amount of lunch time meetings in that graph is just obscene and a very american thing, I don't think anywhere else in the world people do that, we need down time during lunch to eat properly and have some rest or even, gasp, socialize a little.
    To me lunch time meetings are just unacceptable, even when working from home.

    • My employer has a thing called "lunch and learn". They're completely optional, but you also know that someone takes notice who attends. These meetings are on teams.

      The topics are all kinds of random shit, not related to your project or even necessarily anything to do with your job. They're sort of cast as "for your benefit" or "informational".

      Personally, I think it is very bad form. If they want to have these kinds of meetings, they should not be during the lunch hour.

  • I think this has more to do with MSFT software stack users than business in general

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