Irritating phone habit of co-worker

[ckay87]

There's a woman I work with occasionally on different projects. She's a phone person and I only work part time, so I end up with a lot of voice messages from her. Absolutely every single voice message she leaves, she marks "urgent." I don't know if all VM systems have the same functionality: marking a message urgent just puts it first in line when messages are played back. Each message is also is intro-ed with "urgent."

This drives me crazy. I know I shouldn't care, but how self-centered can a person get? I would love to say something real innocent, along the lines of "hey, I thought I'd mention that your VMs are always marked urgent. You might want to check that out, I think there's a problem with your phone."

The ironic thing is, as soon as I hear the word "urgent" when replaying my messages, I immediately think "oh that's just her" and I hit the pound sign to skip. Then I think - now's a good time to check the Dis.

 

[ChrisnSteph]

It really could be the phone. This happened to me at the last office I worked at, and I could never figure out how to fix it. It was irritating, but it wasn't done purposefully.

Or maybe she really thinks every message is urgent!

 

[Sleepy]

My In-Laws used to do that everytime they called our house and left a message. They would say it was "an emergency" or "very important" that my husband call them when he got home. They even used an urgent tone of voice. The emergency was usually a description of what they had for dinner or the fact that cousin Bill had a clogged toilet After a few years of crying wolf, one stops thinking it is necessary to return the call ASAP.

 

[Galahad]

In our phone system, the primary benefit of marking a message urgent is that it puts it at the front of the line so you hear it first. Perhaps that's why she does it. May not be a sense of self importance but thinks you should hear the messages first.

 

[ckay87]

Perhaps that's why she does it. May not be a sense of self importance but thinks you should hear the messages first.

Yea, but I wonder why her messages should come before all of my other messages. And why they should come first every single time. I have worked with her off and on for 10 years and she has never left me a non-urgent message.

Since ChrisnSteph mentioned it, and now that I really think about it, maybe there is something wrong with her phone. But she's a generally pushy person to begin with, so I never even considered that before.

 

[BuzzBoyMom]

I work with a lady like that too - never thougth it could be the phone set up. VERY IRRITATING.

 

[Pop Daddy]

is she sexy

 

[budbeerlady]

All the messages I left her in the future would be marked urgent. After a couple a day, she might get the hint?

 

[Bob Slydell]

It begs the question: If all of her messages are marked "urgent", doesn't that just make them all non-urgent anyways?