If you want to say hi, start your message with it as a single message.
this post was submitted on 27 Jan 2026
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These are your coworkers' best friends, who send you an email and then immediately run to your desk to tell you that they sent you an email. And if you're busy, they stare at you until you turn to them and they get what they want, no matter what you were doing.
I'm glad to never have worked in a workplace where instead of the email they used teams.
That way you can do lengthy email exchanges to discuss what time both parties are available for a phone call
Honestly, we use it a lot for quick questions or to inform someone about something, and it's fine for that.
"Hey, which shared drive has the files regarding blablabla" that sort of stuff.
I prefer it over getting emails for every small thing.
I've toyed with this a few ways, and my favorite response is waiting 4 hours and replying "hi!" That might mean the next day. Then when they ask the question, wait a couple more hours at least to reply. They've set the pace for the conversation this way, and it's going to be glacial. (Folks who have no urgency get no urgency)
If they ask the right way, I am pretty quick. (Polite people get polite responses)
If it's something that can wait 20 minutes, I typically wait 20 minutes. (I am a busy person) (Protip: this makes bosses and coworkers think you're not just fucking around all day, and they respect you more)
Train people using rules, even if they are unspoken, be consistent and it'll work.
Im guilty of this. I hate wasting the time to type it up if the person isnt going to reply. I'll ping them, when they respond, then open a dialogue.
Personally I never respond if someone just writes "hi", but i will always answer actual questions/requests
On my way home tonight, sitting at a red light I noticed that my bosses boss sent me "hi, can you talk?"
I spent the next 20 minutes of the ride home trying to think of anything that I said to anybody that could have been misconstrued into God knows what. I get home and reply "I can now."
It was a question someone had about our specific uniforms (scrubs) and under which heading I was able to order them under.
"Hi, can you talk? I have a question about your uniform." Would have been so much kinder lol.
I don't answer "Hi" anymore.
If they need help they'll ask what they need.
I have some people that my entire message history is "Hi" and no answer. Because they eventually realize they should ask in our QA channel instead of dm'ing our team members.
I notice there are several similar domains by now. I know a few people who have this is the forever status message in the work messaging tool
I just write hi or good morning or whatever, follow it by an empty line, and then my question. In the same message.
This probably isn't an audience that needs to hear this - but you can add a line break with ALT+Enter in Teams.
Getting a flood of short messages instead of 2 paragraphs drives me crazy.
I always put "Hi" and the topic in the first line so they have a chance to estimate what it's about from the little preview blurb and decide whether to pivot their headspace that way now, later or not at all
I'm the opposite ... I put my request in first and then do my pleasantries:
"could you look into this for me?"
"btw good morning"
Just hit them back with a different conversation than the one they wanted to have. I find" hi how's your day going?" isn't tangential enough, but if you know who they are then might try ask something a bit more personalised or even try and offload one of your problems onto them.
Chaotic good
I set that as my status in Teams along with a little message "Please don't just say hi. I might not see your follow up" and checked the box to make it show on chats. It's definitely helped. Also got someone to complain that I was ignoring them, but they just said "hi" and nothing else so my boss sided with me that they were wasting my time without actually asking a question.
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The solution to this is to not reply to them.
They will either give you the information you need (and potentially learn their lesson for next time), or they’ll get tired of waiting and ask someone else.
So passive aggressive
Just reply hi
How often does it really happen
When I share that I ignore people who messages with only a "hi", certain people get real upset. I used to try to be considerate like, "Oh I need to change my communication style" but after a while, I realized every person who gets upset by it was a egotistical asshole in the first place who thinks everyone should wait for them.
So yeah, say what you want to say. I'm not here for you.
100% this. I got this dude who always messages me “hi” when he needs something but doesn’t bother to include what the fuck he needs. I told him, politely, once you can just include everything up front at once and I’ll answer as soon as I can. I just won’t respond to just “hi”. Like fucking hi yourself.
I do love being in IT sometimes. No ticket? Then the problem doesn’t exist
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Just reply “hi” then set your status to away and go grab a coffee!
Just saying "Hi" back five minutes later already throws them off and they'll come back to you the next day.
Oh yeah. Never say “hi” back right away! Always wait at least 5 minutes!
As long as it's just an "hi" you don't know what it is and have to assume it's super urgent. Once you answer, they can disclose the actual matter in its full mundanity, resting assured they have already confirmed your attention.
I do that with my friends out of habit sometimes
At least you can just ignore "Hi".
I have a co-worker "Ed" who's working 1st level support.
He'll take a call (but only if the caller hasn't given up after letting it ring for 20 seconds), then write in Teams:
"Joe Smith called. He has a problem in Outlook." (We have a ticket system, but Ed doesn't use it)
Now, Joe Smith expects IT to help him. So I can't just ignore it.
If I reply "what kind of issue?", Ed will ignore my question, because he doesn't react to Teams notifications.
If I physically walk over to his desk and ask him, he'll reply "Sorry, Joe didn't say".
Literally the quickest way to get this shit off my desk is to call the user back and fix their Outlook issue myself.
And that's exactly why Ed does this.
Of course, Ed isn't the problem.
The problem is that he wasn't fired years ago because he knows certain things about the owner of the company and the CEO.
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I just don't answer, lol
The last time it happened to me I replied, but I waited until the end of the next day and shut down my laptop and put my phone away immediately after clicking send.
Read it, do not reply
We had a communication training at my work that told us to always start with a Hi before asking the question on teams. It was infuriating
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