8 ways to tame the "instant" in messaging

Summary
Instant messaging tools have many benefits but they're also a source of many interruptions. It helps to codify chat etiquette so we can use these tools productively.

1. Use chat as primarily an asynchronous tool and avoid thinking of it as "instant".
2. For urgent matters, don't use chat. Use the phone instead.
3. Use your chat status to broadcast what you're doing right now and respect others' statuses as well.
4. Reduce the number of notifications you generate for people by writing detailed messages, using emojis as reactions and getting to the point in a single message.
5. Target your conversations to the people who need to actively participate. Summarise these later for the group, so you reduce noise.
6. Use and respect threads so conversation is easy to follow.
7. When things get complex, slow down and write things up.
8. Don't resolve arguments on chat. Choose a synchronous medium instead to diffuse tensions.

Asynchronous work is anything but “instant”. There’s value in “instant” but that’s not what asynchronous work is for. Most of our work in software development teams is thoughtful and creative; be it design, coding, or testing. That kind of work benefits from slowing down. In fact, I argue that we often conflate speed and productivity.

Justin Mitchell, founder and ex-CEO, Yac

“A lot of people mis-attribute productivity to speed.”

Instant messaging tools are common in the workplace today. In fact, a lot of the marketing for these tools equates their speed of communication and the ubiquity of that interaction pattern with productivity. In certain cases, I don’t disagree with their utility either. Enterprise messaging software has its benefits.

1. A quick back and forth. Sometimes people need to just share a few messages between each other and get to a decision within minutes. Chat is a great tool for that.

2. Important information, front and centre. Broadcast messages, overnight changes, production issues - these are great candidates to share in a chat group (amongst other places). Many tools offer the ability to ‘pin’ messages. So you can ensure that your important information is visible even when the activity stream keeps moving on.

3. Building connection. Most of the communities in my company have their equivalent chat rooms. They’re a great way to connect with people who have similar interests and to create a sense of belonging not just to the craft, but to the company as well. The collegial nature of chat often flattens whatever hierarchy may exist in an organisation. 

4. Sharing and learning. If you want to share something with a large group of people because you found it interesting, instant messaging is a great way to do that. In fact, that's a pattern most of us follow outside work as well, so there’s a very low learning curve in promoting such behaviours in the workplace.

5. Plain old fun. At Thoughtworks, we have a forum called “Dad Jokes”. It’s a place where memes, puns and odd internet humour come alive. You can always open up that room and come away smiling. Even if your company doesn’t have an equivalent, you can identify with the humour and fun associated with jokes on IM, GIFs, emojis and stickers. And fun is a good thing!

Chat is indeed an essential part of your toolset and it finds mention on the spectrum of synchronousness as well. The trouble, as I mentioned, is in the “instant” of “instant messaging”. To be “instant”, you need to monitor chat all day. Not only does that build interruptions into your way of working, it can be mentally exhausting to keep up with all the channels your team and company have created. And when you use instant messaging ineffectively, it becomes, as Basecamp says, an all-day meeting. So in today’s post I want to share a few ways you and your team can use this set of communication tools effectively and support a more productive, async-first way of working.

1. If it’s urgent, use the phone

If we can agree that people don’t have to look at chat all day, then how do you get their attention for something urgent? My advice - use the phone. Try your messaging app by all means, but don’t let an urgent situation get worse by expecting an immediate response on chat. This is where instituting communication protocols helps. Oh, and remember - if you’re calling someone on the phone and interrupting them, it better be urgent!

2. Show your status, respect others’ statuses

Your personal boundaries are a good place to start. In a previous post, we discussed how your chat status can broadcast that you’re working asynchronously. In addition, you can set up statuses to show that you’re at lunch, or in a meeting, or just pairing with a colleague. If you set up your calendar to reflect how you’ve planned your day, tools like Clockwise can sync your calendar to your Slack status. That way, everyone knows when to expect a quick response and when they should wait. 

The pay-it-forward side of this practice is that you’ll need to respect others’ statuses as well. Don’t get cross with a colleague who’s busy coding and hasn’t responded to your message in minutes. 

3. Limit the number of messages

When I ran my survey with about 500 employees of a major tech company, 20% of the employees identified chat messages as one of the biggest barriers to deep work. A 2021 survey by Cendex quantifies how much time employees lose to communication tools.

Wired magazine

“The average full-time member of staff in a medium to large business loses 9.3 hours per month, or 112 hours per year on digital communication programmes, products and tools.”

Of course, communication is a part of our jobs, but there’s a case for making it more effective. One fallout of the short messaging culture in our personal lives is that we communicate in short, often incoherent sentences. While those habits have their own fallout outside work, when we bring these behaviours to work, we end up creating loads of noise. Before you know it, you have 50 messages for what could have been an email or just a single, well thought out message. 

It’s ok to write longer chat messages! Save everyone the extra notifications. Use emojis and text formatting to make these messages easy to read. Not only will you save others from the interruptions, writing a single coherent message will allow you to go back to your own work quicker.

4. Get to the point

When we worked in the office, it was almost rude to get to the point. You couldn’t just walk up to a teammate and ask a question. Invariably, you’d start with a greeting. For example, “Hey Tina, how’re you doing? Do you have a minute? I need your help with…” That whole interaction pattern works perfectly in a synchronous setup. When you’re distributed, you can’t expect the other person to be looking at their chat app right at the moment that you are typing. This happens when you apply a synchronous interaction pattern to asynchronous instant messaging. 

Coworker 10:20. Hey Sumeet

Sumeet 10:45. Hi!

Coworker 11:01. Do you have a minute?

Sumeet 11:12. Sure mate, what’s up?

Coworker 11:14. So, I was just looking at our backlog and…

See what happened right there? Between the two of us, we created five messages for what could have been one message. I know it may feel awkward to just get to the point. And that’s ok. Go ahead with the pleasantries, but just include it in a single message. Think of how you’d write the note if you were writing an email. Here’s an example.

Coworker 10:20. Hey Sumeet. Whenever you have a minute, can you tag the epics and Confluence pages that relate to the search feature? I’m putting together our roadmap, and the tag will automatically pull related artefacts into the document. Thanks a bunch mate!👍🏽

5. Target your conversations

Just like meetings benefit from the right audience, chat does too. If only three people care about the discussion, target the discussion to them alone. Not only will you have a more focussed discussion, you’ll reduce noise for everyone else. When you’re done with the discussion, summarise it for everyone else on the team channel in one coherent message.

6. React, don’t respond

Reactions acknowledge the message and don’t generate notifications

The cost of responding with a “LOL” or a “So true!” or just piling on a “Congratulations” on a personal chat group has very little impact. In these groups, we sign up for the noise - it’s not a bug, it’s a feature. In a work context, noise is a good old bug. So, in the spirit of limiting messages, use emoji reactions instead of responding to a message. 

7. Use threads; one per topic

Most instant messaging tools allow you to thread conversations. Pictured here, Slack.

Enough said, right? Threads make it easy to follow conversations on chat. We’ve all run into that situation where someone creates a new thread instead of replying to an existing conversation, and you know how it derails the discussion. If you’re the person who makes this mistake, then fear not. Just delete your new thread and respond to the right conversation.

The converse also holds true. Don’t hijack a thread with an unrelated topic. Follow a simple rule - one thread, one topic. 

8. Slow things down and don’t argue on chat

Have you ever tried to argue with your significant other or your friends on chat? How many times has that ever gone well? You know the answer. Instant messaging and charged emotions don’t mix well. IM is best for short, ephemeral discussions. Long discussions on chat add little clarity to the topic at hand and they just become an ineffective version of an all day meeting. 

So the moment you see a chat conversation taking too long, slow things down. Write things up properly in a collaborative document and take things from there. And if you see an argument developing, stop right there. Take some time away from the screen, collect your thoughts and go synchronous when everyone’s calmed down. It’s easier to assume positive intent when you can see each other. Real-time video conversation can diffuse emotions much better than chat. 

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So those were my eight ideas to help your team tame the “instant” nature of messaging. With everything you’re learning about asynchronous agile from this site and other resources, you should now build a communication charter for your team. The guidelines relevant to instant messaging should become a pinned post on your team channel. That way, it’ll never be out of sight. Every new member of your team will see it and you should encourage them to read it as well. From that point on, everyone needs to be thoughtful about their communication, slow things down and hold each other accountable.