So should I answer some work emails in the middle of the night?

[Ralphie ★]

Sort of the work equivalent of a late like.

 

[Airehead]

Yes. 

[Prophet Zacharia]

4 hours ago, Philander Seabury said:

Sort of the work equivalent of a late like.

 

It depends. Is it routine? Then absolutely, you show how dedicated to the job you are. Is it important/emotional? Don’t, you want the clarity of the next day to review before you hit send. And you also don’t want to seem that you are perseverating over it.

[maddmaxx ★]

Of course.  You belong to the company 24/7

[Airehead]

1 hour ago, Prophet Zacharia said:

It depends. Is it routine? Then absolutely, you show how dedicated to the job you are. Is it important/emotional? Don’t, you want the clarity of the next day to review before you hit send. And you also don’t want to seem that you are perseverating over it.

Very wise. 

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

PZ's view has merit, although I'd like to offer another.

I would suggest if it's routine, then don't respond.  Otherwise you will receive an increasing number of routine emails outside of work and the senders will expect you to respond - as the norm - outside of work hours.  People will take advantage of this; dumping off a routine email in the evening knowing you'll answer, just so they can have a ready answer for themselves when they start their day tomorrow.  It resolves down to whether you want to give up your time when you're at home to do work you could quickly accomplish the next day at the office.

As far as an email containing an emotional or important topic: I would suggest responding with a phone call, not an email.  Unless of course you email back along the lines of "I've read your email, I understand its importance, and I'll call you so we can talk through this."

[dinneR ★]

Never for me. When my day is done, the email is shut down and I do not touch it until the next day. 

Why are you reading email that late?

[BuffJim]

My work phone is not allowed in the bedroom. Bedroom is for two things only. Sleeping and eating midnight snacks 

[ChrisL]

I told my team to text me after hours as my email chime is turned off and I don’t check email on my phone after around 7 PM.  The executive team does work late and I sometimes get messages late that need attention early the next day so I do need to keep an eye on email for a bit. 
 

The issue for me is I get 75-100  auto generated emails overnight from various systems  that need sorting through every morning.  Some need action, most get filed.

[Prophet Zacharia]

4 hours ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

although I’d like to offer another.

Oh, to be sure I don’t advise it becomes a routine thing. Maybe just enough to keep ‘em guessing. But if Ralph’s awake and wants to respond to emails at midnight occasionally, it’s not horrible in and of itself.

I get emails all night that affect my day the next day. I’ll peak at them if I’m awake, or else be surprised at what the day brings when I get to the office. 
 

They call me if they need me after hours. I still have a pager, but no one bothers anymore. The benefit of having a work phone is it all gets shut down whenever I don’t want to be contacted.

[Ralphie ★]

I like the way outlook from work behaves on my personal eyephone. Reminders remain visible for some short period of time like a minute or two, and then they recede to a red dot on the Outlook icon so they are oot of sight and out of mind. But things can slip by if I miss that reminder, so a manual dismissal might be better. But if it is important I will hear via other means. Saul good, man!  

[12string]

I've always been willing to answer emails at night, for urgent issues only.  Working with people around the globe, it can cut days out of a schedule.  But, I've learned to keep it to urgent issues only, so as to not send a precedent.  Especially with my boss, where a 3 word answer can turn into 3 hundred emails.

When COVID sent us all to home offices, there were a LOT of late emails flying around.  I have learned to close the laptop when it's quitting time, so I don't hear the "ding" 

[Kzoo]

We have an environment where we expect our people to respond to an after hours request.  We also have an environment where we expect that our people are not harassed by trivial requests after hours so it doesn't happen often.  We also have an environment where our people fell free to spend their work time as they see fit.  If that means that they are not available some time during normal business hours, we're good with that.  There's some give and take.  We hire professionals that are expected to get the work done.  When they do it is mostly up to them (and our clients).

Many of our people will take their laptops with them on vacations to be available to address emergencies.  These same people know that they will have the luxury of deciding why they should be comped for that time as well.  They are good people that go over and above and we treat them in kind.

 

[Road Runner]

4 hours ago, BuffJim said:

My work phone is not allowed in the bedroom. Bedroom is for two things only. Sleeping and eating midnight snacks 

Nominated for best post of the year.  

[Forum Administrator]

I typically shut off the work stuff around 7:00 p.m. each night.  People know to text me if it is important. 

I don't like people thinking that I am hear at all hours to answer their questions.  Sometimes, just to keep home and work separate, I will answer an email in the evening, but schedule it to send the next morning.  This gets it off my list of to dos, keeps people from bothering me, and makes people feel important because answering their question was the first thing I did when I got in the office.

[groupw]

Only send the emails if you know it will annoy someone!

I typically keep my work phone available until the office closes just so I know what I might be walking into in the morning. 
I do IT work at my boss’s church. He runs the media for church services and weddings. Once in a while he will message about something being down at the church and I walk him through it. 
Boss’s wife is the office manager. She is the only one at the store with my personal cell number. She is the filter so they go to her if I need to be reached on vacation. Only once has she called me to help.