Disastrous Teams meeting - is it as bad as I think?

[BoringSilentHill]

Name changed as work related.

important teams meeting. I’m sat on couch, suddenly my dog jumps up and rams her nose into my eye, my mic is off . I try to push dog away and she thinks I’m playing so starts wrestling with me. Big dog. I notice the talking has stopped and colleagues are half way between amused and horrified.

I manage to sort this one out and everything is back on track until DH suddenly starts belting out Rule Britannia - this time my mic is on and in his defence, he didn’t know I was on teams. It was because we watched the choir.

this is a new job / one week in. How bad is it really or am I overthinking it?

I bet you really cheered everyone up! If people work from home you can expect normal homely things to happen, surely?

It’s a bit unprofessional but I think it’s fine as a one off. As long as all other meetings are quiet and professional. I have meetings with clients from big companies where some people are clearly at a desk in their bedroom or in a quiet corner of a cafe so the sofa wouldn’t bother me. Pets also don’t bother me as long as not making noise. I probably would’ve laughed, but I don’t work in a serious field (if something like cancer research or child abuse then probably wouldn’t have laughed). Tell DH to shut the hell up for further meetings and it will be fine

The sitting on sofa would be a red flag for me

If @BoringSilentHill worked in a dedicated workspace with the door shut then her husband wouldn't have to worry about being quiet

I work in a really laid back company, we're all mostly remote, lots of teams calls with people in their scruffs, all quite relaxed. The odd child/ dog / cat/ husband has made an appearance.

I still think this would look pretty bad, especially first week in. It's more the sitting on the sofa thing. I have an office space at home but do fairly often sit on the sofa if I'm doing less intensive stuff (especially in the run up to Christmas, I wanted to look at my tree!), but if there's a meeting happening or I get a call I move quick sharpish to my desk or at least the kitchen table. DH also works from home and we're both sensitive/ aware of the fact the other might be on a call/ in a meeting. We all have a set background which helps.

I don't think it's a sackable offence but I'd be cringing and making plans to set up a suitable workspace, at least for meetings, and get your background blurred or set to something suitably neutral.

I’d be surprised if they heard your husband , my dog has gone crazy at the postman many times when my mic is on and when I’ve apologised people have said they didn’t hear anything. I’d just make a joke of it , tell them you’ve locked the dog in the kitchen and muzzled your DH

You need your own office space out of sight or earshot of other humans to WFH.

You and your husband might both work efficiently in shared office spaces when you go into the office, but there you only share with other people from the same company - so at home it has to be one company, one room.

Don't sweat it OP nobody was in the background making racist or misogynistic comments etc. I'd find your dog and DH quite funny tbh.

In the early days of lockdown my DH was in our lounge on a call with some head of investment or similar big cheese, I wasn't aware this call had started and I stubbed my toe very hard and yelled out the f word. Nobody really cared, apparently there were a few stifled laughs if anything.

Sorry OP but this really made me lol if nothing else you’ve brightened my rather dull morning hopefully they will just laugh it off

It was unprofessional of you, but you can’t change what has happened now. You can definitely make sure this doesn’t happen again by being in a room with the door shut, away from husband, dog and most other household noise. Never take an important teams or zoom call sitting on the sofa again!

And this is why people need to get back to the office.

Hilarious my old company would have loved all that!

Wondered how long it would be before someone piped up with this 🙄

That really made me laugh OP!

We all need some levity. Just try to minimise other crazy interruptions and it’ll be a thing of the past soon.

Although the time my colleague stood up on a zoom call to adjust his fan and accidentally flashed his white y-fronts just at the start of Covid will never ever stop being office lore 😂

I cannot believe there are people that have a problem with someone sitting on their own sofa. How a dare someone sit somewhere comfortable for a meeting.

Our divisional directors cat invaded a meeting the other week. They have a spare room but the door is being changed so it was difficult to keep the cat out. He had to go in the kitchen in the end. People would probably have an issue with that too.

As though we all have a home office.

There's Health & Safety regulations for working with screens. If you don't have somewhere suitable to sit that's an issue, regardless of how it comes across on calls.

It's one thing where these slip ups were in the early days of lockdown, or where someone is senior or has worked for a company for years and has built a reputation. A slip up there could be funny because it's so out of character. But this isn't.

This really

We would have found that really funny! We are professional but we're human first. Good luck in your new job OP, I think if they have a massive problem with something like this happening as a one off - you'll not want to stay there very long anyway.

And 'lots of people, including me' would think you were incredibly uptight and think you needed to remove the stick from your arse. So, y'know, we're all different.

OP, nobody would bat an eyelid if this happened on a Teams call where I work. If things like this happened in every meeting with you, then it might start to raise eyebrows, but not as a one-off.

Mumsnet is really weird about people WFH in general though.

I've done online meetings since before Covid (Goto meeting was awful) and for the most part I'm alone in my office as my desk.
No one can walk behind me thank goodness else I'm sure they would have done dozens of times. My husband has my calendar schedule and knows when I have regular meetings. I can message him on WhatsApp if he needs me during the meeting.

Get a desk and use that than crouching over a laptop on a coffee table.

Ha, PPs would have a fit if they could see me- I sit on my bed with the duvet over my legs to keep me warm all day at work, often with something on TV in the background.

It does depend entirely on your team or place of work.

I've recently changed teams within the same organisation. My previous team was very laidback, and no engagement with external clients. If DD was around (she rarely is, it's only occasionally that childcare falls through) she'd occasionally pop up and say hi and everyone would tell her how cute she was- which meant that me telling her not to do that went in one ear and out of the other as clearly everyone was happy to see her. They'd have been delighted to see your dog.

Then a couple of weeks ago she was sat in the same room as me happily occupied with some drawing when I unexpectedly had to jump on a very quick call with a client and she immediately came over and started trying to get into the camera frame. The client was understanding about it and we resolved the issue he had, but I was furious with her as she'd been told that things were different now and it looked unprofessional. She definitely won't do it again.

We use teams all the time. For an internal meeting, we would probably find it hilarious, an external meeting it's an absolute no.

That's right, no-one has ever suffered any kind of mishap or interruption or been distracted or unprofessional in an office. It's never happened once.

We should all have a home office, or other space that can be used similarly to an office, if choosing to work from home. Other household members being present is inappropriate as discussions that should be confidential will not be.

I would have found that really funny, don't worry about it.