People working from home and using MS Teams - status changes to 'Away' very quickly...

Right the media player one didn't work, but I've found what might be the simplest and most reliable workaround so far.

Create a PowerPoint slide and animate some text to wobble or something on a endless loop (i.e. until next click) using animations.

Put it in slide show mode and it'll keep your work computer alive, so Teams will retain whatever status you set manually.

Seems to work flawlessly so far.
 
i've found that if you're actually working, it doesn't get set to 'away' that often ;)

Saying that, in the early days of lockdown I recorded a macro that moved 1 cell down every few seconds on a loop and that seemed to do the trick.
 
Participant said:
Right the media player one didn't work, but I've found what might be the simplest and most reliable workaround so far.

Create a PowerPoint slide and animate some text to wobble or something on a endless loop (i.e. until next click) using animations.

Put it in slide show mode and it'll keep your work computer alive, so Teams will retain whatever status you set manually.

Seems to work flawlessly so far.
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Please say you've given up on the idea of piloting passenger 'planes. :p
 
Hades said:
I get this a lot too with our internal chat system (not teams). My London location is clearly in my profile but I frequently login in the morning to find someone from the other side of the world frantically pinging me overnight repeatedly asking if I'm there because it's urgent, then escalating to senior management when I don't respond at 2am :D
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Slack has a built in thing where it tells you what time-zone people are in, nice and clearly.

People still ping me at all ridiculous hours of the day expecting me to respond, particularly our support org who seem to have me incorrectly pegged as a person with the most clue about everything.
 
Working from home, I feel like whatever I’m doing, or whatever my status, I’m available if anyone needs me. The fact that I may or may not be working the whole time doesn’t seem that important
 
Yadda said:
Please say you've given up on the idea of piloting passenger 'planes. :p
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Lol.

I think the fact that I'm going to these lengths tells me I've got the desire to do something else with my life.

Whether that something is propelling 100 tonnes of aluminium through the air at 300 knots is a question.

Liking the paperclip (traditional methods are best) and macro ideas.
 
giphy.gif


Homer knew best.
 
I’ve taken to always putting my status as unavailable / do not disturb across all platforms. I’ll immediately get back in touch, usually by phone, unless it’s someone I’m avoiding.

A worse problem is people who do not have their phone number in their email signature; die. Not specifically in relation to setting statuses as away, just in general. Why would you do that?! Die!!!
 
As above Caffeine program simulates pressing of a key.

I've also written code in Excel and Access VBA to use a sendkeys command for a function keystroke such as F15, triggered by a timer event.

I needed it to get around our company's 20 minute no activity and log you out policy for data collection terminals.

Whilst working from home in April I used Caffeine when I went off to make coffee or something as I wouldn't be surprised if someone was logging away time during work at home hours.
 
dirtychinchilla said:
Working from home, I feel like whatever I’m doing, or whatever my status, I’m available if anyone needs me. The fact that I may or may not be working the whole time doesn’t seem that important
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Nope, nope, nope, nope. Don't fall for that trap. They're not paying you for it, your mental health gets impacted (whether you recognise it or not), and your productivity overall diminishes. There are numerous studies that show how overall productivity drops when people are working more than 40 hours a week. After just a few weeks, the overall benefit has already gone and you're soon moving in to net-negative vs having just done 40 hour weeks.
 
Garp said:
Nope, nope, nope, nope. Don't fall for that trap. They're not paying you for it, your mental health gets impacted (whether you recognise it or not), and your productivity overall diminishes. There are numerous studies that show how overall productivity drops when people are working more than 40 hours a week. After just a few weeks, the overall benefit has already gone and you're soon moving in to net-negative vs having just done 40 hour weeks.
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I don't doubt you on this but can you post a couple of links to these studies be interested to read them. Thanks in advance
 
Garp said:
Nope, nope, nope, nope. Don't fall for that trap. They're not paying you for it, your mental health gets impacted (whether you recognise it or not), and your productivity overall diminishes. There are numerous studies that show how overall productivity drops when people are working more than 40 hours a week. After just a few weeks, the overall benefit has already gone and you're soon moving in to net-negative vs having just done 40 hour weeks.
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This is why I don't have teams on my phone. I like a clean disconnect when work finishes.

If it's that urgent, they have my number.
 
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