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Mar
03

Email at dinner: when is it okay?

After spending the better part of my day under a fog of photoshop,  I surfaced just long enough to browse some tweets and respond to some emails. While looking through the twitter stream, a question from @Gizmodo caught my attention: When is it okay to check email during dinner?

I think the answers depends on the type of person you are talking about…

If someone is an employee of a company and they were to check email during dinner (after work hours) I would be offended. They are off the clock and have zero need to check in. If they are working on a large project, once 5 or 5:30 hits, the day is over and it waits for the next day. They get to keep business and home life separate. In this case, it is never okay to check email during dinner.

But, this is a tough question for a small business owner. I find that I check my email a lot in the evening, sometimes during dinner. Usually, this is because I am just taking a quick break from work to eat and then heading back into my office/closet. Then again, there are also nights that I am still checking emails even after I have shut down my computer and made myself cozy on the couch. Do I respond to a lot of the emails? No. But I do write notes on some of them, or create email drafts. This is helpful when the project is fresh in my mind and I am not overwhelmed with everything else that goes on during normal hours. It is hard for a small business owner to separate work from normal life because the separation doesn’t really exist.

What do you think? Should small business owners have different rules?

Related posts:

  1. Is it that hard to give people your email address?
  2. Turning a blog and a hobby into a business

Category: Blog Management, Inspired by Other Blogs
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  • alanbaumbach

    So small business owners get special rules? I don't think so. Most of us these days are expected to be “on” even when we are not in the office or the hours are outside the 8-5 Monday thru Friday workweek. However—-The people you are with physically are always more important than the electronic leashes we have allowed into our lives. People come first!

    • kirstenwright

      Alan, to some extent you are right, people should come first. But, I think that “employees” are rarely on after they clock out…I know almost no one who is an employee that deals with anything work related after they leave the office. But, I know tons of small business owners who do, and do on a regular basis. I don't do it every night, but at least once or twice a week I am pretty much working through dinner and into the night. Once my business is settled and I can afford help, then I will be able to ignore emails at dinner.

  • alanbaumbach

    Kirsten—I haven't put in a 40 hour 'regular' work week in years. As part of management, I always got the after hours calls about something needing to be taken care of even though I was an 'employee'. Guess it depends upon your job definition.

    • kirstenwright

      Alan,

      I appreciate so much that you are sharing your thoughts! I have re-read my post and realized that it didn't sound exactly how I wanted it to. I 100% agree that the phone should never be brought out during family dinners, out to dinner or personal time with your spouse. However, I do have some nights that I have working dinners.

      Second, when I refer to “employees”, I was referring to lower level, basic employees. Managers do have more involvement.

      Thanks again for your thoughts!

      • alanbaumbach

        Would love to share thoughts more frequently but still need that voice-to-text machine we had said we needed earlier.
        :)

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