Out of Office Messages

[melissa]

I'm getting ready to go on vacation starting tomorrow and it got me thinking about my out of office message. I follow this lady on TikTok who reads off her boss' out of office messages because they are funny. So are you out of office messages funny or professional?

I'm debating adding a little fun to mine but haven't decided yet.

[jamie.1022]

I am leaning towards "professional" because I can't think of a funny message that would actually be funny.

Can you give me an example?

[underwaterrhymes]

Professional.

Funny would not fly with my org.

[W.T.Faulkner]

I could get away with an internal funny one, but I'm too lazy to set two.

[NewOrleans]

Funny would not at all fly in my workplace. Doing so is entirely dependent on your work culture and knowing your audience who receives the messages.

[konapoppy]

5 or so years ago I started making mine more personal, like:
I am in the happiest place on earth with my family for a few days. I will respond when I return…

At the time I was working in an environment where it was a competition who could work the most hours. So I wanted to signal to people that life is about more than work.

People noticed and started doing the same. It helps to build connection as well.

[bex1973]

I don't know that I would call it professional - I just keep it short and simple knowing that folks really only want to know when I'll be back so I just say I'm out of office until X date and will reply to emails in the order received.

Honestly I wouldn't find it unprofessional (depending on industry of course) if it was funny but I'm not sure I would even read it because I'm just skimming for the date.

[penelope]

Agreed with professional. Funny wouldn't fly in my world either. Now, in my bosses world, sure thing. But I'm not high enough up on the ladder to live on the wild side.

[Pilsy]

I work with someone whose are hilarious, and I laugh at them, but that approach is not for me. I regularly begin my presentations with jokes, and I'm a pretty casual person who generally enjoys humor in all parts of my life, but there's something about the live delivery (and a confirmed audience) that's lost in an OOO message for me.

ETA: Hilarious isn't right. They're worth a chuckle.  

[Deleted]

We have a format we must follow for our out of office messages. I have seen another person outside my org that was going to be out for two months. Essentially they said if it was important to send it to X or if not then resend after X date upon their return. I assume they would receive too many emails to sort after being out for that long and they are just going to delete a whole bunch of emails. I have a friend who is a geologist and she sets her start of her out of office to "Sorry, I'm away rocking and rolling....."

[circa1978]

I've never seen a funny one outside of social media. I used to give a lot of options but I started a ticket system for my team so now I just say I'm out, if you need something start a ticket. I don't even promise to get back to people when I get back, lol.

[kath16]

there is one person in my org who tries for funny and it is very, very cringey. and i'm generally really laid back.

keep it simple.

[eddy]

Professional
Funny would probably be frowned upon.
Plus I am getting the hell out of there. I don't have time to think of funny lol. BITCH, BYE

[kadams767]

Mine are professional. Mildly funny/cute would probably be fine here, but I can't be bothered with that.

But this thread reminds me of my colleague who is currently on PTO and their out-of-office right now says "I will be out of the office with limited to no phone or email access until August 1st. If you need immediate assistance, please call XXX-XXX-XXXX.", with the phone number being their own cell phone number. So essentially, I have no access, but call me!

[hermione]

I just say I am off until X date. I don't even say I will respond to you then because I probably won't get to them until a week later.

[winnied]

I keep it professional/boring most of the time. During my maternity leave I wrote something to the effect of enjoying baby snuggles and sleepless nights, but that's as far as I go.

[lessel]

Professional, which is boring. I saw one recently from someone that said: "The bad news is that I’m out of office. The good news is that I’m out of office. ✌🏼"

Made me chuckle.

[midwestmama]

I keep mine professional because I work in a global organization and am not sure if what I think is humorous would be considered humorous elsewhere.

[isabel]

I'm not a particularly funny person, so professional.

[Susie]

I don't work in an industry known for its sense of humor, so my external OOO is very basic:  OOO until X date, will/will not/will intermittently have email access to review for emergencies, please reach out to my assistant at (email) if you need assistance sooner.

My internal ones are more casual:  if it's on fire and relates to X, please see person Y.  If it's on fire and relates to A, please see person B.  If it's merely smoldering, I'll get back to you ASAP upon my return.

[wildrice]

I haven't done a funny one, but probably could. Our CEO is out this week and sent out a message saying something like "I am unreachable by phone, email, text, carrier pigeon, or telepathy" so I think humor is accepted or even encouraged. So is unplugging completely on vacation I love our CEO.

[Aloe Vera]

When in doubt, keep it professional, always. It would be a stupid move to get in trouble for an out of office message.

[mokes]

At my last job I would keep the external professional but would sometimes be casual/inside joke-y for the internal one. There were only like 15 people in the company so it was a very familiar/casual culture.

[shauni27]

I need more people to share funny ones they have seen. This is very entertaining to me, lol.

[purplepenguin7]

some people go for funny in my org, it's totally fine, we are very laid back company/industry. I personally go bare bones with something really simple because I have no desire to be witty.

[RoxMonster]

Professional. I don’t know that funny would fly at my company.

Besides the OoO message, our team does this thing where you set a five minute meeting reminder at like 7 AM for each day you’re OoO so the rest of the team can see who is out when they log on that morning. In “meeting location” I have seen people put things like “a dreamy tropical island” or “lost in the woods somewhere” etc. So I think more laid back there is fine bc it’s just internal to our team.

[moreace01]

I'm just glad when I remember to do it. Half the time I'm like - I'm outta here! And then at the last second remember to set the OOO and my slack vacation. I don't think about saying anything other than the dates. Period.

[thebreakfastclub]

I'm struggling to envision a funny message. I've never seen one in real life.

[chickadee77]

Professional and short. I figure most people just look for the date and/or an alternate contact if they have an emergency.

I had coworkers that would give waaaay too much detail IMO ("we're out of town visiting the Grand Canyon! I'll check my email every other hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays blah blah blah") like, I don't care, yo. Or, if I did, we'd have already chatted about it before you left.

[fumbalina]

In business, I always opt for short and to the point. Name, dates, forwarding number if appropriate. I ran a babysitting business for years as well and started from there. It was so standard, I had a friend tell me my message was the exact same for five phones, lol, but it kept me getting paid.