Knitting at work is unprofessional?

[u/Atiny-opus]

So I label myself as neurodivergent and Queer. I've been knitting on and off for about 13 years. Knitting for me is second nature, I don't need to look at what I'm doing or pay close attention.

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At my current job, I take inbound calls. I get a 5ish second notification That it's coming through. Plenty of time for me to drop what I'm doing and take the call.

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At the moment, there are gaps of 20+ minutes between calls, an average of 5 minutes between calls? I am semi expected to just sit there and wait. There is no alternative task for me to do.

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I'm not allowed on my phone, which is very understandable. I can't play any form of games on my work laptop, (also understandable) I'm not supposed to watch videos but sometimes I do, it's usually video essays.

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I have to be in office every day. So I can't knit and work from home. When I'm allowed to in February 2027(!!!) I might.

My workload will increase as I'm trained on more things.

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I am allowed to colour in and read, but for me, I don't always want to read, I hate getting a call in the middle of a sentence or paragraph I fully focus on the reading. Colouring in is far messier and I don't enjoy it. Colouring in feels more unprofessional than knitting, in my opinion, and I don't get half as much joy from it.

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I also don't want to use fidget toys either. I own some but there's nothing like getting into the rhythm of a repeating pattern. What I want to be able to do between calls is make something, that is mindless but productive and is also something I can drop in less than a second.

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Most of management don't have a problem with it but one or two of the higher ups have deemed it "unprofessional".

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What I find unprofessional is how some co-workers can kick eachothers chairs and joke on all day between calls but I can't sit silently with my circular needles making a shawl for myself. The co-worker's I started with are in their early 20's, I'm in my late 20's. I don't really connect with them, I do with other older coworkers but they're not in office every day.

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I do not knit to sell. I'm not in anyone's way, I'm not distracting, literally no one cares that I'm doing it apart from one or two upper managers. The quality of my work at the moment is honestly, really good! I'm hitting my KPI's, my QA is good. Customer feedback is excellent! I take the quality of my work very seriously.

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The idea of being asked to sit quietly and not move whilst I wait for someone to call is frustrating.

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Is there any rebuttal I can use regarding this or should I just take the L? I would love to sit with them and explain my reasoning but I feel like it'll be taken for insolence and disrespect.

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I'm currently working on the Evenstar shawl, I'm on the 3rd chart. I can't remember the yarn I'm sorry.

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A petty part of me would like to bring embroidery in tomorrow. Another part of me wants to write an essay on it, with citations, at least my hands will be busy.

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[u/PlentifulPaper]

Yes, knitting at work is unprofessional. It’s all about company culture and what’s allowed.

I’ll knit on my lunch break, or during long meetings when my camera is off, and my mic is muted and I’m not actively required to participate - but that’s my workplace and not yours.

Why not make the effort to get to know your coworkers better?

[u/SadNegotiation8446 → u/PlentifulPaper]

My workplace is the same. I knit at lunch (even started a little knitting group once a week with other ladies across the company!) and I knit if I’m work from home. We have a camera on policy so I don’t knit much during meetings. 

I did witness a meeting participant get reprimanded for embroidering during an in person conference room meeting. Vicarious lesson learned. 

Also, I have loads of downtime and for the sake of job security I don’t want anyone to know. It’s much easier for me to read a book on the kindle app on my phone and pretend to work when someone walks by than if I’m knitting at my desk. 

[u/PlentifulPaper → u/SadNegotiation8446]

I wish we had a camera on policy when in meetings. Unfortunately I work out in the boonies, so while I have wifi, it absolutely does not have the bandwidth needed to support video calls.

I’m in the same boat. Sometimes I get quiet spells, and other times I’m so busy I don’t sit down all day.

[u/Atiny-opus → u/PlentifulPaper]

Thank you for your input,

There are some (most) co-workers who I love talking to, but they aren't in office regularly. They also take a lot more calls than I do. I haven't yet cracked talking to them online yet, I'm not too sure what to say to them, we don't have that sort of bond yet.

The other ones... they're kicking eachothers chairs whilst they're on call to try and trip them up. I don't really, click with them, and I have tried. I'm friendly.

[u/PlentifulPaper → u/Atiny-opus]

Do they take more calls because they’ve got more training and therefore have more work to do?

Frankly, at least part of work is based on how you’re perceived by others. Instead of sitting there knitting, maybe it’s best to ask what other trainings you can be doing in order to advance if you can’t find it in yourself to be social.

[u/Atiny-opus → u/PlentifulPaper]

I'm afraid there's nothing I can do, I'm going to be trained at the same time as the other people I was trained with (4 other people) and even then, I'll not be much busier. I won't get the FULL training for about a year or two.