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I would like to know what is the consensus regarding etiquette on contacting coworkers outside work hours, for example in the evening on a work night (Mon-Fri). If one is working collaboratively on a project and is communicating project related information, without which risks the project being completed late or diverted, how should an employee go about the contact? The team is small, with under 10 team members. No company policy explicitly addresses matters such as this. IM is frequently used among members at work.

Several members have remote access to company intranet. Within the team, contact information is available to all with each persons company's email being used.

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    "Call outs" should be reserved for time-critical issues, and unless someone is explicitly on call with a documented procedure for handling this ONLY a manager should make that call.... or you should call the manager and have them handle it or direct you to do so. If it can wait until tomorrow, leave them alone unless they're already signed in to their company account and thus can reasonably be presumed to be working... unless they're someone you'd feel comfortable calling with a purely personal question, and even then obviously don't do it often.
    – keshlam
    Mar 5, 2015 at 2:53
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    If a person has gone home for the day, then respect that unless it is something wrong on production that must be fixed immediately. It is rude to call people who are not at work because you want to work late. It is also a bad idea to work late unless the issue is critical and must be delivered today.
    – HLGEM
    Mar 5, 2015 at 5:30
  • You should not except for very urgent and critical issues.
    – user67275
    Aug 30, 2020 at 4:26

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If one is working collaboratively on a project and is communicating project related information, without which risks the project being completed late or diverted, how should an employee go about the contact?

Context is key here. Every company is different. Every project is different.

This is something you should specifically address with the team (during an in-office meeting).

In some companies, the culture is such that after-hours communication about work happens frequently. In several startups where I have worked, this was the case.

In other companies, it would be very unusual (and perhaps considered odd), for work communications to occur after hours.

In many companies, critical projects occur once in a while. The teams may decide that the project is so critical, that after-hours work is expected. Such teams often establish a protocol (either formal or informal) for communicating among team members.

In my current company, after-hours discussions are not the norm. Here, if there is a "production emergency" people are paged or called - but seldom otherwise.

If you bring up the subject ("Should people be calling each other after hours about Project X?") at work, you'll soon learn your company's expectations.

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Unless something is burning or you have explicitly been informed that it's expected to be available outside of business hours don't contact your coworkers outside of business hours.

If you have concerns about the project being late, bring it up with management and actively try to identify solutions.

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If it is an actual emergency: call, and compensate. This should rarely occur

If not: it seems like you already have communication channels for work questions (IM, email, and so on). These are perfect for sending out a question which would require the recipient to make a conscious choice to be "at work", for example checking the email. You've then left it up to them to decide

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