Tips for an Immature Virtual Meeting

The investors sat in stunned silence as the CFO explained how everything got all ducked up.

Well howdy everyone and good Monday night, Tuesday morning, or I-forgot-to-read-the-article-until-just-now o’clock to you. By now you’ve all seen your corporate standards for virtual meetings (and completed the mandatory training, right?). Perfect solutions if you want to display a professional image and make sure your audience sees you as a mature, responsible adult. But what if the situation calls for an unprofessional image? What if you’re just pretending to be an adult? For that you need:

Tips for an Immature Virtual Meeting

Let’s start easy and work our way up to the more advanced options:

Set up a funny hat day

• Wear a funny hat on the video call. Yes, it’s that simple. No, I didn’t “phone this one in”. Yes, it does count as advice. Man, tough crowd.

Backwards shirt day

• T-shirts don’t count (and who wears a t-shirt on a video call anyway? (Cue nervous fidgeting across the company))
• The first person to make a “Kris Kross will make you jump jump” joke gets promoted

Create and show off your new Finger Puppets

• Be sure to hold up your puppets close to the camera for a better forced perspective.
• Avoid putting the puppet on your middle finger when your boss is on the call.

Intern (Kid) toys make excellent props

• Who wouldn’t love seeing plastic dinosaurs that look like they’re about to bite you?
• Hold up an Elsa doll anytime someone just needs to let a topic go already.

Formal wear Friday

• Flip casual day on its head and break out those ties and complicated dresses.
• Better yet — only tell half of the attendees about the dress code so the other half is mortifyingly underdressed.

Conference Call Bingo

• Create your own conference call Bingo board that you can use with your team. Send me a message if you’d like a copy of a randomized Excel version to use. No cheating by setting up the speaker to say your phrases. We’re running a clean ridiculous game around here.

Choose a funny video background

Here are three of my favorites. Make your background reflect the HR-approved-version-of-your personality.

Last, but not least — Pig Latin Day

• What’s that you say? Think you’d do okay? Well, you just may.
• Again, only tell half of the audience about the theme and record the expression on everyone else’s face. Now you’ll know who else was a nerd growing up.

We’re all stuck at home viewing the same internal video calls with the same faces taking place in the same rooms day after day after day. Don’t your coworkers deserve a laugh? Don’t you? Embrace your inner whimsy and have fun (and try not to shout “BINGO” during the CEO’s town hall meeting).

-Philip