With the sudden switch from working in the office to working from home, no one ever really got taught the exact way to use online meeting tools. From the get go it has been a guessing game from how to invite someone to a meeting to how to share your screen – it’s a constant learning lesson. Here’s some of the Humpday Headaches that we have battled against during our time in virtual meetings
Internet problems
You’re sailing away having a productive day completing tasks and BAM, everything stops. You shake your head and think no, not now, not today! Your clicking gets a little more frantic and still nothing is happening. You look outside to see a bunch of builders “Oh don’t worry love it’ll only be off for the next couple of hours” – Not sure if you know but the entirety of the population is working from home?! Looks like you’ll be hotspotting and draining your data until you’re back online, typical!
Still no internet and I have an online meeting in 3 hours 🙂
— Capu (@CapuOsu) April 28, 2020
Can you see my screen?
With face to face interaction out of the question, screen sharing has become the new norm for collating ideas, delivering training or even presenting the weekly team quiz. It’s a simple concept, yet somehow causes so many problems?
It’s Monday morning, your boss has a quick task for you but it’s not something you’ve done before and he needs to run through the motions with you. You both jump onto a Zoom call thinking it will last 5 minutes and you’ll be set to go. But wait, he’s adamant he’s shared his screen with you but all you can see is his face still… “I can only see you Darren…’, but he insists he’s pressed the right button. After fumbling about for a minute he triumphantly says ‘AH there you go Alex!’, but now all you can see is black.. Another minute of rustling and up pops a YouTube video titled ‘15 Abnormally Large Animals That Actually Exist’. Each to their own Darren…
What seems like forever later and you can finally see his screen, for him to show you how to drag and drop a file into the centralised management system. Something that takes all of 30 seconds and you could have easily worked out yourself! Well at least we are learning…
To mute or not to mute?
There’s never a meeting where everyone gets their mute buttons on the correct setting! Even worse it’s the most formal meeting with the top bosses and everyone has their time to shine. Suddenly, Tim’s screen highlights itself, but wait he’s discussing his delicious lunch plans with his wife… NOO Tim press mute press mute!! Everyone looks shocked and Tim’s none the wiser. In about five minutes you’ll see his face goes red as he realises and finally clicks over to mute.
Now it’s Gemma’s turn to deliver her information and nothing is happening… she’s sat jabbering away and no one can hear her. People start telling her to unmute her microphone but nothing.. Well done Gem, I bet your dogs loved your presentation.
Turn on your camera!
It’s one of those days, you’ve quickly got out of bed and shoved on your scruffy dressing gown to start up your computer. Oh no it’s the dreaded Microsoft Teams call sound, the meeting you completely forgot about – not on the only day you didn’t shower! It’s okay, you can answer without sharing your camera right? Oh no you guessed wrong, everyone is sitting there coffee in hand, smiling from ear to ear as if they have been awake for hours! “Steven come on turn on your camera”, “My Microsoft Teams is playing up sorry, it’s not working”. You got away with it this time, but looks like you can never use that excuse again! NTS: Remember which day the early morning meeting is!
if my camera in the zoom meeting is tilted up and u can only see the top of my head it means im rockin out in my pink puppy pyjamas
— Chel (commissions closed) (@ChelmiAboutIt) August 31, 2020
You’ve frozen!
After many virtual meeting mishaps, you’re convinced you’ve cracked it and nothing can go wrong. It’s Friday, you’re feeling good and you’re all set up for your 11am meeting. Everyone gets logged on and you begin to lead the presentation of some key statistics from the week. You start feeling smug about how smoothly it’s going, but then you ask a question to your colleagues and get no response.. Unusual, considering they’re normally big talkers. Next thing, the meeting chat pings. “Olivia, you’ve frozen!!! We can’t see or hear you!! Can you start from the top?” Could they not have warned you straight away, rather than wait until you’re 5 minutes deep into the best delivery of your life? Oh well, we’ll try again next week…
