Interrupted at Work? Exploring Employee Responses to Work Interruptions

Abstract

The current research sheds light on a crucial aspect of the work interruption experience: how interruptees respond when interrupted. Work interruptions are a ubiquitous and pervasive stressor in contemporary workplaces. Conventionally regarded as detrimental, emerging evidence suggests that work interruptions can also yield positive employee and work-related outcomes. Guided by Affective Events Theory, the current study adopted a qualitative approach to explore how employees respond to work interruptions and the related impacts on their well-being, work performance, and experience. Thematic analysis of 30 in-depth interviews revealed three novel employee responses: accepting, rejecting, and tangling. This study challenges the prevailing assumption that work interruptions are uniformly harmful, demonstrating that they can produce both positive and negative outcomes depending on how employees respond. By identifying accepting, rejecting, and tangling, it highlights the active, agentic role of interruptees in shaping emotional, well-being and performance consequences, including extended post-event cognitive processes. Using an episodic qualitative approach, the research captures the lived experience of interruptions and explains why outcomes differ across contexts. Overall, it advances interruption research by offering a balanced perspective on outcomes, recognising employee agency, and employing a rich methodological lens to provide a nuanced understanding of interruption dynamics in contemporary work settings.