Since CoVid moved everyone to working from home, my husband has become my co-worker. We now share an office that is also our living room. I’ve had the benefit of overhearing his virtual meetings. He works in IT sales for a large corporation that shall not be named.
Listening to his calls has been a bit like studying a new culture in the wild.
I work with mostly creative teams and we speak a different language. It’s been fun to overhear a large fortune 500 company do business. I am learning a lot.
A few things are glaringly clear:
No one knows what they are doing. No one knows how to engage a virtual workforce. Leadership has overworked their teams by setting up multiple hours of trainings, virtual meetings, virtual happy hours and “busy work.” That causes extra hours fitting in real work around the chaotic schedule.
No one knows how to engage new customers. Sales and Marketing strategies are all turned on their head. Teams are scrambling to catch up and are working overtime to adjust.
Agendas are important. Meetings without a clear goal or structure are sucking up valuable work time.
You need a host. Virtual networking events also need structure. The best ones had a host leading questions and people toward connections.
Competing for screen time with new clients is hard. If a strong digital strategy wasn’t in place before, this has put teams into a tail spin. His teams are racing to put together ways to complete with digital attention.
Phone Calls are the new thing. It’s old school but finding that a good old conference call is more refreshing than a virtual chat. I get it right? Being “on,” all the time is exhausting.
Artists and Entertainers have an advantage. My hubby happens to be a talented musician. He’s had more interaction with potential clients through playing music in virtual meetings. People are hungry for humor, light, music and anything that uplifts teams. The best meetings I have overheard are those lead by the artists with creative solutions for interaction and enjoyment.
No one is planning for mental health. In this space, intentional breaks for inspiration are going to be more important than bogging a work force down with training. It’s crazy to overhear meeting after meeting of a workforce that is stressed out. Screen Fatigue is real. I’ve overheard people saying they have returned to analog reading as a break from the stress of reading screens.
We are all in this together and there is so much learning happening in our virtual spaces. My hope that it changes the American workforce for the better; but so far it seems to be “business as usual.” Where work bleeds into all the spaces of your life and it’s up to us to set boundaries.
The reality is, we are all in uncharted waters. This is survival.
If we all make it out of this healthy with minimal losses, we have done our work. With many people unemployed, we should count ourselves as lucky to still have meetings to conduct. That shouldn’t be cause for panic. So take a collective deep breath and step back. We’ll figure this out. In the meantime, have some fun and don’t be afraid to play with one another. A laugh is the best medicine in your corporate meetings. So put on that mullet wig and make your co-workers and potential clients laugh. Like this:
