In recent years I’ve polled hundreds of people about their work in the digital age. Last week I wrote about what’s irritating to people about cellphones. This week, it’s what’s irritating about video?
When people:
-don’t acknowledge others on the other side of the monitor
-constantly look bored or continuously check their cell phone
-don’t speak up
-use cell phones to call which is usually a poorer connection
-join in late
-don’t set up pre-call arrangements and end up having to spend call time dealing with equipment or call setup issues
-invite too many people to get on the video
-have poor backlighting and contrast
-talk louder than necessary
-are not aware of their body language
-don’t smile
-have a background that is too busy or distracting
-on the other end start multi-tasking
-talk over others
-don’t mute their phone when appropriate
-move excessively in and out of view
-make statements like, “I know you probably can’t see this…” but then goes on to explain a graph or picture without giving details along with the point, i.e. “as you see here the numbers are…” versus “this graph shows a 30% growth rate”
-don’t pay attention, fidget with laptop and cell phones
-only speak to folks in the room not the people on the other side of the monitor too
-talk all over each other because of time delay
-are obviously having private side conversations
-don’t look at the camera; act stiffly around it
-shuffle papers noisily
-do not pay attention to personal appearance
-don’t operate the data systems correctly
-eat or drink while on the call
-use too much hand gesturing
Now that you are reminded, reframe from doing the above!
