I don't believe that ambient information ruins productivity. At least for me, the problem is noise, not signal.
I've spent quite a while working in spaces where the space is devoted to a team. If people are having quiet, focused discussions about what we're all focused on, I rarely find that distracting. The thing that drives me bonkers is when people are having loud, emotional, or off-topic conversations. Then part of my brain wanders off to process it and the rest is compelled to follow.
I also think Slack is rarely a good solution to trying to avoid interruption. If I turn it off for a few hours of coding, I'm far too late to participate. And if I leave it on, there are distractions right there on my screen. There's no way to overhear the useful bits and let the rest go; it requires full visual attention to process. The workplaces where I've felt least effective are the ones with big IM cultures.
I've spent quite a while working in spaces where the space is devoted to a team. If people are having quiet, focused discussions about what we're all focused on, I rarely find that distracting. The thing that drives me bonkers is when people are having loud, emotional, or off-topic conversations. Then part of my brain wanders off to process it and the rest is compelled to follow.
While I'm not good at tuning out any kind of noise, I'd say I'm pretty much the opposite, in that an argument about football or (building) architecture is easier to work through than a "team" conversation that I'm reasonably sure isn't pertinent but contains enough relevant keywords to keep pinging me for attention. My point is that distraction is such a personal thing that the only way to mitigate it is to give individuals a fair bit of control over their environments.
Yes, IM can be a horrible distraction too. If you've got a question that needs some thought from everyone -- as opposed to chatter or ephemeral questions -- then truly asynchronous communication (yes, e-mail...) is probably a better bet.
Could the difference here be that you're in environment where team boundaries are poorly drawn? To me, a team is a group of people who are playing the same game, who win and lose together.
Often I see "team" mean to use something much hazier, like "group of people with same skills" (e.g., design team) or "group of people in the same office". But I mean it more like "basketball team" or "soccer team".
In that environment, there is no team conversation that isn't pertinent, because we're all working to the same goal, and we're all jointly responsible for the same outcome.
That isn't to say that team members shouldn't work to be respectful. E.g., a team conversation over by the whiteboard is easier to let pass by than one where people are standing right behind me. But if we're on the same team, their problems are (eventually) my problems. I'd rather know sooner than later.
100x yes, I think people are often conflating "background conversations" to all be the same thing. I feel bad for people who work in offices where people are so inconsiderate that they start yakking about their kid's baseball game behind some software engineer trying to get some shit done. Or where a topic becomes heated or emotional and they don't take it elsewhere. But rich, constructive conversations that are happening about the work but possibly tangential to the concrete task that that engineer is doing can be immensely valuable in so many ways.
You are right about Slack, but I find most people aren't immediately responding to it so I'm hoping they've turned off notifications and just check it like email most times. Or they use it's Do Not Disturb feature when they need to focus.
I've spent quite a while working in spaces where the space is devoted to a team. If people are having quiet, focused discussions about what we're all focused on, I rarely find that distracting. The thing that drives me bonkers is when people are having loud, emotional, or off-topic conversations. Then part of my brain wanders off to process it and the rest is compelled to follow.
I also think Slack is rarely a good solution to trying to avoid interruption. If I turn it off for a few hours of coding, I'm far too late to participate. And if I leave it on, there are distractions right there on my screen. There's no way to overhear the useful bits and let the rest go; it requires full visual attention to process. The workplaces where I've felt least effective are the ones with big IM cultures.